SC130 RCBus-40pin RomWBW CP/M Computer Kit

Name: SC130 RCBus-40pin RomWBW CP/M Computer Kit
SKU: 18155
Price: 65.00 USD
Availability: InStock
Rating: 4.90 (22 reviews)

(22 Reviews)

A complete Z180 single board computer with RCBus/RC2014 bus sockets, running RomWBW to provide a robust CP/M implementation

Designed by Stephen C Cousins in United Kingdom

SC130 RCBus-40pin RomWBW CP/M Computer Kit 1

SC130 RCBus-40pin RomWBW CP/M Computer Kit 2

SC130 RCBus-40pin RomWBW CP/M Computer Kit 3

SC130 RCBus-40pin RomWBW CP/M Computer Kit 4

SC130 RCBus-40pin RomWBW CP/M Computer Kit 5

SC130 RCBus-40pin RomWBW CP/M Computer Kit 6

SC130 RCBus-40pin RomWBW CP/M Computer Kit 7

2019-09-29T11:02:12.363Z-SC130 v1.0.1 Assembled 1 - 3x2.jpg

2020-12-21T15:38:29.882Z-SC130 v1.0.1 Assembled - labelled - 3x2.jpg

2019-10-04T11:20:19.584Z-SC130 v1.0 Kit Boxed 1 - 3x2.jpg

2021-03-13T13:46:25.610Z-SC130 v1.0 PCBx4 - 3x2.jpg

2019-09-29T19:39:21.555Z-SC130 v1.0 PCB Image - 3x2 - Green - Top.jpg

2019-09-29T19:39:21.555Z-SC130 v1.0 PCB Image - 3x2 - Green - Bottom.jpg

2020-12-21T12:57:41.270Z-SC126 v1.0 Accessories - 3x2 - 3318x2212 - with label.jpg

$65.00

Quantity*

+ —

Printed circuit board colour*

SC302 Serial to USB adapter*

SC303 Micro SD card adapter*

SC305 Adapter cable, 6-way, 8"/200mm*

SC306 USB cable, A to mini-B, 18"/500mm*

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A complete Z180 single board computer with RCBus/RC2014 bus sockets, running RomWBW to provide a robust CP/M implementation

The aim of this design is to provide a low-cost CP/M system. It uses the Z180 CPU for good performance and RomWBW firmware for robust implementation of CP/M with support for a wide range of hardware.…

Documentation

The documentation can be found at www.smallcomputercentral.com

Compatibility

This computer conforms to the RCBus specification v1.0 for RCBus-2014 40-pin systems.

The RCBus specification includes RCBus-2014 (both RC2014 standard 40-pin bus and RC2014 enhanced 60-pin bus) and also the full 80-pin RCBus. The 80-pin RCBus provides support for advanced Z80 features, such as the interrupt daisy-chain, as well as support for other processor families.

The kit

This kit includes all the components needed to make the computer, as shown in the first picture. Other modules and backplanes shown in the pictures are not included. You will require tools, solder, and cleaning materials to assemble this kit.

The ROM supplied in the component set are programmed with RomWBW.

You will need a terminal or a computer running a terminal emulation program, such as Tera Term, to communicate with the motherboard.

The Z180 CPU (Z8S180xx) is no longer in production and finding stock is becoming increasingly difficult. The CPU supplied in this kit is either the 20MHz or 33MHz version, and is either old or used stock. I test all of them before packing in kits. Some of the CPUs have superficial scratches. All other integrated circuits are brand new and from major retailers in the UK or USA.

The assembled kit is approximately 10cm (4") x 10cm (4") x 6cm (2.5"). It is typically supplied in a box approximately 12cm (5") x 16cm (6.5") x 2.5cm (1") weighing about 150g (0.35lbs).

Printed Circuit Board

The printed circuit board is available on its own here.

Notes

This product is supplied as a kit of parts that require assembly.
It is your responsibility to pay any import duty or taxes charged by your home country.
This product is designed for hobby use and is not suitable for industrial, commercial or safety-critical applications.
This product is made in accordance with the "designed for RC2014" labelling scheme.
RC2014 is a trademark of RFC2795 Ltd.
RomWBW has been provided free of charge by its author Wayne Warthen.

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Review Breakdown

Average Ratings

Product: (4.91)

Documentation: (4.91)

Shipping: (4.86)

Communication: (4.91)

Gerald | April 3, 2024

High quality SBC

I chose this machine for a specific project that needed the extra CPU throughput and memory offered, over a Z80 platform, and my experience of the maker’s SC126. It did not disappoint.

The component quality and documentation are superb making it easy to recommend this machine to those looking for a small but potent SBC.

Mleo | May 12, 2023

Easy to build, well documented kit

I've been building kits for over a half century. Started with the venerable Heathkits and continued from there. This has to be the best engineered and documented kit I've ever laid my hands on. Ships in less than two weeks from the UK to the US, thanks to reliable Royal Mail.

Points to watch.
1) Care must be taken in bending the pins of the ICs so they snap into the sockets. Not so easy when you're a senior and your hands are not as steady as they once were.
2) USB ports on some laptops may not supply enough current to power the board reliably. Some Thinkpad models are notorious for this.
3) Be careful to supply 5v and only 5v through the barrel jack. 9v or 12v will damage the ICs and render the board inoperable. I made this mistake and had to replace chips, one by one, in order to restore the board to full function.

William | June 7, 2022

Great kit and well documented

I really enjoyed putting this together and, to my surprise, it worked on first power on! That is not a credit to my skill but rather Stephen's excellent documentation and build guide. You can build this in an evening and be running CP/M applications, just like the old days, in no time. I'm still figuring out the mechanics with the SD card and getting applications from around the web. I'm (re)learning lots! Shipping to Canada was reasonable and fast.

Mike | May 8, 2022

Blown Away: Fantastic Kit!

Stephen, THANK YOU! The board is beautiful. The documentation is so amazing (even little "watch out!" tips. The kit was really easy to put together. Maybe an hour? It booted the first time! Within an hour I had WordStar up and running! So much fun. I have to admit, my CP/M skills are all but gone. But it was fun to reacquaint myself. Thank you for such an amazing kit at a really impressive price point. This is going to be a part of a display piece, featuring the 3 big early computer influences for me: Timex-Sinclair ZX80, your CP/M board (I had a Sanyo... doubt I'd find THAT!) and a PDP/8 (https://www.tindie.com/products/obso/pdp-8-replica-kit-the-pidp-8/). I learned so much from this project! Sill am!

Claudiu | Oct. 10, 2021

Excellent retro computing starter kit

Simple and clear documentation on how to assemble the kit and use it. Excellent starter kit for showing to young ones how a computer works.

Kevin | Aug. 28, 2021

Great Kit, Great Instructions

Kit arrived in the US after about a week. Board is very well labeled, and laid out for easy assembly. Very complete documentation, including tests for every step. I did not read the directions, and got *extremely* lucky I placed the z180 socket rotated 180 degrees (90 might have been really bad). I socketed the z180 in the correct orientation and it worked - so if you buy this kit and think you know what you are doing, you better pay attention to that at the very least.

If you aren't skilled at reading color codes on resistors, definitely use a multimeter on r10 and r13 to determine which is which.

I had a lot of fun putting this kit together. So much so I will probably buy the s126 kit rather than a rc2014 RTC module, and gift this one to a friend.

Egor | June 16, 2021

Great kit for beginners!

I was eager to try something of retro-/homebrew flavour, but: 1) I have no experience in this field, 2) I have no soldering skills (nothing aside audio jacks and .1" connection pins), 3) I have little budget to spend.
So, SC130 became my project of choice:
1) It's affordable. One of the most affordable kits on the market, I would say.
2) It's easy to build. The overall design is simple, the layout is clear, the online build instruction is very straightforward. There are not many small descrete components, no SMDs, most soldering points are for DIP sockets and pin headers - it's hard to get in wrong. I was totally new to resistor color encoding and nearly mistook one for another but noticed it in time. It took about two hours from uboxing to fully working board - with no skills and cheapest soldering kit from Ali.
3) It's flexible. You have 2 UARTs and SPI from the start - to connect SD storage and communicate. And RC2014 bus for huge variety of expansions.
4) It's powerful. 512K of RAM&ROM, fast Z180 CPU, fast UARTs, memory banking, RC2014&ROMWBW compatibility - you won't be limited in your projects.
And there is actually a whole "model line" of RC2014 bus boards from SCC - 3 models, you can easily choose the most suitable in terms of affordability, fuctionality and complexity. Well done!

Patrick | June 13, 2021

Nice kit! Fast shipping!

Very happy with my purchase. Kit works very well. Shipping to Canada was very fast! Highly recommend!

Jeff | March 13, 2021

High quality kits, easy assembly, fast shipping

Four of us at my company each bought the SC130 computer kit and the SC129 Digital I/O board, just for fun. I haven't soldered in a decade but I put the kit together easily. I think it took about 3 hours for both the SC129 and SC130 kits, not rushing. The computer started up on the first try. I've been having fun writing blinkenlights programs in BASIC.

It took about 7 days for the kits to arrive, shipped from England to the east coast of the USA. This was in Feb of 2021.

It was a pleasure doing business with Steven Cousins. Thanks!

Terry | Feb. 3, 2021

Another wonderful kit!

The kit was packaged great. It was put together in almost no time at all, and works great! I previously built an RC2014, SC126, and SC131, they are a joy to build and fun to use. I also have some S100 machines and other SBCs, these SC-series boards are a super edition to my stuff!
Terry, N4TLF (formally WB4JFI)

A | Jan. 2, 2021

A brilliant all in one kit for beginers or lazy old hands ..

I have been tinkering with old tech for decades and always wanted a simple easy to use cpm machine with enough expansion to let me mess around. I decided to go with a semi retro solution i.e. not a purist old z80 design just to get my feet wet. Well it was worth it. It took an hour and a half one evening and it was up and running. The kit is idiot proof. It even included rubber feet for the PCB so you can power it up on a table surface without risking scratching your dining room table (in my case). The documentation is clear and the creator totally responsive. I am already planning to expand it further. If you want to get a CPM beast up and running in under 2 hours... this kit is totally for you.

Richard | Dec. 27, 2020

Excellent

Received my SC130 quickly but only allowed to assemble it after Christmas! Full documentation and assembly guide, well packaged. Printed circuit very good quality. Assembly took 45 mins but may be longer if not experienced. Worked first time. Just written first 8080 style code with Ed. Takes me back! This is not the first kit or board from this seller and all are excellent with very efficient service. Richard Wilkins

Stefan | Oct. 10, 2020

Excellent: Great product, fast delivery

The kit has been shipped at the day of the order and arrived just 6 days later, despite international delivery.

The quality of the board and the components was very good and the complete assembly with the help of the excellent guide was only a matter of a few hours.
The assembly guide is not only very detailed with a lot of pictures which clearly shows how to mount every part, it also contains a lot of checkpoints, so that you can be sure, not having created a short circuit.

The finally assembled machine worked immediately. Overall a very pleasant experience.

José Ángel | Sept. 25, 2020

GOOD CHOICE.

This is my first z180 SBC.

Honestly, I´m fairly new to the retrocomputing world and I bought this computer with two goals in mind: to discover the CP/M and to learn assembly language for this microprocessor.

I chose the SC130 because it offered a great deal for its price and I think it was a good decision.

The kit arrived within a week, well packaged and was easy to build (great manual, very detailed). There are tons of documentation about the Z80/180 and the CP/M and besides, there is an active and helpful community.

I had some troubles with Tera Term and the seller wrote my back in a short time. Finally I changed to Putty and all went smooth.

To sum up, a recomendable choice for any beginner.

Dylan | Aug. 23, 2020

One very happy customer!

This kit is my first introduction to retro computing since using a ZX Spectrum as a teenager. I'm very impressed, a huge thanks to Stephen. You've recaptured the excitement that modern computing has lost.

The assembly was straight forward and the instructions are excellent.

The only possible area for improvement would be adding an option to include some right-angle headers and 6-pin dupont cables for the serial and SD card adaptors. Finding the dupont cables here in New Zealand is proving a pain.

Kurt | June 2, 2020

SC130

This small system is outstanding.
Very suitable for the first steps with CP / M.
I have some programs (BASCOM, C and ASM)
tested. It works and is a real pleasure.
1984-1990 I have div. Software programmed.
They were used on Kaypro and Sharp.

I can't get KSAM to work. I suspect the Z180 doesn't work with KSAM. With a Z80 could work.
KSAM supports index sequential file management.

I can fully recommend the system.

Kurt Pieper

David | May 16, 2020

Wonderful SBC!

I was looking for an old school project to keep me busy and discovered RC2014. After spending time looking at options decided on this kit and absolutely glad I did.

Packaging - small box with all you need.
Documentation - brilliant. Can't understate how easy and simple the documents are to follow. Sheets to check you have all the components, assembly guides to make sure you do things in the right order and finally checks to make sure you haven't broken it as you go along!

Support - there is a massive and friendly base of people using and looking at old school electronics like this.

Software - comes with latest RomWBW so you can run CP/M 2.2 out of the box! And two different BASIC to play with.

Highly recommended kit - you can't go wrong here!

Already bought two more to expand and have digital IO as well as sound!

Thanks Steven.

Stephen | March 15, 2020

Great computer kit, highly recommended.

Product: Perfect for an easy-to-implement CP/M system. Single board design minimises the amount of soldering. High performance (by CP/M standards). Not so good if you need maximum expansion possibilities, but two expansion slots still provides a reasonable amount of leeway.
RomWBW is included which means bringing up a new system is very simple.

Shipping: Shipped the next day, small package sent through normal mail. Took about a week to reach Switzerland.

Documentation: The best!

Communications: First class. Steve Cousins helped me sort out several problems via his website email.

Bill | March 3, 2020

SC130 RomWBW CP/M Computer Kit for RC2014

This amazing kit is a creation of Stephen Cousins.

In my opinion, the best that's available in it's class. It has a micro SD card for storage, enabling the user to read & write files to & from it.
You can run programs directly from the card with no issue.

The PCB has a small footprint. The kit is excellent for beginner (with supervision), to intermediate soldering ability. All components are through hole.
There is excellent documentation for parts checking included with the kit, with excellent documentation online.

Lastly, it is excellent value for money. Mine worked first go & I've been enjoying it's use ever since.

I highly recommend this kit.

Cheers & great job Stephen !!!

Bill

Oscar | Jan. 17, 2020

Fantastic kit!

I really enjoyed putting this together. It is simple, you can't really go wrong. But I did go wrong anyway (I soldered stuff on the wrong side of the PCB) and Steve sent me a replacement PCB within a day. But back to the kit itself, it is pretty much the ultimate CP/M computer in terms of performance. It's even plenty fast enough to run the unix-like fuzix, with multi-user multitasking. thanks to the RC2014-style expansion connectors, there's plenty of scope for adding more hardware fun.
Great design, I don't think you'll find a more attractive Z80/Z180 machine anywhere. If you have any interest in the Z80 or CP/M, this is the kit to get.
I did a more thorough review here: http://obsolescenceguaranteed.blogspot.com/2020/01/sc130-perfect-cpm-computer-kit-at-50.html

Gary | Dec. 6, 2019

Amazing product, easy build, super value!

Very much enjoyed building this Z180 computer. The sturdy PCB is well laid out, approx 0.070 inches thick, and about 4x4 inches square. Build time was about 3 hours. It has a Meg of physical memory split evenly between RAM and ROM that the Z180 MMU maps into the Z80's logical space (64K). The clock is 18Mhz, so it is quite fast. The PCB has 2 expansion slots that are RC2014 compatible, so you can add RC2014 project boards or backplanes that are available on Tindie. It came with a USB virtual serial port, and an SDCard expansion peripheral that is used as a disk. The RomWBW software includes CPM, a full size floating point BASIC, a Tiny integer BASIC, Forth, and a small monitor so you can explore and play around with the Z180 registers, memory, and I/O The cost was very reasonable at $56USD which included shipping. I live in Atlanta and received the board in less than a week.

Randall | Nov. 23, 2019

Awesome

Cool little kit that coalesces into a cool little Z180 RomWBW CP/M machine perfect for learning or experimenting.

Easy to build and with brilliant documentation that leaves nothing but an evenings worth of therapeutic soldering and testing. Well worth the money and time.

+ Show 17 more

$65.00