Atari 2600 ROM fetch simulated at CMOS FET level

A designer has created a simulation that shows how an almost 50-year-old computer fetches data from ROM, rendering the process down to the CMOS FET level. The clip tracks data moving between circuits on a very small scale; it's scattered and fast, but visually striking.

The simulation uses the TT09 Atari circuit from Tiny Tapeout, a chip platform that relies on community feedback and open source models to create chip designs. The creator built their work on Tiny Tapeout's model and shared the short clip on X. They say a testable version is in development, so others should soon be able to run this simulation or recreate similar models of old chips themselves.

The Atari 2600 at the heart of the demo launched in 1977 in North America, with Europe and Japan following later; it cost just under $200 at launch (around $1,000 today), and featured 128 bytes of RAM and an 8-bit 1.19 MHz CPU, using ROM cartridges for games.

North America

atari 2600, cmos fet, rom fetch, chip simulation, tiny tapeout, tt09, open source, rom cartridge, 1.19 mhz, 128 bytes