Have Some Free Time For Esoteric Projects? (1 Viewer)

[Steve R.]

Linux boots in 4.76 days on the Intel 4004

Historic 4-bit microprocessor from 1971 can execute Linux commands over days or weeks.

arstechnica.com

Hardware hacker Dmitry Grinberg recently achieved what might sound impossible: booting Linux on the Intel 4004, the world's first commercial microprocessor. With just 2,300 transistors and an original clock speed of 740 kHz, the 1971 CPU is incredibly primitive by modern standards. And it's slow—it takes about 4.76 days for the Linux kernel to boot.

If you're skeptical that this feat is possible with a raw 4004, you're right: The 4004 itself is far too limited to run Linux directly. Instead, Grinberg created a solution that is equally impressive: an emulator that runs on the 4004 and emulates a MIPS R3000 processor—the architecture used in the DECstation 2100 workstation that Linux was originally ported to. This emulator, along with minimal hardware emulation, allows a stripped-down Debian Linux to boot to a command prompt.

Now who has the courage to take on the challenge of getting the current version of Windows to boot on an Intel 4004?

 

[The_Doc_Man]

What is the address range of the 4004 or the relevant emulator? I have a feeling that the current version of Windows wouldn't quite fit. Heck, Win3.2 would probably have a hard.

At not quite 3/4 MHz, networking would be interesting. Do modern systems even still retain the ability to talk that slowly? I am reminded of a Night Court episode in which a man spoke excruciatingly slowly and everyone had reasons why they wanted to clear the docket by 12 Midnight.

 

[Uncle Gizmo]

episode in which a man spoke excruciatingly slowly

I think there was a similar episode in taxi? A series, and the episode I'm thinking of is where the actor who plays Doc in back to the future was taking a test?