Cloning a Clone - Recreating a Clone Apple II Logicboard

max1zzz

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Sep 23, 2021
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It's that time of year again, time for a new clone!

Really I should be working on the LC 475 board but 6 layer boards and desoldering 208pin QFP's is not seeming appealing at the moment so another project was needed

I have been after a Apple II for a while but they go for way more money in the UK than I am prepared to pay so building a clone one seemed like the right way to go, while clones of the original apple PCB are available (and I actually have a few I never finished assembling) building a clone of a clone seems like more fun

Really the idea came while watching a recent Adrian's Digital Basement video on a low cost clone of the apple II during which he produces a unpopulated clone PCB, my immediate thought on seeing the board was "I need to ask for scans of that" but as it tuns out I didn't as he scanned the PCB while troubleshooting and uploaded those scans to archive.org :)

The board is a pretty simple 2 layer design so shouldn't take too long to redraw in sprint, the only complication being that some areas of the scans are not the clearest but as scans of the accompanying schematic where also uploaded this should not be a big problem.

Current status of the board is this: (Most pads placed, just needs the connectors / trimmers placed before I can start drawing tracks)

1695078557453.png


once this is all done I will be uploading the design to github for anyone who wants to build their own clone :)
 

max1zzz

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Sep 23, 2021
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A basic first pass of all the trace routeing has been done:
1695586672734.png


Still need to do the connectors and check a few area's against the schematic (and run the big power traces down the sides of the board) but most of the hard work has been done now :)