Western Design Center

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Western Design Center

The Western Design Center (WDC), located in Mesa, Arizona

Mesa, Arizona

Mesa is a city in Maricopa County, Arizona, in the U.S. state of Arizona and is a suburb of Phoenix, Arizona, within the Phoenix Metropolitan Area....
, USA

United States

The United States of America is a Federal government constitutional republic comprising U.S. state and a federal district. The country is situated mostly in central North America, where its Contiguous United States and Washington, D.C., the Capital districts and territories, lie between the Pacific Ocean and Atlantic Oceans, Borders of the U...
, is a company developing and manufacturing MOS 65xx

MOS Technology 65xx

MOS Technology 65xx is a family of 8-bit microprocessors from MOS Technology, based on the Motorola Motorola 6800 . The 65xx family most notably included the MOS Technology 6502, used in several home computers such as the Commodore PET and Commodore VIC-20, the Apple II family, and the Atari 8-bit family....
-based microprocessor

Microprocessor

A microprocessor incorporates most or all of the functions of a central processing unit on a single integrated circuit . The first microprocessors emerged in the early 1970s and were used for electronic calculators, using Binary-coded decimal arithmetic on 4-bit Word ....
s, microcontroller

Microcontroller

A microcontroller is a small computer on a single integrated circuit consisting of a relatively simple CPU combined with support functions such as a crystal oscillator, timers, watchdog, serial and analog I/O etc....
s (µCs), and related support chips. WDC was founded in 1978 by co-holder of the MOS Technology

MOS Technology

MOS Technology, Inc., also known as CSG , was a integrated circuit design and Semiconductor device fabrication company based in Norristown, Pennsylvania, in the United States....
6502

MOS Technology 6502

The MOS Technology 6502 is an 8-bit microprocessor that was designed by Chuck Peddle and Bill Mensch for MOS Technology in 1975. When it was introduced, it was the least expensive full-featured central processing unit on the market by a considerable margin, costing less than one-sixth the price of competing designs from larger companies such...
patent, Bill Mensch

Bill Mensch

United States engineer William David Mensch, Jr., born 9 February 1945 in Quakertown, Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania, is the founder, chairman and CEO of the Western Design Center of Mesa, Arizona, Arizona....
, himself a former MOS employee.

In addition to the actual microchips, WDC offers chips designs in the form of IP cores to be used inside other chips (like ASIC

Application-specific integrated circuit

An application-specific integrated circuit is an integrated circuit customized for a particular use, rather than intended for general-purpose use....
s), and provides ASIC and embedded system

Embedded system

An embedded system is a special-purpose computer system designed to perform one or a few dedicated functions, often with real-time computing constraints....
s consulting services revolving around their processor designs.

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Encyclopedia

The Western Design Center (WDC), located in Mesa, Arizona

Mesa, Arizona

Mesa is a city in Maricopa County, Arizona, in the U.S. state of Arizona and is a suburb of Phoenix, Arizona, within the Phoenix Metropolitan Area....
, USA

United States

MOS Technology 65xx

Microprocessor

Microcontroller

MOS Technology

MOS Technology, Inc., also known as CSG , was a integrated circuit design and Semiconductor device fabrication company based in Norristown, Pennsylvania, in the United States....
6502

MOS Technology 6502

Bill Mensch

Application-specific integrated circuit

An application-specific integrated circuit is an integrated circuit customized for a particular use, rather than intended for general-purpose use....
s), and provides ASIC and embedded system

Embedded system

C (programming language)

C is a general-purpose computer programming language originally developed in 1972 by Dennis Ritchie at the Bell Telephone Laboratories to implement the Unix operating system....
compiler

Compiler

A compiler is a computer program that transforms source code written in a programming language into another computer language . The most common reason for wanting to transform source code is to create an executable program....
s, assembler

Assembly language

An assembly language is a low-level language for programming computers. It implements a symbolic representation of the numeric machine codes and other constants needed to program a particular CPU architecture....
/linker

Linker

In computer science, a linker or link editor is a computer program that takes one ormore object file generated by a compiler and combines them into a single executable program....
packages, simulator

Simulation

Simulation is the imitation of some real thing, state of affairs, or process. The act of simulating something generally entails representing certain key characteristics or behaviors of a selected physical or abstract system....
s, development/evaluation board

Printed circuit board

A printed circuit board, or PCB, is used to mechanically support and electrically connect electronic components using Conductor pathways, or signal traces, industrial etchinged from copper sheets laminated onto a non-conductive substrate....
s, and in-circuit emulator

In-circuit emulator

An in-circuit emulator is a hardware device used to debugger the software of an embedded system. It is usually in the form of bond-out processor which has many internal signals brought out for the purpose of debugging....
s for their processors.

Hardware products

Microchips

Name	Type	Comments
W65C02S WDC 65C02 The Western Design Center WDC 65C02 microprocessor is an upgraded CMOS version of the popular NMOS logic-based MOS Technology 6502 8-bit central processing unit — the CMOS redesign being made by Bill Mensch of the Western Design Center ....	8-bit 8-bit Eight-bit CPUs normally use an 8-bit data bus and a 16-bit address bus which means that their address space is limited to 64 KBs. This is not a "natural law", however, so there are exceptions.... CPU	Bug-fixed CMOS version of the originally NMOS NMOS logic nMOS logic uses n-type metal-oxide-semiconductor field effect transistors to implement logic gates and other digital circuits. nMOS transistors have three modes of operation: cut-off, triode, and saturation .... -based 6502
W65C134S WDC 65C134 The Western Design Center W65C134S microcomputer is a complete fully static 8-bit computer fabricated on a single chip using a low power CMOS process....	8-bit µC	Microcontroller with W65C02S CPU core
W65C21S WDC 65C21 The W65C21S is a very flexible Peripheral Interface Adapter for use with WDC?s 65xx and other 8-bit microprocessor families. It is produced by Western Design Center....	I/O Input/output In computing, input/output, or I/O, refers to the communication between an information processing system , and the outside world ? possibly a human, or another information processing system.... chip	Compatible with the 6520 Peripheral Interface Adapter (PIA)
W65C22S WDC 65C22 The W65C22S Versatile Interface Adapter is an I/O device for use with the MOS Technology 65xx microprocessor family. The W65C22S is compatible with the MOS Technology 6522 and includes functions for programmed control of two peripheral ports ....	I/O chip	Compatible with the 6522 MOS Technology 6522 The 6522 Versatile Interface Adapter was an integrated circuit made by MOS Technology, as well as second sources including Rockwell and Synertek.... Versatile Interface Adapter (VIA)
W65C51S WDC 65C51 The CMOS W65C51S Asynchronous Communications Interface Adapter provides an easily implemented, program controlled interface between microprocessor based systems and serial communication data sets and modems....	I/O chip	Serial comms chip compatible with the 6551 MOS Technology 6551 The 6551 Asynchronous Communications Interface Adapter was an integrated circuit made by MOS Technology. It served as a companion UART chip for the widely popular MOS Technology 6502 microprocessor.... Asynchronous Communications Interface Adapter (ACIA)
W65C816S WDC 65816/65802 The WDC 65816 , a 16-bit microprocessor central processing unit developed by the Western Design Center, is an expanded and compatible successor to the venerable MOS Technology MOS Technology 6502....	16-bit 16-bit 16-bit architectureThe HP 2100#Descendants and variants , introduced in 1975, was the world's first 16-bit microprocessor.Prominent 16-bit processors include the PDP-11, Intel 8086, Intel 80286 and the WDC 65C816.... CPU	16-bit compatible follow-up to the W65C02; 24-bit address bus Address bus An address bus is a computer bus that is used to specify a memory address. When a central processing unit or direct memory access-enabled device needs to read or write to a memory location, it specifies that memory location on the address bus ....
W65C802S WDC 65816/65802 The WDC 65816 , a 16-bit microprocessor central processing unit developed by the Western Design Center, is an expanded and compatible successor to the venerable MOS Technology MOS Technology 6502....	16-bit CPU	65816 version with 16-bit address bus; pin-compatible drop-in replacement for 6502 (no longer available)
W65C265S WDC 65C265 The Western Design Center W65C265S microcomputer is a complete fully static 16-bit computer fabricated on a single chip using a Hi-Rel low power CMOS process....	16-bit µC	Microcontroller with W65C816S CPU core
W65T32 Terbium(1)	32-bit 32-bit The range of integer values that can be stored in 32 bits is 0 through 4,294,967,295 or -2,147,483,648 through 2,147,483,647 using two's complement encoding.... CPU	A compatible 32-bit follow-up to the W65C816. The Terbium is named after the 65th element Terbium Terbium is a chemical element with the symbol Tb and atomic number 65.... as 65 is the prefix to all of WDC's microprocessor number identifiers. The chip has a 32-bit address bus, a 16-bit data bus, and a variable length instruction set Instruction set An instruction set is a list of all the instruction , and all their variations, that a processor can execute.Instructions include:* Arithmetic such as add and subtract... .

(1) In development as of February 2007.

Other

The Mensch Computer
Mensch Computer

The Mensch Computer is a computer system based on the WDC 65C265 microcontroller and produced by the Western Design Center. The computer system is named after Bill Mensch, designer of the 6502 and subsequent series of microprocessor....
– A W65C265 and W65C22-based hobbyist experiment computer named after company founder Bill Mensch.

Western Design Center

Hardware products

Microchips

Other

External links