23 Mar
2010
23 Mar
'10
3 p.m.
On Mar 23, 2010, at 5:41 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote:
...and I DO like new processors. But I wonder if 8-bit uC's are
long for this world, at least in the commercial area. The Cortex M0
ARM CPUs appear to be coming on pretty strong. Why buy 8 bits when
you can get 32 for the same price in an upward-compatible package?
That's certainly a valid point. 8-bitters won't go away anytime
soon, though. Engineers tend to design with what they know, and
while 32-bitters are getting cheaper, well, 8-bitters are too.
Further, one can design an mcs51-based chip without paying a dime to
anyone...can't exactly do that with ARM.
I think there will always be a market for small processors. FWIW,
I've seen people loudly predicting the death of 8-bit processors for
well over twenty years now. They're still here.
-Dave
--
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL
For an awful lot of applications you don't need
more power than an
old 8 bit processor IMHO.
Or a NEW 8-bit processor, for that matter.