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Zilog Z80
The Zilog Z80 is an 8-bit microprocessor designed by Zilog that played an important role in the evolution of early computing. Software-compatible with the Intel 8080, it offered a compelling alternative due to its better integration and increased performance. The Z80 boasted fourteen registers compared to the 8080's seven, along with additional instructions for bit manipulation, making it a more powerful chip. Initially intended for use in embedded systems like the 8080, the Z80's combination of compatibility, affordability, and superior performance propelled it to widespread adoption in video game systems and home computers during the late 1970s and early 1980s, fueling the personal computing revolution. The Z80 was the brainchild of Federico Faggin, a key figure behind the creation of the Intel 8080. After leaving Intel in 1974, Faggin co-founded Zilog with Masatoshi Shima. The Z80 was released in July 1976. With the revenue from the Z80, the company built its own chip fac ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Zilog
Zilog, Inc. is an American manufacturer of microprocessors and 8-bit and 16-bit microcontrollers. It is also a supplier of application-specific embedded system-on-chip (SoC) products. Its most famous product is the Z80 series of 8-bit microprocessors that were compatible with the Intel 8080 but significantly cheaper. The Z80 was widely used during the 1980s in many popular home computers such as the TRS-80, MSX, Amstrad CPC and the ZX Spectrum, as well as arcade games such as '' Pac-Man''. The company also made 16- and 32-bit processors, but these did not see widespread use. From the 1990s, the company focused primarily on the microcontroller market. The name (pronunciation varies) is an acronym of ''Z integrated logic'', also thought of as "Z for the last word of Integrated Logic". In the oral history interview video which Federico Faggin (co-founder of Zilog) recorded for the Computer History Museum, he pronounced Zilog with a long "i" () consistently. History Zilog wa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Zilog Z180
The Zilog Z180 eight-bit processor is a successor of the Z80 CPU. It is compatible with the large base of software written for the Z80. The Z180 family adds higher performance and integrated peripheral functions like clock generator, 16-bit counters/timers, interrupt controller, wait-state generators, serial ports and a DMA controller. It uses separate read and write strobes, sharing similar timings with the Z80 and Intel processors. The on-chip memory management unit (MMU) has the capability of addressing up to 1 MB of memory. It is possible to configure the Z180 to operate as the Hitachi HD64180. Variants Z80182 The Zilog Z80182, introduced in 1997, is an enhanced, faster version of the older Z80 and is part of the Z180 microprocessor family. It's nicknamed the ''Zilog Intelligent Peripheral Controller'' (ZIP). It's also fully static (the clock can be halted and no data in the registers will be lost) and has a low EMI option that reduces the slew rate In electronics, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Semiconductor Intellectual Property Core
In electronic design, a semiconductor intellectual property core (SIP core), IP core, or IP block is a reusable unit of logic, cell, or integrated circuit layout design that is the intellectual property of one party. IP cores can be licensed to another party or owned and used by a single party. The term comes from the licensing of the patent or source code copyright that exists in the design. Designers of application-specific integrated circuits (ASIC) and systems of field-programmable gate array (FPGA) logic can use IP cores as building blocks. History The licensing and use of IP cores in chip design came into common practice in the 1990s. There were many licensors and also many foundries competing on the market. In 2013, the most widely licensed IP cores are from Arm Holdings (43.2% market share), Synopsys Inc. (13.9% market share), Imagination Technologies (9% market share) and Cadence Design Systems (5.1% market share). Types of IP cores The use of an IP core in chip des ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Second-source
In the electronics industry, a second source is a company that is licensed to manufacture and sell components originally designed by another company (the first source). It is common for engineers and purchasers to avoid components that are only available from a single source, to avoid the risk that a problem with the supplier would prevent a popular and profitable product from being manufactured. For simple components such as resistors and transistors, this is not usually an issue, but for complex integrated circuits, vendors often react by licensing one or more other companies to manufacture and sell the same parts as second sources. While the details of such licenses are usually confidential, they often involve cross-licensing, so that each company also obtains the right to manufacture and sell parts designed by the other. Examples MOS Technology licensed Rockwell and Synertek to second-source the 6502 microprocessor and its support components. Intel licensed AMD to seco ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Semiconductor Fabrication Plant
In the microelectronics industry, a semiconductor fabrication plant (commonly called a fab; sometimes foundry) is a factory where devices such as integrated circuits are manufactured. Fabs require many expensive devices to function. Estimates put the cost of building a new fab over one billion U.S. dollars with values as high as $3–4 billion not being uncommon. TSMC invested $9.3 billion in its ''Fab15'' 300 mm wafer manufacturing facility in Taiwan. The same company estimations suggest that their future fab might cost $20 billion. A foundry model emerged in the 1990s: Foundries that produced their own designs were known as integrated device manufacturers (IDMs). Companies that farmed out manufacturing of their designs to foundries were termed fabless semiconductor companies. Those foundries, which did not create their own designs, were called pure-play semiconductor foundries. The central part of a fab is the clean room, an area where the environment is controll ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Personal Computing
A personal computer (PC) is a multi-purpose microcomputer whose size, capabilities, and price make it feasible for individual use. Personal computers are intended to be operated directly by an end user, rather than by a computer expert or technician. Unlike large, costly minicomputers and mainframes, time-sharing by many people at the same time is not used with personal computers. Primarily in the late 1970s and 1980s, the term home computer was also used. Institutional or corporate computer owners in the 1960s had to write their own programs to do any useful work with the machines. While personal computer users may develop their own applications, usually these systems run commercial software, free-of-charge software ("freeware"), which is most often proprietary, or free and open-source software, which is provided in "ready-to-run", or binary, form. Software for personal computers is typically developed and distributed independently from the hardware or operating system man ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Video Game
Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, game controller, controller, computer keyboard, keyboard, or motion sensing device to generate visual feedback. This feedback mostly commonly is shown on a video display device, such as a TV set, computer monitor, monitor, touchscreen, or virtual reality headset. Some computer games do not always depend on a graphics display, for example List of text-based computer games, text adventure games and computer chess can be played through teletype printers. Video games are often augmented with audio feedback delivered through loudspeaker, speakers or headphones, and sometimes with other types of feedback, including haptic technology. Video games are defined based on their computing platform, platform, which include arcade video games, console games, and PC game, personal computer (PC) games. More recently, the industry has expanded on ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Embedded System
An embedded system is a computer system—a combination of a computer processor, computer memory, and input/output peripheral devices—that has a dedicated function within a larger mechanical or electronic system. It is ''embedded'' as part of a complete device often including electrical or electronic hardware and mechanical parts. Because an embedded system typically controls physical operations of the machine that it is embedded within, it often has real-time computing constraints. Embedded systems control many devices in common use today. , it was estimated that ninety-eight percent of all microprocessors manufactured were used in embedded systems. Modern embedded systems are often based on microcontrollers (i.e. microprocessors with integrated memory and peripheral interfaces), but ordinary microprocessors (using external chips for memory and peripheral interface circuits) are also common, especially in more complex systems. In either case, the processor(s) u ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bit Manipulation
Bit manipulation is the act of algorithmically manipulating bits or other pieces of data shorter than a word. Computer programming tasks that require bit manipulation include low-level device control, error detection and correction algorithms, data compression, encryption algorithms, and optimization. For most other tasks, modern programming languages allow the programmer to work directly with abstractions instead of bits that represent those abstractions. Source code that does bit manipulation makes use of the bitwise operations: AND, OR, XOR, NOT, and possibly other operations analogous to the boolean operators; there are also bit shifts and operations to count ones and zeros, find high and low one or zero, set, reset and test bits, extract and insert fields, mask and zero fields, gather and scatter bits to and from specified bit positions or fields. Integer arithmetic operators can also effect bit-operations in conjunction with the other operators. Bit manipulatio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Processor Register
A processor register is a quickly accessible location available to a computer's processor. Registers usually consist of a small amount of fast storage, although some registers have specific hardware functions, and may be read-only or write-only. In computer architecture, registers are typically addressed by mechanisms other than main memory, but may in some cases be assigned a memory address e.g. DEC PDP-10, ICT 1900. Almost all computers, whether load/store architecture or not, load data from a larger memory into registers where it is used for arithmetic operations and is manipulated or tested by machine instructions. Manipulated data is then often stored back to main memory, either by the same instruction or by a subsequent one. Modern processors use either static or dynamic RAM as main memory, with the latter usually accessed via one or more cache levels. Processor registers are normally at the top of the memory hierarchy, and provide the fastest way to access data ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Backward Compatible
Backward compatibility (sometimes known as backwards compatibility) is a property of an operating system, product, or technology that allows for interoperability with an older legacy system, or with input designed for such a system, especially in telecommunications and computing. Modifying a system in a way that does not allow backward compatibility is sometimes called " breaking" backward compatibility. A complementary concept is forward compatibility. A design that is forward-compatible usually has a roadmap for compatibility with future standards and products. A related term from programming jargon is hysterical reasons or hysterical raisins (near-homophones for "historical reasons"), as the purpose of some software features may be solely to support older hardware or software versions. Usage In hardware A simple example of both backward and forward compatibility is the introduction of FM radio in stereo. FM radio was initially mono, with only one audio channel represent ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
