PlasMa simulates a complete mini/mainframe system in a self-contained desktop-sized box with real lights and switches. The system is comprised of a simulated ‘mini-like’ processor with a small amount of main memory, and simulated ‘mainframe-like’ peripherals such as a paper tape reader and punch, mag tapes, exchangeable disks and an operators console.
The processor is ‘micro-coded’ and can run (currently) 3 different instruction sets; two based on the Princeton TOY architecture with 2K words memory for educational use, and a more advanced home-grown ISA based on NICE, with 64K words memory and floating point.
The simulation runs on an ATmega2560 MCU which also controls the user-interface comprising approx 540 LEDs, 100 switches, 6 SD-cards for the storage peripherals, LCD screen, keypad, speaker, Centronics interface for a dot-matrix printer, PS/2 interface for a qwerty keyboard… and a MIDI in & out interface for fun.
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