Don
In December 2025 I got an email from Don. He told me that he had built in the 1980's a computer based on the NS32032 CPU. Recently he discovered the main board, made photos and sent them with the email.
I'm always impressed about what people like him did in the past to get a powerful computer. Systems with a Series 32000 CPU were expensive and therefore not in reach for most young people. The alternative had been to build it ourselves. See the result of Don's work in the next Figures.
Fig. 1. The NS32032 CPU is a powerful beast. The disadvantage is that it has a 32 bit wide date bus - it requires four EPROMs to store programs.
Fig. 2. Don used wire-wrap to built his computer. The prototype board looks very good and was for sure not cheap.
The black thing in the upper right corner of Figure 2 is a connector for a Centronics printer port. Nearby is a 8255 PIO which serves as the interface device for the printer port. The port was used for fast data transfers. The blue connector at the left edge allows a memory expansion of 1 MByte of DRAM. This board does not exist any more.
Don wrote about the software for his computer:
"I developed an object-oriented operating system for it, along with a built-in one-pass assembler, linker, and very sophisticated debugger. I also remember a built-in hardware single-stepper for initial testing and debugging. I had some discussions with National Semiconductor but nothing came of it other than me getting some free development boards which are long gone."
The board needs 5V and an RS232 terminal to operate. Voltages for RS232 are generated on the board. Don doesn't know whether the board is still functional. Because he has not the time to test it he gave the board to Vince. I'm sure Vince will find the time for a hopefully successful test.
Next chapter: Emulator III