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Member's Forum Wat is the oldest chip in your parts bin?
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  • Replies 45 replies
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  • MC6800
  • 2708
  • z80
  • old ICs
  • old chips
Related

Wat is the oldest chip in your parts bin?

dougw
dougw over 2 years ago

I came across some old and famous chips in one of my parts cabinets. Does anybody else keep old chips? and why?

Note that these were pretty expensive when they were purchased, especially the gold plated ceramic chips.

I expect most of these are part numbers that everyone has heard of.

Have you designed with any of these famous chips?

Brownie points if you can figure out the date codes.

image

image

What chips are buried in your archives?

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  • ralphjy
    ralphjy over 2 years ago +8
    I used to design with a lot of Signetics parts in the 70's. I've got one of the early 555 parts. Shown here with a 566 VCO and 5556 opamp. I probably have some of the 56x series PLLs around somewhere…
  • baldengineer
    baldengineer over 2 years ago +6
    I was excited because I thought I'd have a real contender. But, today is the first time I ever looked the date code, which is on the bottom. It's from a run in 1980. So I probably have MOS 6502 chips…
  • Jan Cumps
    Jan Cumps over 2 years ago +6
    oldest I had: image source . I don't have that kit anymore.
  • gordonmx
    gordonmx over 2 years ago

    It may not be the oldest, but if we dig deep enough I sure we could all find a 555 timer lying around. What about an Intel 4040?

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  • ralphjy
    ralphjy over 2 years ago in reply to gordonmx

    Or a 4004...

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  • dougw
    dougw over 2 years ago in reply to misaz

    Wow TTL, not even "LS" series....Thumbsup

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  • dougw
    dougw over 2 years ago in reply to ralphjy

    I think at that time TI was the largest semiconductor company in the world.

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  • dougw
    dougw over 2 years ago in reply to baldengineer

    Definitely an old design though.....the first CPU IC...cost $60 at introduction - equivalent to about $450 today

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  • rsc
    rsc over 2 years ago

    image

    On the right is the original ROM for the Sinclair MicroAce kit from 1981 

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  • Gough Lui
    Gough Lui over 2 years ago

    For the record, Wat is not the oldest chip in my collection.

    That being said, for me, I suspect it's a Texas Instruments 74-series octal buffer of some sort ... which isn't really that old to begin with. It's in a tube somewhere ... it's exact co-ordinates unknown.

    - Gough

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  • jc2048
    jc2048 over 2 years ago in reply to jc2048

    This is the Nat Semi version of the 1771 on a board. That date code would be week 45 of 1979 (I was doing this in the early 1980s). There's a hugh cavity there, so maybe that's two chips side by side. It would explain why the Western Digital part has windows top and bottom if their part had two die back to back.

    image

    The 1771 had an internal data separator that didn't work very well, so this was the mod to get it going.

    image

    I had that working with a 6502 as the processor, a single-sided 8" disc drive, and fig-FORTH.

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  • michaelkellett
    michaelkellett over 2 years ago

    For someone who has been in the game for a long time my store of old chips is surprisingly small. This is because there was an effective purge when I left the family business about 20 years ago.

    I have lots of old bits inside old electronic equipment and test gear but I'm not counting those as within the scope of Doug's question.

    I did inherit a job box of parts collected to prototype a new instrument in 2001 - I long ago used up some immediately useful parts but a lot remain:

    All these bits were bought  (some in drypack, most not) in 2001.

    LTC1540IS8 100
    LT1761ES5-3.3 50
    LT1754ES6-5 100
    DS1306 9
    INA321EA 250
    MAX4163ESA 100
    MAX4401AXT

    100

    TLV2760IDBVT 250
    MSP430F149IPM 160
    MAX990ESA 100
    MAX4638EUE 100
    MAX4610EUD 100
    AM30LV0064DJ40E2I 5
    22UF 6V TANT KEMET 500
    330UF 10V TANT AVX 400
    TI 3402ID 75

    They've been in  a cardboard box in three different labs since then.

    If anyone wants to make me a good offer (or pitch, or swap) I'll be happy to see them doing something interesting.

    MK

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  • Jan Cumps
    Jan Cumps over 2 years ago

    oldest I had:

    image

    image source. I don't have that kit anymore. 

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