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A project log for VT100 simulator and 3D printed replica

Simulator for the VT100 hardware. Running inside Gardi's 3D model.

lars-brinkhoffLars Brinkhoff 06/12/2021 at 15:060 Comments

I first heard about Michael Gardi's VT100 replica in a message to the PiDP-11 group titled "2:3 Scale VT100 is a Perfect Pairing for PDP-8/I Replica".  Since I'm a fan of retrocomputing and especially DEC machines, this immediately piqued my interest.  My employer has a 3D printer at the office that are free to use, so I decided to take on the project.

But I was thinking, with an exterior so close to the original VT100 it would be a shame to have the internal software be a mere run of the mill terminal emulator.  So I decoded to make a simulator running the original firmware.  There are at least two already, one in JavaScript and another in MAME, but I wanted to make one explicitly for the 3D printed replica and have it running on a Raspberry Pi.

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