Ben Eater 8 bit computer , Modular PCB version

This is my implementation of Ben Eater's 8 Bit Computer (SAP) on PCB. I have designed it in modules close to the original design. I have the source files for Easy EDA but they are outdated and need some work to be updated. So for now please have a look and enjoy.

[philipacovington]

Cool! I got my FPGA version running which implements either the Ben Eater 8 bit computer or the 6502 computer he is currently doing. Now I am now designing my own 16 CPU and compiler (which is written in Python).

[slu]

Hi Config IOI, thanks for sharing your very clean and modular SAP design. And thanks a lot for mentioning my 'Minimal CPU System' at the end of your video as your upcoming project. Can't wait to see your "modularized" - and probably LED-ified(?) - version of it. Let me know how things are evolving :-)

[BigJasonWebb]

Very cool to see the computer like this. You are inspiring sir.

[your_utube]

This is a good start to prepare for starting something like what James Sharman has created, with his pipelined cpu. I would recommend his channel next. Very worth watching!

[LunarRunner]

Awesome work! I had the same idea, but my project fizzled. It's great to see this up and running. Kudos!!!!

[sjair]

That looks pretty neat. It’s taken me since the beginning of April to get to the control logic circuit. I can’t imagine how long it took you to design that. Great job

[davidbayer]

Random hardware errors. Add more capacitors to your boards. When you look at commercial boards from the 80's and 70's you will see a ratio of one capacitor per discrete component. It looks like you have one capacitor per board. Random hardware errors happen when two or more IC's switch (change state) at the same time. IC's switching puts stain on the power bus and the power source. Your power capacitors probably are under valued, adding more smaller capacitors at each IC will compensate for this. This type of problem appear totally random. Also each board should have an electrolytic capacitor on it's power input. Other wise the back plane should have a few electrolytic capacitors distributed at different locations. Adding a one to one capacitors ratio to your boards will solve your problem. Watch some videos showing vintage computer hardware. This is what your duplicating. You will see many more capacitors on the boards. Search for SWTP 6800 computer review videos. Good luck.

[EUPThatsMe]

This looks like it would make a good kit - maybe you and Ben could team up. Ben's videos inspired me to build my own CISC 8 bit processor using Logisim Evolution. So far it is only a simulation but it could be built with standard parts.

[robinkarpeta]

Very impressive! I followed Ben's project and did get the whole thing working (After about 6 months!). But I stored it away and now it does not work. So I'm very interested in your PCB version. I think it makes a great display project. Well done!!

[rubixsolution]

Nice! I bought the RC2014 pro kit because of my Z80 upbringing, but I love the spirit of your modular boards

[alexgian]

Brilliant work, well done!
So many different takes on Ben Eater's project and other basic computers in general... It's all a bit like a mini Renaissance, isn't it?

[inerlogic]

I have a stack of PCBs that mirror breadboard layout and i thought about building Ben's kit onto those.
This is a cleaner design for sure, when the boards are all set i'be interested in having a set made...
Rather than use headers i'd probably solder wires and mount the thing in a frame to hang on my wall...

[CaptZenPetabyte]

Brilliant project. Love this! Looking at one of a number of Z80 based 8bit 'modern' computer board kits.

[derekchristenson]

Very cool! Be sure to update when you have the design files updated. 🙂

[goupigoupi]

I'm trying to complicate my life by using a 4 bit data bus and a 8 bit address bus, which means that the 2 halves of the address need to be transmitted separately and reconstructed before accessing the memory. I gave up on using breadboards but it's way too early to do PCB, so I settled for wire wrapping which is incredibly fun, reliable and fast (once you get the hang of it).

[Nebulorum]

Love the project. I had the same idea but not the follow through. Super nice.

[sinjhguddu]

Thinking about the brain power that went into this marvel gets my head to begin a quick shut down. Bravo!

[Cherijo]

I have two suggestions that are minor nitpicks, which mostly come from my experience with older PCs and backplanes.

1- I would strongly suggest putting the power rails on the backplane rather than the clock board. That would make it easier to experiment with other clock options, as well as streamline the power pull of the system more evenly.
2- Swap the female and male headers on the bus board connections. Since the downward headers are reversed, it should use an opposing connector. The bus board being the same as the modules also means it's consistent which jumper connector type is used if a module is removed.

Those are just minor nitpicks. Overall the idea is well thought out!

[jsmythib]

Beautiful build. I spent several weeks working on board layouts and a card system for similar. I ended up adding some addressing bit/schemes and buried myself in production lol :) As a kit I betcha you could sell a bunch. Looks like a great open ended layout.

[andybrown]

Have plans in the work for a PCB version as well, with mods.