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    Nintendo Gameboy Architecture and Design: Mitchell Cook and George Day

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    Ray Joshua
    The Nintendo Gameboy was an 8-bit handheld device released in 1989. It used a hybrid CPU based on the Intel 8080 and Zilog Z80 that operated at 4MHz. It had 8KB of RAM and could address up to 64KB of memory, with cartridges providing additional swappable ROM banks. While using older 8-bit hardware, the Gameboy was innovative in bringing console-quality games to a portable device and helped establish precedents for modern mobile devices.

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    Nintendo Gameboy Architecture and Design: Mitchell Cook and George Day

    Uploaded by

    Ray Joshua
    44 views14 pages
    The Nintendo Gameboy was an 8-bit handheld device released in 1989. It used a hybrid CPU based on the Intel 8080 and Zilog Z80 that operated at 4MHz. It had 8KB of RAM and could address up to 64KB of memory, with cartridges providing additional swappable ROM banks. While using older 8-bit hardware, the Gameboy was innovative in bringing console-quality games to a portable device and helped establish precedents for modern mobile devices.

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    The Nintendo Gameboy was an 8-bit handheld device released in 1989. It used a hybrid CPU based on the Intel 8080 and Zilog Z80 that operated at 4MHz. It had 8KB of RAM and could address up to 64KB of memory, with cartridges providing additional swappable ROM banks. While using older 8-bit hardware, the Gameboy was innovative in bringing console-quality games to a portable device and helped establish precedents for modern mobile devices.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    44 views14 pages

    Nintendo Gameboy Architecture and Design: Mitchell Cook and George Day

    Uploaded by

    Ray Joshua
    The Nintendo Gameboy was an 8-bit handheld device released in 1989. It used a hybrid CPU based on the Intel 8080 and Zilog Z80 that operated at 4MHz. It had 8KB of RAM and could address up to 64KB of memory, with cartridges providing additional swappable ROM banks. While using older 8-bit hardware, the Gameboy was innovative in bringing console-quality games to a portable device and helped establish precedents for modern mobile devices.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
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    Download as pdf or txt
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    Nintendo Gameboy

    Architecture and Design


    Mitchell Cook and George Day
    Gameboy: Overview
    • History
    • CPU
    o Z80
    o 8080
    o Hybrid
    • Memory
    o Cartridges
    ƒ Reading
    ƒ Structure
    Gameboy: History
    • 8-bit handheld device
    o Successor of Game and
    Watch series (1980)
    o Older hardware / mobility focus
    • Nintendo
    o Released April 21, 1989 (JPN)
    o Gunpei Yokoi + Nintendo R&D1
    • Foundation for the Gameboy
    handheld series
    • Helped set precedents for mobile
    devices
    Gameboy: Technical Details
    • CPU: 8-bit Hybrid Zilog Z80 and Intel 8080 based processor
    o Result: Sharp LR35902
    • Clock Speed: 4.19 MHz
    • Working RAM: 8KB
    • Video RAM: 8KB
    • Resolution: 160x144 (2.6” screen)
    • Colors: 4 gray shades
    • Sound: 4 channels with stereo sound
    • Power: DC 6V, 0.7W
    Intel 8080: History
    • “The first truly usable microprocessor”
    o Huge industry impact
    • General Purpose Microprocessor
    • Main Design: Intel Engineers:
    o Federico Faggin
    o Masatoshi Shima
    • Released April 1974
    Intel 8080: Technical Details
    • Opcode usage
    • 16 bit address bus
    • 8 bit data bus
    • 64KB of byte-addressable memory
    • 2MHz clock speed
    • Registers:
    o 8 bit accumulator
    o 8 bit status register
    o Six 8 bit general purpose registers
    o 16 bit stack pointer
    o 16 bit program counter
    Zilog Z80: History
    • Origin of Zilog
    • Superset of the 8080
    • 8080 similarities
    o Design team - Intel 8080 Engineers
    ƒ Ralph Ungermann
    ƒ Federico Faggin
    o Binary Compatibility with 8080
    o Opcode usage
    • General Purpose Microprocessor
    • Released July 1976
    Zilog Z80: Technical Details
    • Instruction extender: 0xCB
    • Interrupt system
    • Special IX + IY registers
    • 2.5 MHz clock speed
    • Based off of 8080 - similar capabilities
    o Similar registers, stack pointer,
    program counter, bus sizes
    Sharp LR35902: Comparisons
    • Custom hybrid of the Z80 + 8080
    o Application specific
    • ISA + Syntax: Z80
    • Instruction extender: Z80
    o Bit-manipulation instructions
    • Register set: 8080
    o No IX, IY (no index + base addressing)
    • Faster clock speed: 4 MHz
    • Single address space: no IO addresses
    • 8080 - 1974, Z80 - 1976, Gameboy - 1989
    • Design of hardware for the device
    Memory
    • 16 bit address bus =
    64kB address space
    • GamePak: 0000-7FFF and A000-BFFF
    • “Character RAM” = Video RAM
    o Split into 32x32 tiles, 8x8 pixels each
    o Total of 256x256 pixels, with
    160x144pixels displayed at a time
    The GamePak
    • 32-pin edge connector
    • ROM split into 16kB blocks
    o Memory map of the system
    supports 1 permanent bank
    and 1 switchable bank
    o Swapped using Memory
    Bank Controllers (MBC)
    • 8kB of RAM
    o Battery sometimes required
    Memory Bank Controllers
    • Manages the bank swapping of the GamePak
    • Five versions
    o MBC1-MBC5
    o Expands ROM capacity to 2MB-8MB
    • Requires explicit activation
    Conclusion
    • Hybrid CPU
    o Intel 8080
    o Zilog Z80
    • Emphasis on older hardware
    o 10+ year old CPU
    • Memory
    o 64kB of total addressing space
    o 16kB swappable banks on the cartridge
    • Innovation
    Sources
    Text Sources
    • "DuoDreamer's Dreamscape." DuoDreamer's Dreamscape. N.p., n.d. Web. 5 Dec. 2013.
    <http://gameboy.mongenel.com/dmg/asmmemmap.html>.
    • "Game Boy." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 12 Mar. 2013. Web. 5 Dec. 2013. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_Boy>.
    • "GameBoy Dev'rs - Hardware." GameBoy Dev'rs - Hardware. N.p., n.d. Web. 5 Dec. 2013.
    <http://www.devrs.com/gb/hardware.php#hardgb>.
    • "Gamebody Developer Wiki." GbdevWiki RSS. N.p., n.d. Web. 5 Dec. 2013. <http://gbdev.gg8.se/wiki/articles/>.
    • Rawer, Marc. "Gameboy Manual." Marc Rawer, n.d. Web. 5 Dec. 2013. <http://marc.rawer.de/Gameboy/Docs/GBCPUman.pdf>.
    • "RealBoy." RealBoy. N.p., n.d. Web. 5 Dec. 2013. <http://realboyemulator.wordpress.com/>.
    • "Technical Information." GameBoy. N.p., n.d. Web. 5 Dec. 2013. <http://fms.komkon.org/GameBoy/Tech/>.

    Image Sources
    • "Game Boy." (Platform). N.p., n.d. Web. 5 Dec. 2013. <http://www.giantbomb.com/game-boy/3045-3/>.
    • "Game Boy." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 12 Mar. 2013. Web. 5 Dec. 2013. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_Boy>.
    • "Intel." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 12 Mar. 2013. Web. 4 Dec. 2013. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel>.
    • "Intel 8080." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 12 May 2013. Web. 4 Dec. 2013. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_8080>.
    • "Zilog Logo." Segaretro.org. N.p., n.d. Web. 5 Dec. 2013. <http://segaretro.org/File:Zilog_logo.svg>.

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