Intro
This is my eighth and final blog in the Upcycle IoT Design Challenge. During the course of this project I recycled, reused, repurposed, upcycled, salvaged, and reimagined various components and subsystems from a 23 year old PC to create:
- a CP/M Altair 8800 computer emulator
- a Commodore VIC20 emulator
- a space invaders arcade game
- an audio CD player
- a USB adapter for old IDE disk drives
- a USB adapter for old floppy disk drives
- a Mr. Pentium Running Man sculpture made from computer chips
- a bench power supply
- a solid state file management system for an AIM65
- and collected a bunch of miscellaneous components to be used in future projects
Microchip Curiosity Nano System with Curiosity Nano Base for Click Boards & LCD
This blog is a summary/review of the other 7 blogs.
Project Introductory Video
Altair 8800 CP/M emulator
Commodore VIC 20 Emulator
ESP32 Retro Emulation System Enclosure Design
Exploring FabGL on an ESP32
Audio CD Player
Hard Drive and Floppy Disk Drive Salvage
Mr. Pentium - Running Man Chip Sculpture
PC Chassis Teardown
Bench Power Supply
Curiosity Nano Unboxing
Curiosity Nano Programming
AIM 65
Discussion
Each of the sub-projects above had significant meaning for me. The classic computers covered in this project included, Rockwell AIM 65, Altai 8800, Commodore VIC 20, a Space Invaders game console, and a PC. I was an enthusiastic computer buff when each of these classic computers was developed and wanted each of them when they appeared. It satisfied a long standing itch to implement each of them in this project.
The Mr. Pentium Running Man Chip Sculpture was a creative exercise that immortalized the venerable PC and all the marquee brand name chips that were involved. And it even has perpetual solar powered electronics functions.
The bench power supply was another key component that was worth repurposing. It provides the key voltages I generally use at power levels that would be very expensive to otherwise procure.
All in all, I recycled/upcycled a lot of PC technology into items that I actually want and that are useful. I am very happy with everything, even the Curiosity Nano system that still needs a bit of work to be really useful. The kit arrived a bit late to complete my plans for it before the challenge deadline, but I made good progress in the time that I had, and it is in good enough shape to easily finish off. The Curiosity Nano kit is very capable and also has the flexibility to be used in other applications such as an audio recorder/player.
I hope my explanation of how to use the extensive suite of Arduino libraries with the Curiosity Nano is useful to other members.
I would like to thank Microchip and element14 for the opportunity to participate in this unusual (for me) type of project.
Links:
If you want more details or .stl files, or code, or images, they are available in these links:
Serendipitous Salvage - Blog 2
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