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FM-7
The FM-7 ("Fujitsu Micro 7") is a home computer created by Fujitsu. It was first released in 1982 and was sold in Japan and Spain. It is a stripped-down version of Fujitsu's earlier FM-8 computer, and during development it was referred to as the "FM-8 Jr.". Although it was designed to be a cut-down version of the FM-8 (with the FM-7 costing 126,000 yen, compared to 218,000 yen for the FM-8), most notably removing the (expensive) bubble memory technology, the FM-7 was given a more advanced AY-3-8910 sound chip capable of three voice sound synthesis, leading to a strong uptake among the hobbyist computer market in Japan and making it a more popular system than the FM-8. The FM-7 primarily competed with the NEC PC-8801 and Sharp X1 series of computers in the early 1980s. It was succeeded by the FM-77 series of computers in 1984, which featured backwards compatibility with the FM-7. The FM-77 series was later succeeded by the 32-bit FM Towns in 1989. The FM-7 is based around t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
FM-8
The FM-8 (Fujitsu Micro 8) is a personal computer developed and manufactured by Fujitsu in May 1981. It was Fujitsu's second microcomputer released to the public after the LKIT-8 kit computer, and the first in the "FM" series. The FM-8 was an early adopter of bubble memory technology. The FM-8 would later be replaced by two new models in November 1982 – the FM-11, aimed at businesses and the FM-7 aimed at the mass market. Emulator The computer is emulated by MESS. Reception In an evaluation of six Japanese computers, ''BYTE'' in 1982 approved of the FM-8's BASIC tutorial and other manuals. See also * FM-7 * FM-11 * * * * FM Towns The is a Japanese personal computer built by Fujitsu from 1989 to 1997. It started as a proprietary PC variant intended for multimedia applications and PC games, but later became more compatible with IBM PC compatibles. In 1993, the FM Towns ... * References 6809-based home computers Computer-related introductions in 1981 Ho ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Motorola 6809
The Motorola 6809 ("''sixty-eight-oh-nine''") is an 8-bit microprocessor with some 16-bit features. It was designed by Motorola's Terry Ritter and Joel Boney and introduced in 1978. Although source compatible with the earlier Motorola 6800, the 6809 offered significant improvements over it and 8-bit contemporaries like the MOS Technology 6502, including a hardware multiplication instruction, 16-bit arithmetic, system and user stack registers allowing re-entrant code, improved interrupts, position-independent code, and an orthogonal instruction set architecture with a comprehensive set of addressing modes. The 6809 was among the most powerful 8-bit processors of its era. It was also among the most expensive; in 1981 single-unit quantities were compared to for a Zilog Z80 and for a 6502. It was launched when a new generation of 16-bit processors were coming to market, like the Intel 8086, and 32-bit designs were on the horizon, including Motorola's own 68000. It was not feature ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
FM Towns
The is a Japanese personal computer built by Fujitsu from 1989 to 1997. It started as a proprietary PC variant intended for multimedia applications and PC games, but later became more compatible with IBM PC compatibles. In 1993, the FM Towns Marty was released; it is a game console compatible with existing FM Towns games. The "FM" part of the name means "Fujitsu Micro" like their earlier products, while the "Towns" part is derived from the code name the system was assigned while in development, "Townes". This refers to Charles Townes, one of the winners of the 1964 Nobel Prize in Physics, following a custom of Fujitsu at the time to code name PC products after Nobel Prize winners. The e in "Townes" was dropped when the system went into production to make it clearer that the term was to be pronounced like the word "towns" rather than the potential "tow-nes". History Fujitsu decided to release a new home computer after the FM-7 was technologically overcome by NEC's PC- ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
OS-9
OS-9 is a family of real-time, process-based, multitasking, multi-user operating systems, developed in the 1980s, originally by Microware Systems Corporation for the Motorola 6809 microprocessor. It was purchased by Radisys Corp in 2001, and was purchased again in 2013 by its current owner Microware LP. The OS-9 family was popular for general-purpose computing and remains in use in commercial embedded systems and amongst hobbyists. Today, OS-9 is a product name used by both a Motorola 68000-series machine language OS and a portable (PowerPC, x86, ARM, MIPS, SH4, etc.) version written in C, originally known as OS-9000. History The first version ("OS-9 Level One"), which dates back to 1979–1980, was written in assembly language for the Motorola 6809 CPU, and all of its processes ran within the 64KB address space of the CPU without a memory management unit. It was developed as a supporting operating system for the BASIC09 project, contracted for by Motorola as part ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
NEC PC-8801
The , commonly shortened to PC-88, are a brand of Zilog Z80-based 8-bit home computers released by Nippon Electric Company (NEC) in 1981 and primarily sold in Japan. The PC-8800 series sold extremely well and became one of the four major Japanese home computers of the 1980s, along with the Fujitsu FM-7, Sharp X1 and the MSX computers. It was later eclipsed by NEC's 16-bit PC-9800 series, although it still maintained strong sales up until the early 1990s. NEC's American subsidiary, NEC Home Electronics (USA), marketed variations of the PC-8800 in the United States and Canada. History Nippon Electric's Microcomputer Sales Section of the Electronic Device Sales Division launched the PC-8001 in September 1979, and by 1981 it consisted of 40% of the Japanese personal computer market. In April 1981, Nippon Electric decided to expand personal computer lines into three groups: New Nippon Electric, Information Processing Group and Electronic Devices Group, with each specializing in a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
YM2203
The YM2203, a.k.a. OPN (FM Operator Type-N), is a six-channel (3 FM and 3 SSG) sound chip developed by Yamaha. It was the progenitor of Yamaha's OPN family of FM synthesis chips used in many video game and computer systems throughout the 1980s and early 1990s. It was used in a variety of NEC computers, along with various arcade game machines. The YM2203 has the following features: *Three concurrent FM synthesis channels (voices) *Four operators per channel *Two interval timers *For channel three, operator frequencies can be set independently, making dissonant harmonics possible. (Normally, they would have a simple relation like e.g. 2× or 3× relative to a common base frequency) *Internal implementation of Yamaha's YM2149F SSG chip The YM2203 and the rest of the OPN synthesizer family generate sound via frequency-modulated digital sine waves. It included 12 operator "cells", each generating a 13-bit sine wave at a programmable frequency, the volume of which is controlled ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
AY-3-8910
The AY-3-8910 is a 3-voice programmable sound generator (PSG) designed by General Instrument (GI) in 1978, initially for use with their 16-bit CP1610 or one of the PIC1650 series of 8-bit microcomputers. The AY-3-8910 and its variants were used in many arcade games—Konami's ''Gyruss'' contains five—and Bally pinball machines as well as being the sound chip in the Intellivision and Vectrex video game consoles, and the Amstrad CPC, Oric-1, Colour Genie, Elektor TV Games Computer, MSX, Tiki 100 and later ZX Spectrum home computers. It was also used in the Mockingboard and Cricket sound cards for the Apple II and the Speech/Sound Cartridge for the TRS-80 Color Computer. After GI's spinoff of Microchip Technology in 1987, the chip was sold for a few years under the Microchip brand. It was also manufactured under license by Yamaha (with a selectable clock divider pin and a double-resolution and double-rate volume envelope table) as the YM2149F; the Atari ST uses thi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Home Computer
Home computers were a class of microcomputers that entered the market in 1977 and became common during the 1980s. They were marketed to consumers as affordable and accessible computers that, for the first time, were intended for the use of a single, non-technical user. These computers were a distinct market segment that typically cost much less than business, scientific, or engineering-oriented computers of the time, such as those running CP/M or the IBM PC, and were generally less powerful in terms of computer memory, memory and expandability. However, a home computer often had better video display controller, graphics and sound than contemporary business computers. Their most common uses were word processing, playing video games, and computer programming, programming. Home computers were usually sold already manufactured in stylish metal or plastic enclosures. However, some home computers also came as commercial electronic kits, like the ZX80, Sinclair ZX80, which were both h ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Random Access Memory
Random-access memory (RAM; ) is a form of electronic computer memory that can be read and changed in any order, typically used to store working data and machine code. A random-access memory device allows data items to be read or written in almost the same amount of time irrespective of the physical location of data inside the memory, in contrast with other direct-access data storage media (such as hard disks and magnetic tape), where the time required to read and write data items varies significantly depending on their physical locations on the recording medium, due to mechanical limitations such as media rotation speeds and arm movement. In today's technology, random-access memory takes the form of integrated circuit (IC) chips with MOS (metal–oxide–semiconductor) memory cells. RAM is normally associated with volatile types of memory where stored information is lost if power is removed. The two main types of volatile random-access semiconductor memory are static ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kilobyte
The kilobyte is a multiple of the unit byte for Computer data storage, digital information. The International System of Units (SI) defines the prefix ''kilo-, kilo'' as a multiplication factor of 1000 (103); therefore, one kilobyte is 1000 bytes.International Standard IEC 80000-13 Quantities and Units – Part 13: Information science and technology, International Electrotechnical Commission (2008). The internationally recommended unit symbol for the kilobyte is kB. In some areas of information technology, particularly in reference to random-access memory capacity, ''kilobyte'' instead often refers to 1024 (210) bytes. This arises from the prevalence of sizes that are powers of two in modern digital memory architectures, coupled with the coincidence that 210 differs from 103 by less than 2.5%. The kibibyte is defined as 1024 bytes, avoiding the ambiguity issues of the ''kilobyte''.International Standard IEC 80000-13 Quantities and Units – Part 13: Information scien ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Computer Storage
Computer data storage or digital data storage is a technology consisting of computer components and Data storage, recording media that are used to retain digital data. It is a core function and fundamental component of computers. The central processing unit (CPU) of a computer is what manipulates data by performing computations. In practice, almost all computers use a storage hierarchy, which puts fast but expensive and small storage options close to the CPU and slower but less expensive and larger options further away. Generally, the fast technologies are referred to as "memory", while slower persistent technologies are referred to as "storage". Even the first computer designs, Charles Babbage's Analytical Engine and Percy Ludgate's Analytical Machine, clearly distinguished between processing and memory (Babbage stored numbers as rotations of gears, while Ludgate stored numbers as displacements of rods in shuttles). This distinction was extended in the Von Neumann archite ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Central Processing Unit
A central processing unit (CPU), also called a central processor, main processor, or just processor, is the primary Processor (computing), processor in a given computer. Its electronic circuitry executes Instruction (computing), instructions of a computer program, such as arithmetic, logic, controlling, and input/output (I/O) operations. This role contrasts with that of external components, such as main memory and I/O circuitry, and specialized coprocessors such as graphics processing units (GPUs). The form, CPU design, design, and implementation of CPUs have changed over time, but their fundamental operation remains almost unchanged. Principal components of a CPU include the arithmetic–logic unit (ALU) that performs arithmetic operation, arithmetic and Bitwise operation, logic operations, processor registers that supply operands to the ALU and store the results of ALU operations, and a control unit that orchestrates the #Fetch, fetching (from memory), #Decode, decoding and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
