I'd favour as close to the original electron as possible but with a few deviations for extra optional features/quality of life improvements.
For example, reasonable size FPGA for the ULA since the original ULA will continue to become harder to source. This then provides another project people can play around with and push beyond the original ULA feature set if they wish.
Other tweaks might be optional display port out (or HDMI if you fancy jumping through the insane yearly licensing costs) alongside the original RGB etc.
Perhaps a bigger question is, which do you want to make and does it have to be either/or, or could it be more of a, which project to do first?![:mrgreen:]( "Mr. Green")
As for through hole or SMD. I honestly don't know. Through hole looks more authentic for the time period it's recreating, but I wouldn't limit feature set to avoid SMD either.
I guess this one depends on whether you plan to do a kit with bare pcbs, but unless you provide ULA mounting via socket and provide a fully assembled FPGA module for it, you're going to at least have to place some parts.
For example, reasonable size FPGA for the ULA since the original ULA will continue to become harder to source. This then provides another project people can play around with and push beyond the original ULA feature set if they wish.
Other tweaks might be optional display port out (or HDMI if you fancy jumping through the insane yearly licensing costs) alongside the original RGB etc.
Perhaps a bigger question is, which do you want to make and does it have to be either/or, or could it be more of a, which project to do first?
As for through hole or SMD. I honestly don't know. Through hole looks more authentic for the time period it's recreating, but I wouldn't limit feature set to avoid SMD either.
I guess this one depends on whether you plan to do a kit with bare pcbs, but unless you provide ULA mounting via socket and provide a fully assembled FPGA module for it, you're going to at least have to place some parts.
Statistics: Posted by hicks — Fri Jan 10, 2025 4:37 pm