2 Dec
2008
2 Dec
'08
11:48 a.m.
On 2 Dec 2008 at 5:14, Bob Armstrong wrote:
The goal was never to be vintage hardware - only to
be a useful accessory
for vintage hardware, and easy for other hobbyists to build and copy. VGA
monitors and PS/2 keyboards are cheap, about as common as dirt, and you can
find them anywhere these days. They're about the only practical choice for
such a project.
As long as this isn't a "vintage" project, why not add a few useful
bells and whistles? For example, one of the reasons that I like a
PeeCee as a debugging terminal is because I can scroll back hundreds
of lines to see what I did, or even save the particular segment long
after it's occurred. The ability to set bookmarks and split-screen
history with current output would be very useful. As would being
able to freeze and save history across power cycles.
The cost motivation that dictated the features of the original
VT100/VT220 no longer apply. The cost difference between 128Kx8 and
512Kx8 SRAM, for example, is negligible today. Using a Z80 today
would seem to be a quaint anachronism where there are so many fine
(and power-miserly) microcontrollers available.
But then, I find the little HP ePCs to come the closest (e.g. they
take a keyboard and VGA display and are small) to what you're
proposing. Replacing the hard disk in those things with flash makes
for a very light pacakge. Pulling the CD-ROM drive out would make it
lighter still.
Cheers,
Chuck