HOME
*



picture info

List Of Home Computers By Video Hardware
This is a list of home computers, sorted alphanumerically, which lists all relevant details of their video hardware. Home computers are the second generation of desktop computers, entering the market in 1977 and becoming common during the 1980s. A decade later they were generally replaced by IBM PC compatible "PCs", although technically home computers are also classified as personal computers. Examples of typical early home computers are the TRS-80, Atari 400/800, BBC Micro, the ZX Spectrum, the MSX 1, the Amstrad CPC 464 and the Commodore 64. Examples of typical late home computers are MSX 2 systems, and the Amiga and Atari ST systems. Note: in cases of manufacturers who have made both home and personal computers, only machines fitting into the ''home'' computer category are listed. Systems in the personal computer category, except for Early Macintosh PCs, are generally based on the VGA standard and use a video chip known as a Graphics Processing Unit. Very early PCs used on ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Alphanumeric
Alphanumericals or alphanumeric characters are a combination of alphabetical and numerical characters. More specifically, they are the collection of Latin letters and Arabic digits. An alphanumeric code is an identifier made of alphanumeric characters. Merriam-Webster suggests that the term "alphanumeric" may often additionally refer to other symbols, such as punctuation and mathematical symbols. In the POSIX/C locale, there are either 36 (A–Z and 0–9, case insensitive) or 62 (A–Z, a–z and 0–9, case-sensitive) alphanumeric characters. Subsets of alphanumeric used in human interfaces When a string of mixed alphabets and numerals is presented for human interpretation, ambiguities arise. The most obvious is the similarity of the letters I, O and Q to the numbers 1 and 0. Therefore, depending on the application, various subsets of the alphanumeric were adopted to avoid misinterpretation by humans. In passenger aircraft, aircraft seat maps and seats were designated by ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Color Graphics Adapter
The Color Graphics Adapter (CGA), originally also called the ''Color/Graphics Adapter'' or ''IBM Color/Graphics Monitor Adapter'', introduced in 1981, was IBM's first color graphics card for the IBM PC and established a de facto computer display standard. Hardware design The original IBM CGA graphics card was built around the Motorola 6845 display controller, came with 16 kilobytes of video memory built in, and featured several graphics and text modes. The highest display resolution of any mode was 640×200, and the highest color depth supported was 4-bit (16 colors). The CGA card could be connected either to a direct-drive CRT monitor using a 4-bit digital (TTL) RGBI interface, such as the IBM 5153 color display, or to an NTSC-compatible television or composite video monitor via an RCA connector. The RCA connector provided only baseband video, so to connect the CGA card to a television set without a composite video input required a separate RF modulator. IBM pr ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Machine Language
In computer programming, machine code is any low-level programming language, consisting of machine language instructions, which are used to control a computer's central processing unit (CPU). Each instruction causes the CPU to perform a very specific task, such as a load, a store, a jump, or an arithmetic logic unit (ALU) operation on one or more units of data in the CPU's registers or memory. Early CPUs had specific machine code that might break backwards compatibility with each new CPU released. The notion of an instruction set architecture (ISA) defines and specifies the behavior and encoding in memory of the instruction set of the system, without specifying its exact implementation. This acts as an abstraction layer, enabling compatibility within the same family of CPUs, so that machine code written or generated according to the ISA for the family will run on all CPUs in the family, including future CPUs. In general, each architecture family (e.g. x86, ARM) has its own I ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  




VIC-II
The VIC-II (Video Interface Chip II), specifically known as the MOS Technology 6567/8562/8564 (NTSC versions), 6569/8565/8566 (PAL), is the microchip tasked with generating Y/C video signals (combined to composite video in the RF modulator) and DRAM memory refresh, refresh signals in the Commodore 64 and Commodore 128, C128 home computers. Succeeding MOS's original MOS Technology VIC, VIC (used in the Commodore VIC-20, VIC-20), the VIC-II was one of the two chips mainly responsible for the C64's success (the other chip being the 6581 MOS Technology SID, SID). Development history The VIC-II chip was designed primarily by Al Charpentier and Charles Winterble at MOS Technology, MOS Technology, Inc. as a successor to the MOS Technology VIC, MOS Technology 6560 "VIC". The team at MOS Technology had previously failed to produce two graphics chips named ''MOS Technology 6562'' for the Commodore TOI computer, and ''MOS Technology 6564'' for the Color PET, due to memory speed constraints. ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Commodore PET
The Commodore PET is a line of personal computers produced starting in 1977 by Commodore International. A single all-in-one case combines a MOS Technology 6502 microprocessor, Commodore BASIC in read-only memory, keyboard, monochrome monitor, and, in early models, a cassette deck. Development of the system began in 1976, and a prototype was demonstrated at the January 1977 Consumer Electronics Show. The name "PET" was suggested by Andre Souson after he saw the Pet Rock in Los Gatos, and stated they were going to make the "pet computer". It was backronymed to Personal Electronic Transactor. A series of problems delayed production versions until December 1977, by which time the TRS-80 and Apple II had already begun deliveries. ''Byte'' referred to the three machines collectively as the "1977 trinity". Following the initial PET 2001, the design was updated through a series of models with more memory, better keyboard, larger screen, and other modifications. The systems were a top ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

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, controller, 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, monitor, touchscreen, or virtual reality headset. Some computer games do not always depend on a graphics display, for example text adventure games and computer chess can be played through teletype printers. Video games are often augmented with audio feedback delivered through speakers or headphones, and sometimes with other types of feedback, including haptic technology. Video games are defined based on their platform, which include arcade video games, console games, and personal computer (PC) games. More recently, the industry has expanded onto mobile gaming through smartphones and tablet computers, virtual and augmented reality systems, and remote c ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

BASIC
BASIC (Beginners' All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code) is a family of general-purpose, high-level programming languages designed for ease of use. The original version was created by John G. Kemeny and Thomas E. Kurtz at Dartmouth College in 1963. They wanted to enable students in non-scientific fields to use computers. At the time, nearly all computers required writing custom software, which only scientists and mathematicians tended to learn. In addition to the program language, Kemeny and Kurtz developed the Dartmouth Time Sharing System (DTSS), which allowed multiple users to edit and run BASIC programs simultaneously on remote terminals. This general model became very popular on minicomputer systems like the PDP-11 and Data General Nova in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Hewlett-Packard produced an entire computer line for this method of operation, introducing the HP2000 series in the late 1960s and continuing sales into the 1980s. Many early video games trace their ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Random Access Memory
Random-access memory (RAM; ) is a form of computer memory that can be read and changed in any order, typically used to store working Data (computing), data and machine code. A Random access, random-access memory device allows data items to be read (computer), 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, CD-RWs, DVD-RWs and the older Magnetic tape data storage, magnetic tapes and drum memory), 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. RAM contains multiplexer, multiplexing and demultiplexing circuitry, to connect the data lines to the addressed storage for reading or writing the entry. Usually more than one bit of storage is accessed by the same address, and RAM ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Kilobyte
The kilobyte is a multiple of the unit byte for digital information. The International System of Units (SI) defines the prefix ''kilo'' as 1000 (103); per this definition, 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 solid-state memory capacity, ''kilobyte'' instead typically 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 accident that 210 differs from 103 by less than 2.5%. A kibibyte is defined by Clause 4 of IEC 80000-13 as 1024 bytes. Definitions and usage Base 10 (1000 bytes) In the International System of Units (SI) the prefix ''kilo'' means 1000 (103); therefore, one kilobyte is 1000 bytes. The u ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

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. Among the most powerful 8-bit processors of its era, it was also much more expensive. In 1980 a 6809 in single-unit quantities was 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 competitiv ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

MOS Technology 6502
The MOS Technology 6502 (typically pronounced "sixty-five-oh-two" or "six-five-oh-two") William Mensch and the moderator both pronounce the 6502 microprocessor as ''"sixty-five-oh-two"''. is an 8-bit microprocessor that was designed by a small team led by Chuck Peddle for MOS Technology. The design team had formerly worked at Motorola on the Motorola 6800 project; the 6502 is essentially a simplified, less expensive and faster version of that design. When it was introduced in 1975, the 6502 was the least expensive microprocessor on the market by a considerable margin. It initially sold for less than one-sixth the cost of competing designs from larger companies, such as the 6800 or Intel 8080. Its introduction caused rapid decreases in pricing across the entire processor market. Along with the Zilog Z80, it sparked a series of projects that resulted in the home computer revolution of the early 1980s. Popular video game consoles and home computers of the 1980s and early 1990s, su ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]