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Re: FPGApple + ARM?

Jorge Chamorro Bieling wrote:

Mark McDougall <msmcdoug@no.spam.iinet> wrote:



I'd imagine you be doing one or the other, *not* a combination of both.
Either you emulate the Apple II (6052 and all) in the FPGA, or emulate the
Apple II in software on the ARM (no differently than on a PC, for example)
which requires no FPGA development.




Unless of course you're thinking of some hybrid emulation using the ARM for
the 6502 and the FPGA for 'hardware-assisted' software-based emulation - but
then I ask myself, "why would you want to do that, when you have 6502 IP
cores freely available?"



If the 6502 is emulated in the arm, you've got the possibility to switch
out of emulation mode (via an unused opcode for example) and run arm
code straight on, with i think would be great.

As the 6502 instructions are not hardwired but emulated in the arm you
could fill with some new totally-geek instructions of your own the
unused 6502 opcodes if you wish.

Having a software based hardware emulator brings in a whole new world of
possibilities... just think about it. It's more powerful than
just-a-faster-6502.


Of course, an FPGA is "soft" *hardware*, so it could also implement
just about any extension you could imagine.


OTOH, who will want to waste the time developing for such a thing ?
Nobody.
Who would buy it ?
Nobody.
Some of us *may* want to have it to play around for a while... but this invention if ever borns will be born dead. 
Does it make any sense ?


I think your understanding is correct.

-michael

Music synthesis for 8-bit Apple II's!
Home page:  http://members.aol.com/MJMahon/

"The wastebasket is our most important design
tool--and it is seriously underused."