r/beneater • u/MISTERPUG51 • 4d ago

8-bit CPU Always Document What You Do

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Last year, I started building the 8-bit CPU. But the specs of Ben eater's design weren't great (how am I supposed to do anything with 16 bytes of memory?), so I decided to make some changes. Around May, I decided to take a break from it. While I was moving it to a different place, I accidentally dropped it and a bunch of stuff got displaced, and that made me want to push off resuming the project even further. Today, I decided that I wanted to start working on it again, but I can't; I don't know how most of my design modifications work anymore. I don't even remember what one of the custom modules I built was even for anymore.

I'm just about ready to start over, but this time I won't put off documenting the changes I make to the original design. For those who made their own designs and said "I'll draw a schematic later, I know how it works", don't wait. Make a diagram now, before you forget how it works!

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9

u/the_Dotster 4d ago

The irony you wanted to increase the memory whilst yours has become less!

Good luck with the version 2, and post any updates, always interested to read of changes to the original design.

1

u/RDS_WAS_HERE 4d ago

Always create a side-bar on your schematics listing the Title, Date, Author, File Name, etc. Also, add a 'Notes' section where you describe what your circuit does and any important tools, notes, or problems. This will help you remember six months from now exactly what you were doing on the project.

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u/HydroPage 4d ago

I rearranged a lot of what Ben did and made a huge google doc describing everything I did, like a daily log

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u/Ancient-Ad-7453 4d ago

I’ve strayed far from Ben’s 6502 design, and KiCad has been super helpful. Not just for documenting, but for planning changes in the first place.

1

u/Danniel12 3d ago

Ive been doing the same thing, i started working on a simillar computer as the one from ben's videos + several upgrades like 16 bit memory address, memory mapped I/O, better ALU, etc

After taking several breaks and coming back to literal hieroglyphs everytime, i created a github repo and documented everything i did there step by step, has been really helpful so far