Charles Ingerham Peddle (November 25, 1937 – December 15, 2019) was an American electrical engineer best known as the main designer of the

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 te ...

microprocessor, the single-board computer, and its successor, the

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, ...

personal computer 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 tec ...

, both based on the 6502.

Biography

Peddle was born in Bangor, Maine,

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

on November 25, 1937. He worked in a

radio station Radio broadcasting is transmission of audio (sound), sometimes with related metadata, by radio waves to radio receivers belonging to a public audience. In terrestrial radio broadcasting the radio waves are broadcast by a land-based radi ...

while in high school. In 1955, Peddle joined the

United States Marine Corps The United States Marine Corps (USMC), also referred to as the United States Marines, is the maritime land force service branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for conducting expeditionary and amphibious operations through combi ...

. He attended the

University of Maine The University of Maine (UMaine or UMO) is a public land-grant research university in Orono, Maine. It was established in 1865 as the land-grant college of Maine and is the flagship university of the University of Maine System. It is classifie ...

where he earned a

Bachelor of Science A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Science was the University o ...

(B.Sc.) degree in

engineering physics Engineering physics, or engineering science, refers to the study of the combined disciplines of physics, mathematics, chemistry, biology, and engineering, particularly computer, nuclear, electrical, electronic, aerospace, materials or mechanical en ...

. Afterward, he went to work for

General Electric General Electric Company (GE) is an American multinational conglomerate founded in 1892, and incorporated in New York state and headquartered in Boston. The company operated in sectors including healthcare, aviation, power, renewable en ...

working with

time-sharing In computing, time-sharing is the sharing of a computing resource among many users at the same time by means of multiprogramming and multi-tasking.DEC Timesharing (1965), by Peter Clark, The DEC Professional, Volume 1, Number 1 Its emergence ...

systems. In 1973, Peddle worked at

Motorola Motorola, Inc. () was an American multinational telecommunications company based in Schaumburg, Illinois, United States. After having lost $4.3 billion from 2007 to 2009, the company split into two independent public companies, Motorol ...

on developing the 6800 processor. Peddle recognized a market for a very low price microprocessor and began to champion such a design to complement the $300 Motorola 6800. His efforts were frustrated by Motorola management and he was told to drop the project. He then left for

MOS Technology MOS Technology, Inc. ("MOS" being short for Metal Oxide Semiconductor), later known as CSG (Commodore Semiconductor Group) and GMT Microelectronics, was a semiconductor design and fabrication company based in Audubon, Pennsylvania. It is mos ...

, where he headed the design of the 650x family of processors; these were made as a $25 answer to the

Motorola 6800 The 6800 ("''sixty-eight hundred''") is an 8-bit microprocessor designed and first manufactured by Motorola in 1974. The MC6800 microprocessor was part of the M6800 Microcomputer System (latter dubbed ''68xx'') that also included serial and para ...

. The most famous member of the 650x series was the 6502, developed in 1975, which was priced at 15% of the cost of an

Intel 8080 The Intel 8080 (''"eighty-eighty"'') is the second 8-bit microprocessor designed and manufactured by Intel. It first appeared in April 1974 and is an extended and enhanced variant of the earlier 8008 design, although without binary compatibil ...

, and was subsequently used in many commercial products, including the Apple II,

and

VIC-20 The VIC-20 (known as the VC-20 in Germany and the VIC-1001 in Japan) is an 8-bit home computer that was sold by Commodore Business Machines. The VIC-20 was announced in 1980, roughly three years after Commodore's first personal computer, the ...

, Atari 8-bit computers and arcade video games,

Oric Oric was the name used by UK-based Tangerine Computer Systems for a series of 6502-based home computers sold in the 1980s, primarily in Europe. With the success of the ZX Spectrum from Sinclair Research, Tangerine's backers suggested a ho ...

computers, and the

BBC Micro The British Broadcasting Corporation Microcomputer System, or BBC Micro, is a series of microcomputers and associated peripherals designed and built by Acorn Computers in the 1980s for the BBC Computer Literacy Project. Designed with an emphas ...

from

Acorn Computers Acorn Computers Ltd. was a British computer company established in Cambridge, England, in 1978. The company produced a number of computers which were especially popular in the UK, including the Acorn Electron and the Acorn Archimedes. Acorn's ...

. The

Atari 2600 The Atari 2600, initially branded as the Atari Video Computer System (Atari VCS) from its release until November 1982, is a home video game console developed and produced by Atari, Inc. Released in September 1977, it popularized microprocesso ...

uses the closely related 6507 CPU, the Commodore 64 uses the also closely related derivative

6510 300px, Image of the internals of a Commodore 64 showing the 6510 CPU (40-pin DIP, lower left). The chip on the right is the 6581 SID. The production week/year (WWYY) of each chip is given below its name. The MOS Technology 6510 is an 8-bit mic ...

, and the Nintendo Entertainment System uses a custom ASIC which includes an altered 6502 core (with the decimal mode deleted). The 6502 microprocessor design was also developed into the 16-bit

65816 The W65C816S (also 65C816 or 65816) is an 8/16-bit microprocessor (MPU) developed and sold by the Western Design Center (WDC). Introduced in 1985, the W65C816S is an enhanced version of the WDC 65C02 8-bit computing, 8-bit MPU, itself a CMOS enha ...

CPU while maintaining

backward compatibility 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, especiall ...

, and into microcontroller versions. The 65C02S and 65C816S, and microcontrollers based on each are still in production and available for purchase as of June 2021, over 45 years after the initial 650x introduction. In 1980, Peddle left MOS Technology, together with

Commodore Business Machines Commodore International (other names include Commodore International Limited) was an American home computer and electronics manufacturer founded by Jack Tramiel. Commodore International (CI), along with its subsidiary Commodore Business Mach ...

(CBM) financer Chris Fish, to found

Sirius Systems Technology Sirius Systems Technology was a personal computer manufacturer in Scotts Valley, California. It was founded in 1980 by Chuck Peddle and Chris Fish, formerly of MOS Technology and capitalized by Walter Kidde Inc. In late 1982 Sirius acquired Victo ...

. There, Peddle designed the

Victor 9000 The name Victor or Viktor may refer to: * Victor (name), including a list of people with the given name, mononym, or surname Arts and entertainment Film * ''Victor'' (1951 film), a French drama film * ''Victor'' (1993 film), a French shor ...

personal computer.

Legacy

Peddle, along with the 6502's co-designer

Bill Mensch William David Mensch, Jr. (born February 9, 1945) is an American electrical engineer born in Quakertown, Pennsylvania. He was a major contributor to the design of the Motorola 6800 8-bit microprocessor and was part of the team led by Chuck Pedd ...

, are regarded as personal computer pioneers, in that both the 6502 technology and

business model A business model describes how an organization creates, delivers, and captures value,''Business Model Generation'', Alexander Osterwalder, Yves Pigneur, Alan Smith, and 470 practitioners from 45 countries, self-published, 2010 in economic, soci ...

were instrumental in helping launch the personal computer revolution. After Peddle's death, Mensch wrote in memoriam.

References

Bibliography

External links

The Legendary Chuck Peddle, Inventor of the Personal Computer

Video: Interview with Chuck Peddle for ''Scene World Magazine'' (2014)

Video: An Interview with Chuck Peddle (The Amp Hour #241)

Video: Oral History of Chuck Peddle (Interviewed by Doug Fairbairn and Stephen Diamond on 2014-06-12 in Mountain View, CA)

Video: VCF East 4.0: History of Commodore, Pt 1: Chuck Peddle (2007)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Peddle, Chuck 1937 births 2019 deaths American electrical engineers Commodore people Computer hardware engineers Motorola employees People from Bangor, Maine Military personnel from Maine University of Maine alumni

Biography

Legacy

See also

References

Bibliography

External links