24 Aug
2006
24 Aug
'06
2:12 p.m.
Chuck Guzis wrote:
I can't honestly admit that I feel any sort of
affinity for the Intel x8x
(including the Z80), even though I've had tons of low-level programming
time on the entire family. The processor family, right from the 8008,
always seemed to introduce capabilities through an agglutinative process
rather than through revolutionary design. I give Moto a lot of credit for
rethinking their processor architecture periodically. The question as to
what it got them competitively is a whole different matter.
Well, the other choice at the time was the 68000. 32-bit registers,
yes, but it had goofy quirks all its own (didn't you halt the CPU if you
attempted to read memory not on word boundaries or something?
--
Jim Leonard (trixter at oldskool.org) http://www.oldskool.org/
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