RC6502 Apple 1 Replica

I've been spending a lot of time lately working on extensions to the excellent RC2014 machine, check out the official web page at http://rc2014.co.uk if you're not familiar with it. Unquestionably, a lot of fun!

Armed with the knowledge from building that kit I decided to attempt to create one myself, lack of knowledge when it comes to circuit design and pcb layout aside shouldn't be a problem right? Not as long as you enjoy tinkering with stuff.

The RC6502 is that kit, and since I wasn't yet born at the time and therefore did not own one I decided to create a working replica of the Apple 1 computer. The original schematics are readily available on the Internet - as is also an excellent book on the topic; Apple 1 Replica Creation, Back to the garage by Tom Owad.

I've been documenting the build process of the various components on my blog at https://hvetebolle.blogspot.no/p/rc6502.html, but be warned that it's in my native language (Norwegian) so this might not be anywhere close to readable for most people. For those of you relying on English as a language, and don't want to try out Google Translate, the essence of it is that it is now a fully functional Apple 1 replica computer!

Modules

Like the RC2014 I've decided to keep things very modular with each card more or less doing one simple thing, easier to wrap ones head around as a beginner and a lot easier to understand when troubleshooting - also a lot cheaper to upgrade or replace since you don't need to replace the entire thing, just the specific board. Note that I haven't decided on designing my own backplane, mainly because the RC2014-version works really well (see RC2014 tindie page for ordering) and I've already got it.

In order to use the RC6502 you'll need the following modules:

• Backplane (see RC2014)
• CPU
• RAM
• ROM
• Reset Circuit
• Serial IO

Optional modules:

• Video Adapter

If you want your own fabricated versions of the modules in the form of PCBs to own and and assemble yourselves, there are quite a few options avaiable though I tend to use Seeed Studio since they are a reasonably priced option with affortable shipping to Europe. Zip up the contents of each modules export folders and give them that to get an estimate - I've stayed within the least pricy tier so at the time of writing you'd end up paying 4.90 USD plus shipping per module.