Motorola 68000 Educational Computer Board

<h2 id="hardware">Hardware</h2>
<ul><li>CPU: 4-<a href="/facts/Megahertz/6Wshj5qm">MHz</a> Motorola 68000</li>
<li><a href="/facts/Random_access_memory/DuD4bxh6">RAM</a>: 32<a href="/facts/Kilobyte/jIe6t4yv">KB</a></li>
<li><a href="/facts/Read_only_memory/P9QMuDLH">ROM</a>: 16KB</li>
<li>9600 <a href="/facts/Baud/uCsmXrdT">baud</a> <a href="/facts/Serial_port/VpcrH530">serial port</a> for <a href="/facts/Computer_terminal/fSlx05qV">dumb terminal</a> connection</li>
<li>9600 baud serial port for host computer connection</li>
<li><a href="/facts/Parallel_port/qpkjH8ts">Parallel port</a> for communication and printer connection</li>
<li>Audio output for <a href="/facts/Magnetic_tape_data_storage/qJUpJnk9">tape storage</a></li>
<li>24-bit <a href="/facts/Programmable_interval_timer/2hpRmVAl">programmable interval timer</a></li>
<li><a href="/facts/Wire-wrap/MwwjB67E">Wire-wrap</a> area for custom circuitry</li>
<li>Required power <a href="/facts/Voltages/EN2po6N2">voltages</a>: -12V, +5V and +12V</li></ul>
<h2 id="software">Software</h2>
<p>The board has built-in 16K ROM memory containing assembly/disassembly/stepping/monitoring software called TUTOR. The software was operated using <a href="/facts/Command-line_interface/R9JpGmXQ">command-line interface</a> over a serial link, and provided many commands useful in machine code debugging. Memory contents (including programs) could be dumped via a serial link to a file on the host computer. The file was transferred in Motorola's <a href="/facts/SREC_(file_format)/EkyL5b8R">S-Record</a> format. Similarly, files from host could be uploaded to the board's arbitrary user memory area.
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<h2 id="price">Price</h2>
<p>The price of the Motorola ECB at launch was US$495 (equivalent to $1,710 in 2024)<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:1" href="#fn:1"><sup>1</sup></a> which was relatively inexpensive for a computer with an advanced for that time 16/32-bit CPU.
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<h2 id="use">Use</h2>
<p>According to the manual, for basic use only a dumb terminal and power source are required. However, it seems that in colleges the board was predominantly used in connection with a time-sharing host computer to teach assembly language programming and other computer science subjects.<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:2" href="#fn:2"><sup>2</sup></a>
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<p>MC68000 Educational Computer Board User's Manual
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<h2 id="external-links">External links</h2>
<ul><li>MC68000 Educational Computer Board User's Manual <a href="https://archive.org/details/bitsavers_motorola68CBD2EduCompBdJul82_8791580">[1]</a></li></ul>

<h2 id="references">References</h2>

<ol>
<li id="fn:1"><p>"The M68000 Educational Computer Board". BYTE Magazine. 1983-10-01. Retrieved 2021-08-13. <a href="https://archive.org/details/byte-magazine-1983-10/page/n325/mode/2up" target="_blank">https://archive.org/details/byte-magazine-1983-10/page/n325/mode/2up</a> <a href="#fnref:1" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li>
<li id="fn:2"><p>The Atmel AVR Microcontroller: MEGA and XMEGA in Assembly and C. Han-Way Huang. 14 January 2013. ISBN 978-1285500089. <a href="978-1285500089" target="_blank">978-1285500089</a> <a href="#fnref:2" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li>
</ol>

Motorola 68000 Educational Computer Board open-in-new

Motorola 68000 Educational Computer Board