I'm not sure which group it was in, but someone who designs toys
talked about the extremes they would go to for cost reduction,
removing useful, but not essential resistors because they were $0.001
each.
I'm trying to find out if there are still 4 bit MCUs used in new
products. I see a number of companies who make them, but I have no
pricing. I have found 8 bit MCUs that are available for $0.05 each
in just moderate quantities at LCSC. But then, maybe LCSC is not a
vendor anyone should depend on.
Anyone here design with 4 bit MCUs? Anyone design things that are
built in millions? Is there a difference in price that adds up at
such high volumes?
How about power levels? 8 bit MCUs are pretty low power these days.
Do 4 bit MCUs make a difference in your designs?
On 13/06/2022 03:44, Rick C wrote:
I'm not sure which group it was in, but someone who designs toys
talked about the extremes they would go to for cost reduction,
removing useful, but not essential resistors because they were $0.001
each.
I remember that poster (though not his name) - I believe you are in the correct group. I have no idea if he is still lurking here.
I'm trying to find out if there are still 4 bit MCUs used in new
products. I see a number of companies who make them, but I have no
pricing. I have found 8 bit MCUs that are available for $0.05 each
in just moderate quantities at LCSC. But then, maybe LCSC is not a
vendor anyone should depend on.
Anyone here design with 4 bit MCUs? Anyone design things that are
built in millions? Is there a difference in price that adds up at
such high volumes?
How about power levels? 8 bit MCUs are pretty low power these days.
Do 4 bit MCUs make a difference in your designs?
As far as I know, there are no longer any 4-bit microcontrollers
available for "normal" customers. The last family was the MARC4, from Atmel. There are still some manufacturers that make 4-bit
microcontrollers, but they are typically bare-die devices with vast
minimum order quantities and masked ROM programs - there are few
situations where they are economically viable now. If your company directory does not play golf with the manufacturer's company director,
it's unlikely that you'll ever use these devices.
The cheapest microcontroller family I know of are from Padauk - they get
down to about $0.03 even in quite small quantities, with free toolchains
and available datasheets, appnotes, etc.. (Note that the references I
have seen are pre-Covid and before the current component availability
crisis, so things may have changed.)
<https://jaycarlson.net/2019/09/06/whats-up-with-these-3-cent-microcontrollers/>
<https://cpldcpu.wordpress.com/2019/08/12/the-terrible-3-cent-mcu/>
If you don't need to be quite so obsessive about the price, for $0.50
you should even be able to get 32-bit devices. The choice of
peripherals and configuration is probably more important than the core -
if you can pick a device with the right pin drives, internal pull-ups or pull-downs, that will save the cost of the device.
The cheapest device I have used personally was an 8-bit AVR Tiny - 2 KB flash, no ram, 8 bytes eeprom (IIRC). I don't remember the price, but I believe it was cheaper than the LED on the board. If the tiny coin cell battery on the board had no self-discharge, the system would have had a standby lifetime of about 200 years - pretty low power!
I'm not sure which group it was in, but someone who designs toys talked about the extremes they would go to for cost reduction, removing useful, but not essential resistors because they were $0.001 each.maybe LCSC is not a vendor anyone should depend on.
I'm trying to find out if there are still 4 bit MCUs used in new products. I see a number of companies who make them, but I have no pricing. I have found 8 bit MCUs that are available for $0.05 each in just moderate quantities at LCSC. But then,
Anyone here design with 4 bit MCUs? Anyone design things that are built in millions? Is there a difference in price that adds up at such high volumes?
How about power levels? 8 bit MCUs are pretty low power these days. Do 4 bit MCUs make a difference in your designs?
The cheapest microcontroller family I know of are from Padauk - they get
down to about $0.03 even in quite small quantities, with free toolchains
and available datasheets, appnotes, etc.. (Note that the references I
have seen are pre-Covid and before the current component availability
crisis, so things may have changed.)
If you don't need to be quite so obsessive about the price, for $0.50
you should even be able to get 32-bit devices. The choice of
peripherals and configuration is probably more important than the core -
if you can pick a device with the right pin drives, internal pull-ups or pull-downs, that will save the cost of the device.
I'm trying to find out if there are still 4 bit MCUs used in new products.
Am 13.06.22 um 03:44 schrieb Rick C:
I'm trying to find out if there are still 4 bit MCUs used in new products.A few weeks ago, I bought some cyclocomputers. I was surprised to find
that even current products are typically based on 4-bit µC. AFAIR, every commercial caclocomputer, on which I found the information had a 4-bit µC.
On 2022-06-13 Rick C wrote in comp.arch.embedded:maybe LCSC is not a vendor anyone should depend on.
I'm not sure which group it was in, but someone who designs toys talked about the extremes they would go to for cost reduction, removing useful, but not essential resistors because they were $0.001 each.
I'm trying to find out if there are still 4 bit MCUs used in new products. I see a number of companies who make them, but I have no pricing. I have found 8 bit MCUs that are available for $0.05 each in just moderate quantities at LCSC. But then,
Anyone here design with 4 bit MCUs? Anyone design things that are built in millions? Is there a difference in price that adds up at such high volumes?
How about power levels? 8 bit MCUs are pretty low power these days. Do 4 bit MCUs make a difference in your designs?
EM Microelectronic still makes them, but custom and mask rom stuff only https://www.emmicroelectronic.com/product/microcontroller-tools-support/ems6500
Not sure this is actually low-cost. They claim ultra low power. For
instance this one: https://www.emmicroelectronic.com/index.php/product/multi-io/em6607
I'm not sure which group it was in, but someone who designs toys talked about the extremes they would go to for cost reduction, removing useful, but not essential resistors because they were $0.001 each.maybe LCSC is not a vendor anyone should depend on.
I'm trying to find out if there are still 4 bit MCUs used in new products. I see a number of companies who make them, but I have no pricing. I have found 8 bit MCUs that are available for $0.05 each in just moderate quantities at LCSC. But then,
Anyone here design with 4 bit MCUs? Anyone design things that are built
in millions? Is there a difference in price that adds up at such high volumes?
On Monday, June 13, 2022 at 8:47:32 AM UTC-4, Stef wrote:maybe LCSC is not a vendor anyone should depend on.
On 2022-06-13 Rick C wrote in comp.arch.embedded:
I'm not sure which group it was in, but someone who designs toys talked about the extremes they would go to for cost reduction, removing useful, but not essential resistors because they were $0.001 each.
I'm trying to find out if there are still 4 bit MCUs used in new products. I see a number of companies who make them, but I have no pricing. I have found 8 bit MCUs that are available for $0.05 each in just moderate quantities at LCSC. But then,
$10,000. That's not a lot of engineering time.EM Microelectronic still makes them, but custom and mask rom stuff only
Anyone here design with 4 bit MCUs? Anyone design things that are built in millions? Is there a difference in price that adds up at such high volumes?
How about power levels? 8 bit MCUs are pretty low power these days. Do 4 bit MCUs make a difference in your designs?
https://www.emmicroelectronic.com/product/microcontroller-tools-support/ems6500
Not sure this is actually low-cost. They claim ultra low power. For
instance this one:
https://www.emmicroelectronic.com/index.php/product/multi-io/em6607
Some have pointed out that 8 bit MCUs are pretty durn low power. I guess the question is if there is enough distinction between 4 and 8 bit MCUs to justify the issues of working with the 4 bit parts. At $0.01 per device, even a million units are only
Nowadays we use 32-bit (arm) for almost everything. The current
availability issues have made us look into other directions, but that is
all too much trouble. Just hoping things will get better in the not too distant future.
On 14/06/2022 23:29, Stef wrote:
Nowadays we use 32-bit (arm) for almost everything. The current
availability issues have made us look into other directions, but that is
all too much trouble. Just hoping things will get better in the not too
distant future.
These days the choice of microcontroller is often determined by what you
can get hold of, not by price, functionality, familiarity or any other traditional criteria.
It is frustrating, to say the least.
On 14/06/2022 23:29, Stef wrote:
Nowadays we use 32-bit (arm) for almost everything. The current
availability issues have made us look into other directions, but that is
all too much trouble. Just hoping things will get better in the not too
distant future.
These days the choice of microcontroller is often determined by what you
can get hold of, not by price, functionality, familiarity or any other traditional criteria. It is frustrating, to say the least.
Small ARM cores cost the manufacturer a few cents and can have extremely
low power - unless you have strong backwards compatibility reasons or
very specific requirements, it is rare for the "best" choice to be
anything other than an ARM for most boards.
But RISC-V is increasing, and I really hope some big names start using
it in their microcontrollers. It offers more scope than ARM for differentiation amongst products while keeping a common basis, and it's
not healthy for the market to be so dominated by a single core. (Look
at the PC market - it's all just highly polished turds.)
Il 15/06/2022 08:55, David Brown ha scritto:
On 14/06/2022 23:29, Stef wrote:
Nowadays we use 32-bit (arm) for almost everything. The current
availability issues have made us look into other directions, but that is >> all too much trouble. Just hoping things will get better in the not too >> distant future.
These days the choice of microcontroller is often determined by what you can get hold of, not by price, functionality, familiarity or any other traditional criteria. It is frustrating, to say the least.Yes, it's frustrating. Here we are spending most of the time to redesign some boards because of MCU shortage.
Two times we ordered the MCU with a long delivery time (around 10
months), purchased another MCU that was available in quantity for
production and started to redesign PCB and software for the new MCU.
We were sure to have the new fully-functional board much before the
delivery of the old MCU, but this wasn't the case.
Patching the firmware for the new MCU, rewriting drivers, fighting with
new errata, different SDK of the manufacturers and so on was a difficult task. Eventually, we arrived to have the new board a couple of weeks
before the delivery of the old MCU, so decided to start the production
of old boards.
Two times we lost money purchasing new MCUs that we didn't use, and lost
a lot of time working on the new MCU, stopping the reasearch and
development of new things and products.
Do you have similar experience?
Il 15/06/2022 08:55, David Brown ha scritto:
On 14/06/2022 23:29, Stef wrote:
Nowadays we use 32-bit (arm) for almost everything. The current
availability issues have made us look into other directions, but that is >>> all too much trouble. Just hoping things will get better in the not too
distant future.
These days the choice of microcontroller is often determined by what
you can get hold of, not by price, functionality, familiarity or any
other traditional criteria. It is frustrating, to say the least.
Yes, it's frustrating. Here we are spending most of the time to redesign
some boards because of MCU shortage.
Two times we ordered the MCU with a long delivery time (around 10
months), purchased another MCU that was available in quantity for
production and started to redesign PCB and software for the new MCU.
We were sure to have the new fully-functional board much before the
delivery of the old MCU, but this wasn't the case.
Patching the firmware for the new MCU, rewriting drivers, fighting with
new errata, different SDK of the manufacturers and so on was a difficult task. Eventually, we arrived to have the new board a couple of weeks
before the delivery of the old MCU, so decided to start the production
of old boards.
Two times we lost money purchasing new MCUs that we didn't use, and lost
a lot of time working on the new MCU, stopping the reasearch and
development of new things and products.
Do you have similar experience?
What processors were you switching between that you had so much trouble with the conversion? Typically drivers are provided for peripherals. What sort of "patches" were needed? Why would the SDK be different? Were the two processors not even of thesame family? Just kibitzing from the peanut gallery, but it seems like those issues could have been minimized by prudent selection of the new MCU.
Rick C <gnuarm.deletethisbit@gmail.com> wrote:the same family? Just kibitzing from the peanut gallery, but it seems like those issues could have been minimized by prudent selection of the new MCU.
What processors were you switching between that you had so much trouble with the conversion? Typically drivers are provided for peripherals. What sort of "patches" were needed? Why would the SDK be different? Were the two processors not even of
In times of allocation and part shortage, a "prudent" selection is not easy!
Rick C <gnuarm.deletethisbit@gmail.com> wrote:
What processors were you switching between that you had so much
trouble with the conversion? Typically drivers are provided for
peripherals. What sort of "patches" were needed? Why would the
SDK be different? Were the two processors not even of the same
family? Just kibitzing from the peanut gallery, but it seems like
those issues could have been minimized by prudent selection of the
new MCU.
In times of allocation and part shortage, a "prudent" selection is
not easy!
On Wednesday, June 15, 2022 at 4:38:09 AM UTC-4, pozz wrote:same family? Just kibitzing from the peanut gallery, but it seems like those issues could have been minimized by prudent selection of the new MCU.
Il 15/06/2022 08:55, David Brown ha scritto:
On 14/06/2022 23:29, Stef wrote:Yes, it's frustrating. Here we are spending most of the time to redesign
Nowadays we use 32-bit (arm) for almost everything. The current
availability issues have made us look into other directions, but that is >>>> all too much trouble. Just hoping things will get better in the not too >>>> distant future.
These days the choice of microcontroller is often determined by what you >>> can get hold of, not by price, functionality, familiarity or any other
traditional criteria. It is frustrating, to say the least.
some boards because of MCU shortage.
Two times we ordered the MCU with a long delivery time (around 10
months), purchased another MCU that was available in quantity for
production and started to redesign PCB and software for the new MCU.
We were sure to have the new fully-functional board much before the
delivery of the old MCU, but this wasn't the case.
Patching the firmware for the new MCU, rewriting drivers, fighting with
new errata, different SDK of the manufacturers and so on was a difficult
task. Eventually, we arrived to have the new board a couple of weeks
before the delivery of the old MCU, so decided to start the production
of old boards.
Two times we lost money purchasing new MCUs that we didn't use, and lost
a lot of time working on the new MCU, stopping the reasearch and
development of new things and products.
Do you have similar experience?
What processors were you switching between that you had so much trouble with the conversion? Typically drivers are provided for peripherals. What sort of "patches" were needed? Why would the SDK be different? Were the two processors not even of the
Rick C <gnuarm.del...@gmail.com> wrote:same family? Just kibitzing from the peanut gallery, but it seems like those issues could have been minimized by prudent selection of the new MCU.
What processors were you switching between that you had so much trouble with the conversion? Typically drivers are provided for peripherals. What sort of "patches" were needed? Why would the SDK be different? Were the two processors not even of the
In times of allocation and part shortage, a "prudent" selection is not easy!
In times of allocation and part shortage, a "prudent" selection is not easy!
On Wednesday, June 15, 2022 at 7:35:56 PM UTC-4, Hans-Bernhard Bröker
wrote:
Am 15.06.2022 um 16:12 schrieb Uwe Bonnes:
In times of allocation and part shortage, a "prudent" selectionAmen. Or, as the saying goes:
is not easy!
"All prognoses are hard, even more so those concerning the
future."
(Made famous by Niels Bohr, but may have been a widely known in his
home country of Denmark before that).
Let's face it: unless you're a major customer (and no, an order
volume of a million units does not reliably make you one), any and
all expectations about parts availability in the micro controller
market that reach further than a few months into the future are
recklessly optimistic. And that was how it was _before_ the
pandemic and all its side effects.
If you need to be sure you have those chips in quantity x over the
run of a given product, and x has fewer than 7 digits, your only
truly safe bet is to stockpile the whole lot up front. The
next-safest plan would be to stockpile enough of them to tide you
over the conservatively estimated time for a redesign of the board
and most of the lower-level software. Obviously neither of those
options is cheap; but the main alternative is that you may one day
have to discontinue your whole product because that one part
suddenly turned into unobtainium.
So how do you stockpile inventory for a product when you don't know
the ultimate sales volume? I designed a board for a company 14 years
ago. I originally sold maybe 100 a year average (100 piece minimum).
Volumes grew until I was getting orders for several thousand in one
year and none in the next. Now I have an order for 10,000 pieces.
The company I sell these to has always refused to commit to any
quantity. It's not always feasible to plan for future production, so
this idea is clearly not a panacea.
Am 15.06.2022 um 16:12 schrieb Uwe Bonnes:
In times of allocation and part shortage, a "prudent" selection is not easy!Amen. Or, as the saying goes:
"All prognoses are hard, even more so those concerning the future."
(Made famous by Niels Bohr, but may have been a widely known in his home country of Denmark before that).
Let's face it: unless you're a major customer (and no, an order volume
of a million units does not reliably make you one), any and all
expectations about parts availability in the micro controller market
that reach further than a few months into the future are recklessly optimistic. And that was how it was _before_ the pandemic and all its
side effects.
If you need to be sure you have those chips in quantity x over the run
of a given product, and x has fewer than 7 digits, your only truly safe
bet is to stockpile the whole lot up front. The next-safest plan would
be to stockpile enough of them to tide you over the conservatively
estimated time for a redesign of the board and most of the lower-level software. Obviously neither of those options is cheap; but the main alternative is that you may one day have to discontinue your whole
product because that one part suddenly turned into unobtainium.
On Wednesday, June 15, 2022 at 7:35:56 PM UTC-4, Hans-Bernhard Bröker wrote:several thousand in one year and none in the next. Now I have an order for 10,000 pieces. The company I sell these to has always refused to commit to any quantity. It's not always feasible to plan for future production, so this idea is clearly not a
If you need to be sure you have those chips in quantity x over the run
of a given product, and x has fewer than 7 digits, your only truly safe
bet is to stockpile the whole lot up front. The next-safest plan would
be to stockpile enough of them to tide you over the conservatively
estimated time for a redesign of the board and most of the lower-level
software. Obviously neither of those options is cheap; but the main
alternative is that you may one day have to discontinue your whole
product because that one part suddenly turned into unobtainium.
So how do you stockpile inventory for a product when you don't know the ultimate sales volume? I designed a board for a company 14 years ago. I originally sold maybe 100 a year average (100 piece minimum). Volumes grew until I was getting orders for
Major customers are in exactly the same boat. Car manufacturers have
had to pause production, or switch to different models and delay
deliveries, because they can't get the parts. HP can't get parts for
its printers, D-Link can't get components for their switches. Even the companies that make the electronics for the machines that make
components can't get the parts they need to get new semiconductor plants online.
On 2022-06-16 Rick C wrote in comp.arch.embedded:several thousand in one year and none in the next. Now I have an order for 10,000 pieces. The company I sell these to has always refused to commit to any quantity. It's not always feasible to plan for future production, so this idea is clearly not a
On Wednesday, June 15, 2022 at 7:35:56 PM UTC-4, Hans-Bernhard Bröker wrote:
If you need to be sure you have those chips in quantity x over the run
of a given product, and x has fewer than 7 digits, your only truly safe >> bet is to stockpile the whole lot up front. The next-safest plan would
be to stockpile enough of them to tide you over the conservatively
estimated time for a redesign of the board and most of the lower-level
software. Obviously neither of those options is cheap; but the main
alternative is that you may one day have to discontinue your whole
product because that one part suddenly turned into unobtainium.
So how do you stockpile inventory for a product when you don't know the ultimate sales volume? I designed a board for a company 14 years ago. I originally sold maybe 100 a year average (100 piece minimum). Volumes grew until I was getting orders for
You cannot plan for everything unfortunately. :-(
But talk to your customers.
Explain that they need to commit to a
quantity so you can buy parts upfront. And that if they don't, there is
a risk that there will be no parts when needed. At least, that is what
we do. Most customers will be aware of the situation and willing to give guaranties (and pay for the parts) to make sure they can get their
product in the future. And if not, they have been warned of the risks.
But still, you cannot stockpile everything. So 100% guarantees are not possible, but they never where.
On Wednesday, June 15, 2022 at 7:35:56 PM UTC-4, Hans-Bernhard Bröker wrote:several thousand in one year and none in the next. Now I have an order for 10,000 pieces. The company I sell these to has always refused to commit to any quantity. It's not always feasible to plan for future production, so this idea is clearly not a
Am 15.06.2022 um 16:12 schrieb Uwe Bonnes:
In times of allocation and part shortage, a "prudent" selection is not easy!Amen. Or, as the saying goes:
"All prognoses are hard, even more so those concerning the future."
(Made famous by Niels Bohr, but may have been a widely known in his home
country of Denmark before that).
Let's face it: unless you're a major customer (and no, an order volume
of a million units does not reliably make you one), any and all
expectations about parts availability in the micro controller market
that reach further than a few months into the future are recklessly
optimistic. And that was how it was _before_ the pandemic and all its
side effects.
If you need to be sure you have those chips in quantity x over the run
of a given product, and x has fewer than 7 digits, your only truly safe
bet is to stockpile the whole lot up front. The next-safest plan would
be to stockpile enough of them to tide you over the conservatively
estimated time for a redesign of the board and most of the lower-level
software. Obviously neither of those options is cheap; but the main
alternative is that you may one day have to discontinue your whole
product because that one part suddenly turned into unobtainium.
So how do you stockpile inventory for a product when you don't know the ultimate sales volume? I designed a board for a company 14 years ago. I originally sold maybe 100 a year average (100 piece minimum). Volumes grew until I was getting orders for
On 2022-06-16, David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no> wrote:
Major customers are in exactly the same boat. Car manufacturers have
had to pause production, or switch to different models and delay
deliveries, because they can't get the parts. HP can't get parts for
its printers, D-Link can't get components for their switches. Even the
companies that make the electronics for the machines that make
components can't get the parts they need to get new semiconductor plants
online.
It seems that last category do have better luck than "the rest of
us". My employer makes a black box that's designed into some
semiconductor tool or other. We haven't been able to build said boxes
for some time because we can't get FPGAs and Ethernet switch chips.
Our customer (who makes semiconductor tools) asked which parts we
neeed to build more black boxes. A week later they informed us that
5000 of the FPGAs had been shipped to us, and they were about to have
a chat with the manufacturer of the Ethernet switch chips. [I haven't
heard the results of that chat.]
About 15 years ago I worked on a project which was building processors on
TFT display technology - the same used for the drive electronics for LCD panels. There the feature size was O(10um), which is the same as the Intel 4004, and you could physically see the transistors if you held the panel up to the light. That's the kind of environment where every transistor counts. Another example is organic electronics, eg inkjet printed transistors.
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