> On Nov 22, 2023, at 3:51 AM, ED SHARPE via cctalk <cctalk@classiccmp.org>
> wrote:
>
> Was there ever a COMPUTER using a 4004 that you cud really do
> something or did tat finally arrive with the 8008 as in the skelby shelby
> sp? 8008 i now there was an Intel INTELIC 4 (?sp) could n that use
> 4004 or one of the later 4000 numbered proc. We have an intelec 8 and 8
> inch floppy drives here at smecc musem .... always wanted a 4!Ed
Don't know about commercial products. But a classmate of mine got Honors in
Independent Study for a project where he built a useable general purpose
computer out of a 4004, plus a boatload of other stuff. It filled a wire-wrap
panel board about 8 x 10 inches. He wrote some software for it as well, and
took it to a summer internship at one of the National Labs (in the Midwest --
Argonne?) where as I understand it they liked it enough to ask him for a copy
of the system. He graduated in 1975, so the work was done in the year or so
leading up to that.
One complication was the terminal I/O (Teletype 33); originally he had a
bit-banging interface for that, which isn't easy on a 4004. At some point he
finagled a UART chip out of one of the DEC field service engineers, I think
that was one of the first single chip UARTs, used in the earlier DEC PDP-11
terminal adapters.
paul
