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The 4-Bit Eight Bit Processor – AMI S2000 and Iskra EMZ1001 (cpushack.com)
31 points by zdw on June 15, 2023 | hide | past | favorite | 5 comments


Apparently such a mixed 4/8 bit design is not all that unusual, the most popular 8-bit CPU (Z80) also has a 4-bit ALU:

https://www.righto.com/2013/09/the-z-80-has-4-bit-alu-heres-...


Capabilities wise it seems to be about the same as a MOS6507 like you would find in an ATARI 2600, save for the fact that it's clocked at around 1/5 the speed of that budget priced and somewhat anemic chip. Being launched 2 years later it is not a big surprise it struggled to find a market in the US.


I love that CPU Shack is still around. What a great heap of awesome content.


FTA: Back in 1975 the Faculty of Electrical Engineering of the University of Ljubljana […] began work with Iskra and AMI to develop an indigenously produced processor […] It wasn’t meant to be a general purpose computer type processor cranking out spreadsheet formula results.

No CPU of that time frame was. http://www.bricklin.com/history/saiidea.htm: “The idea for the electronic spreadsheet came to me while I was a student at the Harvard Business School, working on my MBA degree, in the spring of 1978”


Are there Rudi Čajavec CPUs as well? :) I only know Iskra as a (literal) spark plug brand.




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