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Table of Contents
Simple80, a simple Z80 SBC with no glue logic
Introduction
This design was inspired by low-cost Z80 kit listed on eBay. The motivation is to build a CP/M-ready, RC2014-compatible Z80 SBC with part cost of about $20.
Features
- Z80 at 7.3728MHz
- Dual serial port SIO
- 128K RAM
- 64K PROM or EEPROM
- Three classic RC2014 expansion connectors
- 100mm X 100mm pc board
- No glue logic design
Theory of operation
This is a classical microprocessor design with CPU, I/O, RAM and ROM but with one unusual feature: To keep the part count at minimal, both RAM and ROM are chip selected when Z80 is accessing the memory space. To boot up, only ROM's output enable is asserted at reset; In this mode RAM is selected but write-only; the ROM firmware writes its code into its original locations; this unusual operation does not affect the read-only ROM, but duplicate the ROM program into the write-only RAM. When the copying is done, the firmware enable the RAM's output enable and disable ROM's output enable so now the program is running in RAM.
Design Information
Schematic of Simple80 Motherboard
PC board Gerber files of Simple80 motherboard. The pc boards were made by JLCPCB
Bill of Materials for Simple80
Schematic of SimpleCF, a simple compact flash interface for Simple80
PC board Gerber files of SimpleCF, a simple compact flash interface for Simple80
Bill of Materials for SimpleCF
Software
Simple80 Monitor, a basic monitor for Simple80. Use this monitor to initialize CF disk and load CP/M2.2 BIOS/CCP/BDOS.
SCMonitor for Simple80. This is Steve Cousin's SCMonitor ported to Simple80. Startrek program is included in this port. To run Startrek, type 'wbasic' followed by 'run'.
CP/M2.2 for Simple80. This is the BIOS/CCP/BDOS ported to Simple80.