The first LowSpec Processor

This channel has come so far. I remember when the content was just altering game config files to bring game graphics below their minimum settings and spec, and these documentaries are just as valuable imo.

I bought the first 6502 product, the KIM-1, directly from MOS, and built up a system around it. Later, I bought a Commodore PET and did a lot on that. Then I got a job at Atari designing games for their machine. I still have my KIM-1, my PET, and my Atari 800. I knew the 6502 instruction set, in machine code, by heart.

One exception to accuracy. I don’t think any individual was sued. I only saw one lawsuit and none was served to me personally. All our names were mentioned in the lawsuit. I did have the feeling that if things got tough I could be on my own. The suit was filed in Philadelphia in the fall of 1975. It should be on file. I only read the first page. “Motorola took seven man years to do the layout. MOS Technology took one man year,” therefore we stole it. As a matter of record I returned to Motorola in 1977 and worked there till 2010. There is a story there.

I laughed so hard when the Steve Jobs negotiation part came out. That part of the video really capture his voice perfectly. Jobs biography book described how angry he can be when negotiating with someone he dislike. Jack was certainly the type of person that jobs dislike.

I met Chuck Peddle briefly at an event in the fall of 2019 before he passed away. Even at 82, he was still excited about new projects and eagerly shared his experience with us undergrads. A truly gifted and talented engineer. I really wish I could have spoken with him longer

Ah the memories! Taught myself 6502 assembly language as a teenager in the early 80's and wrote my own games cos I couldn't afford to buy them. Never did manage to stop my Pacman ghosts getting stuck in corners.....

I probably still have the 6502 manuals somewhere. One thing I recall that was not mentioned was that the 6502 was designed to be made on a memory production line rather than requiring a more complex chip production line that other micros required, which allowed them to be made more cheaply and leverage exiting production capacity.

And one of my childhood heroes, Bil Herd, brought both low spec processors together. 65xx and Z80 working together in one machine, the Commodore 128. <3

I don't know what I'm more impressed with, the video quality and storytelling, or that Motorola has been around since the 60's.

MOS and Zilog were the real heroes which turned computers into mainstream devices.

If you're going for a new approach for your videos, let me tell you something. You're absolutely going in the right direction and I love it!

I never get tired of hearing "cal-coo-lader". I still have an Apple ][ and an Apple //e that works! 6502 was so loved by all kinds of lowspec machines - I remember my Vic20 and C64 fondly, as well. My computer class had an army of Commodore PETs. Very fun video - I've owned a number of PCs with this processor but I never knew its story!! Thank you.

Another great video. Without Chuck Peddle there would have been no Commodore 64, no Atari 2600 and that's right, no Apple II! The 6502 was a great, great invention.

10:38 that small note under the pricing is so good. The insane confidence with the transparency really shows they were proud of this.

My father was a mechanical engineer who got the first family computer in 1985, a kaypro 2. 2x 5 1/4 floppy drives and no hdd. You had to boot from disk and it could either run cp/m or msdos. Gaming with ascii graphics on a 5"(? Ish?) Monochrome screen. Ah the days of 'ladders'. You can still find it online as a self contained .jar file. When I was in school for electronics one of my instructors was on the Intel design team that broke the Ghz barrier. When asked how they did it he just said 'P. F. M.' Because of that instructor we also had access to a small corner of Intel's educational materials and I was able to download a transistor schematic for the 4004. I remember some of these wild west days from the early 80's from my early youth. Of course someone younger than 10 as I was at the time had no way of comprehending the gravity of what was happening around me, I just accepted adjusted and moved on. You're making me feel old here 😁, playing games on my ti85 in high school trig..... Great content this is worth chronicling as almost every living person today is affected by decisions made over 40 years ago in back rooms and garages used as office space.

These videos may not pull as many views as the Low Spec ones but they're absolutely top notch content! Can't wait for the next ones!

I will never understand how these videos haven't popped off yet, especially with the watch time probably being insanely high with people watching the whole thing. Gotta happen eventually

I really liked the 6502 instruction set. The zero-page indexing was awesome!

I used the 6502 in the early 80s, and loved programming it (in assembler). It had exactly the right instructions to do just what I wanted. Completely fuss free and clean.

I bought an MOS Technology 6502 as soon as they announced it. It was $25 and came with two excellent manuals, one hardware and one software. I had just built an 8008 machine. The 8008 was $45 and the 2102 rams were $5 each. That was a lot of money in 1975. My 6502 machine had a front panel with the normal arry of switches so I could fat-finger in a loader. The real advantage over the 6800 was not just price, but the indirect addressing modes in the 6502. It was much more advanced. I was shocked when Motorola came out with their 68000. Why would anyone come out with a register rich machine when the future belonged to compilers (which would never use all those registers) and multi-processing which required fast context switching. It was an interesting time.