The Z80Emu program started life as a Zilog Z80 CPU emulator program. When I became interested in using the CPM80 operating system as a monitor/loader shell for my EZ80 based controller board project the Z80Emu software was upgraded to run CPM80.
I primarily use the current version of the Z80Emu program to support my EZ80 controller board project. The File Manager functions allow me to create and manipulate simple CMP disk image files. The CPM disk files can be converted into an Intel 32 bit hex file to be loaded into the 1M flash memory on the controller board. The disk images can also be shared by the Z80Emu program over an IP based network. The current software for the EZ80 controller board can mount a disk image shared by the Z80Emu program. This allows the EZ80 controller board to access programs and data stored on a remote server.
The Z80Emu program seams to run most CPM programs fine. The real problem is terminal support. The Z80Emu program emulates an ANSI/VT100 terminal in the CRT window and a basic teletype terminal in the TTY window. Some CPM80 programs may not support the ANSI terminal type and can not be used with this emulator. If you have a supported terminal connected to one of the Windows COM ports you could run the program.
As with most CPM emulators the CPM devices can be mapped to hardware on the host Windows computer. As an example the CPM console device could be mapped to; a serial COM port, TCP/IP port, and the program CRT or TTY windows.
The Z80Emu program can act as a debug tool. Full CPU register and memory resources are displayed and can be altered. The Z80Emu program supports single step CPU executions and setting a break point. These features help offset the limited debugging features of CPM.
While the Z80Emu program is stable it was not written to be the best CPM emulator available. In fact there a number of better CPM80 emulation programs available. The primary purpose of the Z80Emu software is to support my EZ80 controller board project.
When the final design of the EZ80 controller board software monitor is completed I would like to update the Z80Emu program to act as a emulator for the CPM80 monitor portion of the EZ80 controller board.
