Stew 3000

2021

As a capstone project, my friend Stewart Morris constructed an 8-bit computer made from breadboards, inspired by Ben Eater's project. We decided to further expand both the hardware and the software it is capable of running, which led to what we are calling the "Stew 3000": an 8-bit computer with a compiler, assembler, loader, and emulator.

The 3000, early August 2021.

Hardware

Here is a bit about the hardware itself. The Stew 3000 has:

• 256 bytes of program memory (for storing code)
• 256 bytes of memory for a runtime stack
• Three general purpose registers (A, B, and C), a stack pointer register (SP), and a program counter register
• Four flags: sign flag, zero flag, carry flag, and overflow flag
• A display capable of displaying 3-digit decimal numbers
• An LCD display capable of displaying strings

Software

On top of this architecture, we have put together an instruction set that supports over 200 instructions. Our assembler converts textual assembly programs written with the supported instruction set into binaries that consist solely of bytes that can be loaded into the actual machine's memory.

Our compiler allows users to program the 3000 in a C-like high-level language, using features like types, pointers, strings, arrays, and functions. This high-level code is compiled down into 3000 assembly, with a goal of producing small programs that will fit into the machine's 256 bytes of program memory.

Documentation and Source

We have set up a wiki for the Stew 3000, where we hope to provide more in-depth documentation. If you are curious please check that out!

The project source can be found here.