I recently bought a Novag Octo (10€, nearly a gift as it was boxed with manual and mains adapter included ). It runs a small 2k Kittinger program hosted on a 80C49 single-ship microcontroller.
Searching for information regarding this 80C49 I found it has been frequently used as the scan controller into PC keyboards, as you can see here.
Funny to know I am playing against the computing power of a PC keyboard!
Regards, Tibono
Play chess against your keyboard
Moderators: Harvey Williamson, Steve B, Watchman
Forum rules
This textbox is used to restore diagrams posted with the fen tag before the upgrade.
This textbox is used to restore diagrams posted with the fen tag before the upgrade.
Re: Play chess against your keyboard
The Novag Octo! Yes, I remember buying one of those in my lunchTibono2 wrote:I recently bought a Novag Octo
break from a pawn shop, way back when. After a few games, I
concluded that they called it the "Octo" because it was suited to
8 year old children.
L
- Steve B
- Site Admin
- Posts: 10140
- Joined: Sun Jul 29, 2007 10:02 am
- Location: New York City USofA
- Contact:
Re: Play chess against your keyboard
lol RegardsLarry wrote:After a few games, I
concluded that they called it the "Octo" because it was suited to
8 year old children.
Steve
- microhenri
- Member
- Posts: 37
- Joined: Wed Dec 28, 2016 7:58 am
- Location: Netherlands
The Octo may be a weak machine, but technically it is a great achievement.
The 80C49 is the first 8 bit single chip computer. This means that all I/O (Input and output ports to control applications such as keyboard display or LED’s), the RAM and Program ROM are all on one chip. The predecessors of this chess computers almost all did have a microprocessor with multiple RAM IC’s, one or more ROM IC’s for the program and separate hardware to control the buttons and display. These Chess computers where expensive and the 80C49 gave the opportunity to reduce the costs.
A disadvantage was the limited computing power of the microcontroller and the small program ROM. Again a great achievement to write the best possible chess program in only 2k ROM and 196 bytes of RAM.
Henri
The 80C49 is the first 8 bit single chip computer. This means that all I/O (Input and output ports to control applications such as keyboard display or LED’s), the RAM and Program ROM are all on one chip. The predecessors of this chess computers almost all did have a microprocessor with multiple RAM IC’s, one or more ROM IC’s for the program and separate hardware to control the buttons and display. These Chess computers where expensive and the 80C49 gave the opportunity to reduce the costs.
A disadvantage was the limited computing power of the microcontroller and the small program ROM. Again a great achievement to write the best possible chess program in only 2k ROM and 196 bytes of RAM.
Henri