Ben Eater has built his own 8-bit computer, and documented the process.
I built a programmable 8-bit computer from scratch on breadboards using only simple logic gates. I documented the whole project in a series of YouTube videosand on this web site.
There’s something special about these DIY old-school projects that brings very fond memories back.
For those that aren’t sure.. that object underneath his right hand is a paperback manual.
Are you saying Eater has a lot of fun with *bread*boards? Are they wholegrain?
I did something similar for a digital logic class I took back in college. It’s lots of fun making your own processor – everyone involved in computers should do it at least once in their life. The most expensive part is the breadboards you need – the parts themselves, being simple 7400 logic chips and the like, are ridiculously cheap.
I made my processor microcoded, using a bunch of EPROMs for the microcode. Wrote my own microcode compiler to generate files to burn in the EPROMs. I also had one level of pipe-lining in the design. Got an A for project.