Synertek, Inc. was an American semiconductor manufacturer founded in 1973. The initial founding group consisted of Bob Schreiner (from Fairchild), Dan Floyd, Zvi Grinfas, Jack Balletto, and Gunnar Wetlesen. The manufacturing technology was MOS/LSI.
Initial products included custom designed devices, as well as a line of standard products (static RAMs, ROMs, dynamic and static shift registers) and then, sometime before 1979, second sourced versions of MOS Technology’s successful 6502 8-bit microprocessor, and the (less successful) Philips/Signetics 2650 processor and Zilog Z8 microcomputer.
Major customers included Atari (for its video game product line their biggest customer at a certain point of time) and Apple Computer (for its Apple II computer).
In the days leading up to the 1977 West Coast Computer Faire, Steve Wozniak chose to use a Synertek ROM chip for the Apple II, which was revealed at the event, after a chip from American Megatrends didn’t arrive on time.
Here some pages with information on Synertek, Micro Associates and my SYM-1 systems.
Synertek acquired Microcomputer Associates, Incorporated, consisting of engineers Manny Lemas and Ray Holt, after which it was renamed Synertek Systems, Inc. and established as a subsidiary. In 1978, Synertek Systems released a 6502-based single board computer/evaluation kit called the SYM-1, a derivative of MOS Technology/Commodore Semiconductor Group’s KIM-1.
Synertek’s semiconductor fabrication plant in Santa Clara, California operated from 1974 to 1985. Sometime after 1979, Synertek was acquired by Honeywell and set up as a subsidiary. Later, around 1983, construction began for an additional manufacturing facility in Santa Cruz, California. There was Superfund attention to pollution at the Synertek factory site. When market conditions deteriorated, primarily because of business downturns at Atari, work was stopped at the Santa Cruz facility and it was later sold. Honeywell shut down operations at Synertek in 1985 and assets were sold off (from Wikipedia).
Part of Chapter 5, systems, of the Synertek Databook 1983, note the Jolt was still available.
On these pages some information on the Jolt and Super Jolt and Microcomputer Associates.
Microcomputer Associates company played an important role in the 6502 SBCs, TIM, KIM-1 and SYM-1 all contain results of their work.
The company continued as Synertek Systems with the Superjolt, SYM-1 and more.
One of the first 6502 systems was the Jolt. Built around the 6502 and the TIM 6530-004 RRIOT. The TIM software is developed by Micro Associates for MOS Technology.
The Jolt was superceded by the Superjolt, Micro Associates became Synertek Systems.
A KIM-1 clone build by Bob Applegate of Corsham technologies.
Somewhat inspired by the microKIM by Vince Briel, who was inpired by Ruud Baltissen! The idea is replace the 6530’s with 6532 and by carefull memory decoding have the I/O, timer and RAM of the 6532s appear at the same locations as the 6530-002 and -003. ROM is added with an EPROM.
Not an exact copy, the ROM has been changed/enhanced with a KIM Monitor by Bob, though the original KIM-1 ROM should work also.
The short-lived 6501 by MOS Technology appeared as far as I know only in a board made by The Digital Group.
Aroudn 1975 The Digital Group created their new, reasonably priced, multiple-board computer system with these advanced features:
– Intel 8080, Motorola 6800, or MOS 6500 CPU card
– video display/cassette interface card
– 8-bit parallel input/output ports
– 2KB dynamic memory
– The 3-board Intel or Motorola CPU kit cost $425, while the MOS 6500 CPU kit cost $375. Later, the Zilog Z-80 CPU was added to the selection for $475.
The Digital Group didn’t just copy the MITS Altair design as others did, they improved upon it, with features not available in other systems. For one, the DG system loads the Operating System from the cassette drive automatically with little user interaction. Additionally, the DG system was available with four different CPU cards – the rest of the system remains fully compatible, no matter what CPU card was installed. Technically, the DG system has three different buses for CPU, memory, and I/O. Because of this, the card slots are different sizes and dedicated to each card type:
Thaler AG is a German company, still in business. Around 1983 the company sold a 6502 development system in the format of a SBC, size 2x Euroboard, and several enhancements for it under the name CT-6502 or CT-65. 6502 based, hex keyboard and the usual 6 seven segment LED displays, audio cassette storage.
In 1984 a smaller and stripped version SBC was produced, named MPS-65, size Euroboard. Accompanied by add-on boards such as VIA board and cassette interface. Same software, same keyboard and displays, more modern technology, no cassette storage, less ROM sockets.
In the German magazine MC adverts and articles were published in 1983 and 1984 (thanks user GaBuZoMeu on 6502.org), shown here:
CT-6502
(video by the previous owner, Cristian)
A SBC in the KIM-1 style. Keyboard with 24 keys, 6 seven segment LED displays, simple audio cassette storage, 2K RAM, 2K EPROM.
The manual contains a description of the extensive commands available on the keyboard, circuit diagrams and other interesting facts. A source listing of the system ROM has never been published, only the entry points are documented in the (enhanced) manual.
MPS-65
A rare 6502 SBC. Only two have been seen by me. One is shown by user mba on the forum at 6502.org, who also dumped the system ROM in EPROM. The other was shown on the Facebook group “6502 Homebrew Hardware and Programming” by user Ian Day. who build this system in the 80ties. The MPS65 is a stripped down version of the CT-65, missing ROM sockets and audio cassette storage.
The Euroboard sized SBC has a 6-digit LED display, a 24 keyboard with hex keys and several function keys. Requires a stabilized power supply 5V. WIth expansion connector 64 pins, Siemens SMP bus compatible. On the board is written MPS 65-2. At the bottom of the inscription Thaler (the same inscription is in ROM, in addition to the date 1984.
“MPS 65-2”, “THALER” and “85-1-1” are labels on the CPU board (mba system). The ROM contains (C)BY THALER1/1984
MPS 65-2 owned by mba
Ian Day system
Address selection MPS-65
Ian supplied a dump of the still operational 82S126 PROM.
Output 4 is Rom (16 pages, 8 would be enough for 2716, optional 4K 2732?), three is Ram (8 pages, 2K SRAM 6116) and two is VIA 6522, one page .
Note that the CT-65 has a different PROM and four chip select lines are generated, see the manual.
Memory map MPS-65 and CT-65
0000 RAM, 6116 2K (2x 2114 on CT-65)
A000 6522
E000 and E003 addresses are called by routines in the system ROM. The ROM socket for ROM at E000 are not present on the MPS-2, only on the CT-65.
F800 ROM, 2K 2716
Requires a stabilized power supply 5V
CPU
A 1 (mba system) or 2 (Ian Day) MHz crystal delivers the clock. CPU can be 6502 (mba) or 65C02 (Ian Day)
Power on Reset
A transistor a capacitor and resistor (and the 74LS00) drive the power on reset.
LED and Keyboard
A VIA 6522 supplies I/O for the keyboard/LED display. The darlington array ULN2003 (mba system) or RS307-109 (Ian Day) is driven from the 6522 and goes through limiting resistors and up to the 7 individual segments of the LEDS. So this drives the rows of the display. 6 transistors drive the columns.
RAM is 6116 SRAM, supplying zero page, stack and the RAM for user programs at $0200. The CT-65 uses 2 2114 for 1K RAM
ROM is 2K 2716 at $F800 (memory decode may point to 2732 support). Empry IC sockets on the CT-65 for E000-F7FF
System Rom
The MPS-2 and CT-65 systems seem to share the same system ROM. Some functions can not be used on the MPS_2 such as Load and Save due to missing hardware.
User mba made a dump of the MPS-2 sytem ROM. Binary file here, in hex format here. In theory this is the same system ROM as the CT-65 uses. From the magazine article I read that an updated version for the CT-65 was developed, it is safe to assume this updated version is also used for the later MPS-65.
A disassembly has been made by me, see the assembler source here
Not too much comments yet. The jumptable at the start has been filled in with information found in the manual. Not yet tried to assemble the source!
Ian Day also disassembled his ROM of the MPS-65 and it is different in subtle ways, see it here. And here the dump of his ROM.
Ian Day designed a clone of the MPS-65. All design files here at Easy EDA
Replacement of some old prom by a GAL, Application to a Thaler MPS-65 board
Didier form aida.org was approached by his friend Erik about a malfunctioning MPS-65.
By studying the material on this page and doing measurements on the board it was decided the PROM on the board was malfunctioning.
So Didier designed a GAL replacement for the PROM and the board came back to life!
