[compiler-guy]

The 6502 is still doing hundreds of millions of units a year, and is still a terrific introductory processor that is comparatively easy to wrap your head around, especially if you are interested in board bring up from scratch. (Compare the requirements to boot a 68000 to a 6502 into a nop loop, for example.)

The 6502 is far from dead.

[fernly]

Indeed, it is highly useful for learning projects. See Ben Eater's "Building a 6502 Computer" series[1], and Quinn Dunki's "Veronica"[2], each a from-the-ground-up creation of a system around the 6502.

[1] https://eater.net/6502

[2] https://blondihacks.com/veronica-all-articles/

[chris_st]

Glad to hear it! I first learned assembly for 6502 on the Apple ][, and found it indeed easy to wrap my head around. Great machine, great architecture, TED II Editor/assembler was amazing...

[dhosek]

The great thing about the Apple ][ was that it was largely the work of Woz and thus it was very much possible for a single person to fully understand the whole thing. Even the addition of AppleSoft BASIC and DOS didn't keep it from being comprehensible.

[kazinator]

There are microcontrollers that you can program on an easy-to-use USB-based development board, that lets you debug C code with a breakpoint debugger. Your program is stored in flash memory on the chip: you can just unplug it, and plug it into your project board.

If you're going to use a microprocessor with external peripherals for everything, I'd just bite the bullet and go for a MC68000.

I have that Microprocessor Systems Design somewhere (Alan Clements), from many years ago. I remember the MC68000 examples circuits and code in it are not too bad.

Here is a possible consideration: the MC68000 has DTACK line with wait states for accommodating slower peripherals. The 6502 is synchronous: it expects peripherals to respond according to its clock, on time.

[JKCalhoun]

Crazy. Less than a U.S. dollar each on AliExpress.