32-bit Microcontroller for $1.00 -Guy Macon

That is not a second source. That is a new primary source. A second source gives you redundancy -- you can buy part B if part A is unavaulable, buggy, etc.

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me
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The automotive need for second sourcing seems to have faded. I have had quite bit of automotive work and since 2000 I don't recall a single requirement that second sourcing was a factor.

A lot of the second sourcing I am seeing now is about developing markets that a second vendor has expertise in and distributing silicon development costs.

Regards,

-- Walter Banks Byte Craft Limited

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Reply to
Walter Banks

Which i can almost read through the glitzy colors and small type.

Reply to
JosephKK

Usually by the enthusiasm of the employees.

If one opts not to believe in a company's mission statement it's time to be looking for a new job.

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Regards, Joerg

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Reply to
Joerg

Huh? I just downloaded this datasheet from their RF section and was not asked to register or anything:

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Regards, Joerg

http://www.analogconsultants.com/
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Reply to
Joerg

... of a company on the other side of the planet? Yeah, right.

Reply to
Hans-Bernhard Bröker

I can get a really good feel for that during longer discussions with app engineers. Analog Devices, for example, excels here. Scores every time. A certain company in Texas, well, that has become a whole 'nother story. When you do not get any answers on stuff that requires a little gusto on their part you can pretty much see where the enthusiasm of the employees stands. Which in my case had and still has sales consequences for them. Their stock hit a 52-week, 2nd quarter earnings dropped 4%, upon which shares plummeted another 14%. I am not surprised.

And no, I did not have to fly to Texas to figure this out ;-)

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Regards, Joerg

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Reply to
Joerg

radar', with dominating a sector.

Actually in my very limited experience CISC machines need much more initialization than Regular Instruction Set Computers. Moreover CISC needs much more protection from errant processes, and much more dedicated register saving. Code size may be a compiler issue or a practitioner issue.

days....

matters

Reply to
JosephKK

R&D, all they are doing is an extension

Perzactly. Separation and regularization of fab / process and design.

Reply to
JosephKK

I meant ISA differences. Each instruction set has a different maximum density (assuming perfect compilers). This density depends on how many registers are available, how powerful instructions are, and how they are encoded.

The original RISCs like MIPS and PPC went for all out performance with simple instructions, while ARM added more powerful instructions (such as load/store multiple). The result is ARM has far better codesize (when I last measured it, MIPS was about twice as big as ARM, even MIPS16 was larger than ARM). As Microchip is now making MIPS MCUs this is an issue as you need a bigger flash (ie. a more expensive device).

Wilco

Reply to
Wilco Dijkstra

Got any references to support this? I work with both ARM7 and MIPS32 using the 'same' compiler (GCC 4.2.1) but I'm not under the impression that the code size for MIPS32 is considerably larger then for the ARM7.

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Programmeren in Almere?
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Reply to
Nico Coesel

It's well known MIPS32 has codesize problems due to its simple instructions. I measured it myself on a huge codesize benchmark, you can try doing the same for your code (although GCC is obviously not the best compiler for ARM, so the difference won't be as large). This is a good post from Anton comparing various backends of GCC showing that MIPS is the worst of all RISCs:

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Wilco

Reply to
Wilco Dijkstra

Okay, but can you get it in an 8-pin package?

Reply to
Ben Bradley

Certainly. Just take your wire cutter and snip off 40 of the 48 pins.

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IIRC, they also have a 28 pin SOIC version, so you might only have to snip off 20 pins.

I hope this helps...

--
Guy Macon  Guy Macon 
Guy Macon  Guy Macon 
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Reply to
Guy Macon

And if you choose carefully and cut off the power pins, you should reduce power consumption also, which might be a further help. :-)

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  - Stephen Fuld
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Reply to
Stephen Fuld

You forgot to mention that such Pin-snip can be legally dangerous!!.

So, as well as wearing the appropriate goggles, be sure to do so only in the presence of your lawyer!!

For the element of truth to this, see:

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-jg

Reply to
Jim Granville

There seems to be a lot of that going around...

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--
Guy Macon
Reply to
Guy Macon

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My impression is that Microchip faltered for a few years inbetween the original line of PICs "maturing" and coming out with dsPICs and other interesting parts. At the time, some core employees left, such as the guys who started up Scenix (later Ubicom -- pipelined 50MHz PICs, essentially), and I recall reading that they mentioned they motivation was due to Microchip management having no interest (at the time) in their ideas.

What does a company that no longer has the technical leadership to produce interesting new products do?

Sue the guys who do, if it's at all possible that a link can be established between what the new guys are doing and what you were doing back in your heyday, regardless of how tenuous that link might be.

I could be completely wrong about this, of course... I just remember those years where it seemed that Microchip had lost its way.

---Joel

Reply to
Joel Koltner

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