MOS Technology VIC

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
VIC (Pal version 6561)
Pin assignment of the VIC

The VIC (Video Interface Controller) , technical name MOS Technology 6560 ( NTSC version) or 6561 ( PAL version), is a computer chip for image and sound output on a television or video monitor.

It was originally developed for inexpensive computer terminals and video games, but was mainly used in the Commodore VC 20 home computer .

Its successors VIC II , VIC IIE and VIC III, which were used in the C64 , C128 and in the only pre-series (≈200-1000 pieces) built C65, are also often referred to as VIC .

Technical specifications

  • 16 KB address area for image, font and color memory
  • 16 fixed colors
  • 2 selectable character sizes: 8 × 8 or 8 × 16 pixels
  • 176 × 184 used in the VC-20, 224 × 256 pixels maximum PAL video resolution
  • Sound output: 3 sound channels square + 1 sound channel white noise , 128 different sounds are possible per channel; the three audio channels are tuned differently.
  • On-chip DMA , adapted for 6502 processors. Takes advantage of the fact that they only access the bus for half of each clock cycle and accesses the bus in between. This allows the processor and video chip to access the same memory at full speed.
  • Two 8-bit A / D converters , they are used in the VC-20 to read out paddles .
  • Light pen function
  • No raster graphics ; this must be emulated using a user-defined character set .
  • Video format: FBAS , Y / C

The VIC is programmed via 16 control registers, in the VC-20 in the address range $ 9000– $ 900F.

literature

  • Brian Bagnall: On the Edge. The Spectacular Rise and Fall of Commodore. Variant Press, Winnipeg 2005, ISBN 0-9738649-0-7 .


Web links

Commons : MOS Technology VIC  - collection of images, videos and audio files