Uploaded October 2017 | Updated September 2026, 1 week ago
Still needing front letters and upgrades, Zipii is up and running.
it's an Altair 8800 looking thing, the 1975 popular computer that Messrs Gates and co created BASIC for and then formed Microsoft.
Without $2000+ floating around in my top pocket, this has been a fun ride to create something with a semblance of the old Altair and to bring with it a very capable DOS games computer.
Many Altairs were upgraded to run Z80's.
The aluminium surround was made from the edging pieces of a discarded mosquito window screen. Switches and LED's from USA sellers on Ebay. Z80 itself from a dead 1980's arcade game board. All resistors, capacitors etc from vintage junk circuitboards.
Spec:
Z80 running at *cough* 8Hz
PII @ 400MHz
256MB RAM
ATi Rage IIC graphics card
Soundblaster AWE32 soundcard
10/100 Ethernet
2x 2GB HDD
Here's the video by Julian Ilett, where he built a Z80 based circuit:
youtube.com/watch?v=AZb4NLXx1aM
Z80 test circuit:
z80.info/z80test0.htm
or
z80project.wordpress.com/2014/02/09/z80-test-circuit
A vid here from LGR, where Clint built something similar using a reproduction Altair 8800:
youtube.com/watch?v=ALgxTCEgqqw
Still needing front letters and upgrades, Zipii is up and running.
it's an Altair 8800 looking thing, the 1975 popular computer that Messrs Gates and co created BASIC for and then formed Microsoft.
Without $2000+ floating around in my top pocket, this has been a fun ride to create something with a semblance of the old Altair and to bring with it a very capable DOS games computer.
Many Altairs were upgraded to run Z80's.
The aluminium surround was made from the edging pieces of a discarded mosquito window screen. Switches and LED's from USA sellers on Ebay. Z80 itself from a dead 1980's arcade game board. All resistors, capacitors etc from vintage junk circuitboards.
Spec:
Z80 running at *cough* 8Hz
PII @ 400MHz
256MB RAM
ATi Rage IIC graphics card
Soundblaster AWE32 soundcard
10/100 Ethernet
2x 2GB HDD
Here's the video by Julian Ilett, where he built a Z80 based circuit:
youtube.com/watch?v=AZb4NLXx1aM
Z80 test circuit:
z80.info/z80test0.htm
or
z80project.wordpress.com/2014/02/09/z80-test-circuit
A vid here from LGR, where Clint built something similar using a reproduction Altair 8800:
youtube.com/watch?v=ALgxTCEgqqw
