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by pankajdoharey 84 days ago
That's a lot of transistors. Why do I feel it could be done in less? This is the absolute minimum number of Discrete transistors you need?
2 comments

Silicon Chip Magazine ran a competition in 2021 to build a noughts-and-crosses machine based on one that Australian electronics legend Dick Smith built from parts from an electromechanical phone exchange. They ran a series of articles on it, including an electromechanical one of which unfortunately only the first page is available online although it gives you an idea: https://www.siliconchip.com.au/Issue/SC/2024/March/Electrome.... If you can find the articles there's a lot of detail in them on how to do it with minimum circuitry. Someone had also done it with relays a few years before Dick Smith, https://www.vintagecomputer.net/cisc367/Radio%20Electronics%.... There's an even earlier one very briefly mentioned in this 1949 newsreel, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SlNxBb_27CA
"In case it is not already obvious, efficiency and sensibility were not a top priority when working on this project. I am sure there are more efficient flip- flop designs or implementations with fewer transistors, especially by building composite gates that combine NAND and NOR gates, but I don't really care :)"
Hats off to you for just saying "no" to optimizations.

I'd have gone down an optimization rabbit hole, while never finishing the original project.

There is absolutely no need for this to exist in physical form. It is perfectly alright to run this on a simulation in Logisim Optimize as long as you desire and then once that is done, implementing it in physical form is just a matter of assembling it, which mostly can be done by many print pcb and solder on demand services.