Welcome!

This page is dedicated to coin-operated arcade games, vintage home computer and related electronics projects to preserve them on modern hardware.

<arcade projects> Most of my work is dedicated to arcade game PCBs - or to specify more in detail - to reverse-engineer circuitries and custom ICs used on such boards (which I buy here and there) on the one hand and to re-implement them in a FPGA on the other hand. As people working on this topic are spread around the world, I decided to set up my page in English.

<computing projects> My design target is the FPGAARCADE replay board, for arcade and also computing projects - check out this project page for more details.

I also use my new FPGA-DIL replacement board to replace more complex custom ICs like the Namco 51xx/54xx ICs. I also have some general VHDL-FPGA implementations available as separate projects which might be useful.

I also set up a page with some review of special hardware, which is usually required for my arcade projects, but these are not commonly found in typical hardware reviews...

And finally I have some hardware-related projects which are/were quite useful for my arcade reverse-engineering PCB projects. Maybe later on I'll add other (non-arcade related) hardware designs, too.

Feel free to contact me about them, maybe we can also share information or code which will help all of us!

Latest news:

Please check in from time to time to see how things evolve!


22th February 2015: A few updates done on this homepage...
7th February 2015: The Replay C64 core now contains a mature CIA, VIC-II and SID implementation, nearly all Lorenz test pass, many games run nicely (in CRT and D64 format)! :-)
1st January 2015: Happy new year, C64! Did several updates on the core, about to fix all opcodes on the t65 CPU I use (replicates the 6502/6510 CPU used on the C64 and VIC-20), which will be pushed back to opencores.
26th April 2014: The Replay C64 core contains a initial VIC-II and SID implementation, several games and demos working!
2nd March 2014: Started a "fresh" C64 implementation...
23th January 2014: Not a lot of updates here. Most work is done on my Replay board, thus I am very active on the Replay forum on the fpgaarcade web page!

11th August 2013: I was quite busy working on the fpgaarcade.com replay board. Now, first results are visible - Phoenix is running!
30th May 2013: Initial release of the FDIL v2 project - the ultimate 5V capable DIL replacement setup!
14th April 2013: Added new page about documenting my board/computer/electronics repairs. Click on "REPAIR logs" in the left menu!
6th April 2013: updated header image and logo, updated arcade project page. No significant information added.
1st April 2013: No joke! I implemented Phoenix on a FPGA, look here!
March: Sorry - quite busy at work again, but the easter weekend will come soon :-)
23th February 2013: 100% correct CPLD-based 05xx implementation available now! Check out my custom IC page.
8th January 2013: I set up the page for my 05xx starfield generator replacement, check out my custom IC page!
6th January 2013: Happy new year! Today I released the first setup code for the Nexys 2 and Nexys 3 FPGA boards of my Galaga project !
27th December 2012: Today I released the first code "officially" in my the new file area. It's from the 06xx custom IC project.
26th December 2012: There was a lot to do at work, so I didn't get any time to continue here. But I set up the new file area now! Step by step I'll prepare the downloadable project files now...
11th November 2012: The latest FPGA project is my so-called Xilinx Chipscope replacement, an embedded FPGA logic analyzer setup using jTag.
27th October 2012: The Galaga board project is done! I set up some special SCART cable for my replay board.
26th October 2012: The Popeye board project is running now on the replay board!
19th October 2012: My Galaga board project is nearly done, it boots nicely, just sound is missing!
23th September 2012: I continued with my Galaga board project. Video is fully functional, including my own starfield!
11th September 2012: Got my FPGA-DIL setup running to verify my Namco 54xx implementation on Galaga!
7th September 2012: Got my FPGA-DIL setup running to verify my Namco 51xx implementation on Galaga!
14th August 2012: The Popeye board is fully implemented, the game can be played!
12th August 2012: Updated my Popeye board project. Video is fully implemented now, check out the demo video!
30th June 2012: Fixed webpages for full css 3.0 compliance.
24th June 2012: Fixed webpages for full xhtml 1.0 compliance. Popeye project continued, text and background video works.
3rd June 2012: Continued with my Popeye board project. SERVICE and GAME mode starts up (with TXT-video).
1st June 2012: Finalizing new web setup, added mailing system, added redirectors from old pages - PUBLIC RELEASE @ 22:30!
31th May 2012: Moving content from old pages to new setup - not released yet for public.
30th May 2012: Moving content from old pages to new setup, all pages in SVN - not released yet for public.
29th May 2012: Started with new web page design. Still struggling with the css layout - not released yet for public.
14th May 2012: This weekend I did a clean-up of the modified ZX-Gate code. So I decided to release the sources!
8th May 2012: Frankly, it was already the 9th of May when I was able to load TAP files from SD-Card to the spectrum replay.
6th May 2012: Not a lot happed this Sunday, but at least I was able to implement VGA out to the "spectrum replay" setup.
5th May 2012: My "spectrum replay" implementation got colour video, audio and is able to load & run games!
1st May 2012: Couldn't wait to continue: I had to get the ZX Spectrum running. And I finally set up the "spectrum replay"!
30th April 2012: Great news after quite some pause! The FPGAArcade replay board turns in a "ZX81 replay" board - it works!
February-March: Sorry - currently I have not much time left, I am quite busy at work - but thats good for economy :-)
12th January 2012: Some updates on the project pages, especially for the Galaga board and about my replay board I own.
7th January 2012: Added a further uart peripheral and did some small fix on the I2C peripheral. Check the FPGA project page.
6th January 2012: Happy new year!!! After a short pause I did some further FPGA work on my own µC and released it.
23th December 2011: Finalized custom chip 06xx implementation using a CPLD replacement board, works on a Galaga board!
17th December 2011: Started implementing the Galaga video board on a FPGA.
11th December 2011: Currently I am working on a 54xx custom chip replacement.
10th December 2011: First page in the general project section about my self made logic tester.
10th December 2011: First page in the hardware section about my new dv3400 logic analyzer.
8th December 2011: Added the arcade related project page including some information on the 06xx custom chip.
3th December 2011: Started to set up this website and added some project pages and some hardware pages.