71B documentation

[Valentin Albillo]

(02-27-2015 01:00 AM)Han Wrote:  Are there rom readers that can be used to dump the rom image? I'm sure we could crowd source the disassembly and come with a community IDS for it.

The HP-71B Math ROM has been dumped for its use with several emulators/simulators, I have the dumped file itself.

In theory it could be disassembled, but without proper documentation it would be a gargantuan task to turn the resulting Saturn's assembler code into anything useful. Reverse-engineering the truly complex and highly-optimized algorithms of this particular 32K piece of code (50% of the size of the HP-71B ROMs themselves) would take lots of time to lots of skilled people and I don't think anyone would have that much time or interest for this ~30 year-old piece of code.

Still, I believe that its IDS must be lurking somewhere, perhaps in the hands of some former developers who contributed to the ROM. Their names are known and it would be great if someone could contact them and ask for it.

Thanks for your interest, Han, and regards.
V.