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Home of the PiTrex



An adapter for controlling the Vectrex video game console using a Raspberry Pi Zero or Raspberry Pi Zero W .







PiTrex PCB used for development PiTrex PCB used for development

The Idea

The Vectrex CPU, a Motorola 68A09 running at 1.5MHz, controls all of the I/O including display, sound, and controls, via a 6522A VIA chip. These are both connected to the cartridge port, and with the CPU disabled using the HALT signal also at the cartridge port, all of the Vectrex's functions can be controled by an external device. In this case we're using a Raspberry Pi Zero with a 1GHz ARM CPU and 512MB of RAM, powerful enough to emulate arcade machines with vector displays, emulate the Vectrex CPU to load ROM images akin to a multicart, and run custom games written to take advantage of the greater processing power.



The PiTrex hardware synchronises the data read and written to the VIA by the Raspberry Pi, with the 1.5MHz clock signal that the VIA runs at. At the same time it converts the voltage levels between the 5V signals used by the Vectrex and the 3.3V signals used by the Raspberry Pi.



The PiTrex software runs on the Raspberry Pi in order to control the PiTrex hardware, and to replace the functions of the Vectrex BIOS to allow for displaying Vectors and reading the controller inputs.



Together the Vectrex receives a modern CPU connected to its cartridge port.



The Project

Details on the current state of PiTrex hardware development are documented in: Hardware_Description.



Details on the current state of PiTrex low-level software development are documented in Software_Description, and higher-level applications in Software_Ports.



Plans and objectives for the project are documented in Project_Roadmap.



Code is on GitHub and here .



and here . Development Mailing List .





Latest developments may, or may not, find their way to the Blog.

