Re: If you could design a $300 homecomputer today, what would you choose?

["Branko Badrljica" <brankob@avtomatika.com>]

"Byron Desnoyers Winmill" <wbdesnoy@acs5.acs.ucalgary.ca> wrote in message
news:9iuu8i$p9g$1@nserve1.acs.ucalgary.ca...
> william strutts (wrstrutts1@nospam.home.com) wrote:
> : > Hardware:
> : >  - 4MB to 8MB RAM
> <...>
> : >  - 64MB to 256MB RAM with battery backup, for
> : >    storing documents.  Or use flash memory if
> : >    it is cheap enough.
>
> : You couldn't get that much ram on a 68000 because it only
> : has a 24 bit memory bus.  You would have to go to a 68030
> : or so to get the wider data path.
>
> Then throw in some sort of decoder for the 64-256MB chunk.  Since
> it is not the main memory (that would be the 4MB chunk), it should
> not make much of a difference.  Indeed, it need not make any
> difference to the average programmer, since it would (presumably)
> be access through a set of file system calls.
>
> Besides, isn't the 6502 limited to 64kB chunks.  Apple simply
> implemented some sort of paging mechanism to access the 128kB found
> in later models (IIe/IIc).  Likewise for the 192kB card which I
> have lying around here, somewhere.  (Though my understanding is
> the 1MB card for the 8-bit machines used some sort of window into
> memory.)
>
> Byron.


Why not using 80386, then ? It has it all- MMU and segmented adressing, and
one
even gets a several 100's bytes of cache ? ;o)

Regards,


Branko