The end of life of the Z80 in it's original 40 pin form back in April was a bit of a blow, as that was the heart of a lot of projects in production, and even more that were still in development.
At the time, I tried to buy in enough Z80s to keep me going for a short while, but it was a bit of a thin time for me, so I was only able to get enough to cover a final batch or two of Minstrel kits.
That was further frustrated when I finally did get a bit of money in and went looking for Z80s only to find my usually suppliers had already sold out. I knew it would happen, but was hoping I might scrape through.
One site was actually showing several hundred in stock, but it wouldn't let me order any, and when I checked with their customer support there was apparently an order already in the system and the stock hadn't been updated.
When it was updated, it was updated to 0. Obsolete, no longer manufactured.
Missed them by a day.
Another supplier did look promising as it was showing them as available to backorder.
But when I did order, I got an email the next days saying they were unable to fulfill the order and it had been cancelled.
(They are still showing as available for backorder)
I was resigned to the fact that all those projects were dead, and I put fresh effort into reviving some old 6502 projects that had stalled in the past.
Including one which now has a very yellow PCB.
And another with at least one deliberate mistake.....
(missing the slot in the datasette connector)
More on those later.... (or now if you are on my Patreon)
What to do?
I was still upset about missing out on the last of the Z80s.
I would occasionally check around to see if anyone had magically found some stock behind the fridge (or rather when their last time buy allocations would appear).
The problem is the Z80 CPU was always listed in strange places, and in strange ways.
It often appeared as "ROMless microcontroller" or things like that, not immediately obvious that it was the right thing. The part number was never anything simple like "Z80 CPU", it was Z84C00xx with xx being 04 06 08 10 or 20 depending on the speed grade. I normally bough the 10MHz version as they were the same price as the slower speeds and only the 20Hz was more expensive.
Even in those days it seemed like Zilog (or LittleDiode I think the parent company) didn't care about the Z80, with the confusing descriptions, obfuscated part numbers and listings with badly photocopied 90s product catalogues.
And then one day last week (this was originally on Patreon last month), I found some in stock.
They are the 8MHz version, which is fine. The ZX80 and ZX81 (and the Minstrel 2 and 3) run at 3.25MHz, so any of those would do. The Minstrel 4th runs at 6.5MHz, and the RC2014 in general runs at 7.372MHz, so the 8MHz covers all of those.
I did a silly thing.
I decided to do what may turn out to be a silly thing, or maybe it will turn out to have been a good decision. Time will tell.
I didn't think I would get the chance again, and I know I had been disappointed when I missed out before.
So I bought a lifetime supply of Z80 chips.
That may be optimistic in both the number of Z80 based kits I would sell, and also how long my lifetime may be, but either way, it will cover me for the foreseeable future.
Lots and lots of Z80s.
2024 date code, 27th week, that would make it July 1 to July 7 2024, some of the last Z80s ever made.
A Change of Plan
All Z80 developments are back on the table. All systems go!
The Minstrel 2 and 3 are back then, and I have respun both in the "+ keyboard" versions that were previously TFW8b exclusives.
It is a bit of a gamble, I have invested a lot of time and money into parts to relaunch these kits, so I hope they will sell.
In order to give them the best change, I have reopened by Tindie store and listed them on there.
All kits will be supplied with one of those 2427 date coded Z80s.
I currently have four listings:
Minstrel 2 For ZX81 Case
Minstrel 2 With Keyboard
Minstrel 3 For ZX81 Case
Minstrel 3 With Keyboard
Minstrel 3 Full With Keyboard and ZXpand Micro
(should be live shortly)
I plan to move all the listings over to Tindie, so let me know if there is anything I haven't listed yet and I will get that added.
Shipping should be worldwide, and hopefully won't have all the issues with European shipping I had at SellMyRetro. As ever, international orders may be subject to additional charges at customs.
Anything else?
It also means other things can continue to be developed.
Some of the other project may also still see the light of day.
I have a a couple of other 8-bit computer compatible kits in the works, and another big project that has been on and off several times.
The Mini Micro Professor would also need a Z80-CTC and a Z80-PIO, and I think everyone has sold out of those, but again, Zilog part numbers make them a pain to search for.
Conclusion
I may never sell another Minstrel kit and could be left with a big box full of Z80s but I hope this wasn't the absurdly silly thing it might seem.
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I am slowly going through everything and adding them to Tindie, if there is anything you specifically want, let me know and I will get that added.
Shipping should be worldwide, and hopefully won't have all the issues with European shipping I had at SellMyRetro. As ever, international orders may be subject to additional charges at customs.
Patreon
You can support me via Patreon, and get access to advance previews of posts like this and behind the scenes updates. These are often in more detail than I can fit in here, and some of these posts contain bits from several Patreon posts. This also includes access to my Patreon only Discord server for even more regular updates.
