5 ms·
Maybe was the most popular chip for a while until the 90s, but these days they are not in very many things that sell in high quantities unless it is like a real
by xt00 11y ago
Maybe was the most popular chip for a while until the 90s, but these days they are not in very many things that sell in high quantities unless it is like a really cheap toy or something.. smartphones for example don't have 555 timers in them. Battery charger IC's probably are the biggest total seller.. but many companies sell similar types under different names, so not sure if you could call them all "one chip" like you can call the 555 timer and all of its clones..
- userbinator 11y agoProbably not in smartphones, but I remember seeing a 555 in a recent (i.e. few years old) laptop before, where it was being used for power sequencing.
- pkaye 11y agoThe functionality on the 555 can be replaced by any basic microcontroller hence only the cheapest products have a 555 timer.
- swamp40 11y agoThe cheapest ones at Digikey are going for 10 cents (compared to 35 cents for the cheapest small microcontrollers [PSOC or a 10F200]). So I guess they still have some use. Probably sell mostly to hobbyists, universities and old designs though.
- mrob 11y agoThe microcontroller doesn't need the external resistors and capacitor. If the 555 circuit needs a big capacitor then the microcontroller circuit could be cheaper.
- pjc50 11y agoThe microcontroller does, however, need a decoupling capacitor and the inclusion of a program in manufacturing. It may also be pickier about power supplies.
- mrob 11y agoTrue, but ideally the 555 should have a decoupling capacitor too, and the decoupling capacitor is very small and cheap.
- dheera 11y agoHobbyists hardly use these things anymore, because they require all that external stuff -- resistors, capacitors -- before you get what you want out of them. They're not self-contained. These days you can just program a PIC or something, drop it on your broadboard, and you get whatever signal you want out of them with software, without any components besides the chip itself, and maybe a quartz crystal if you want better accuracy (although I really wish they'd package a crystal inside the DIP as well to make it even more self-contained).
- beeforpork 11y agoThe DS3231 RTC clock chip indeed has an accurate crystal oscilator inside the package, so, yeah, put em in an AVR why not!
- makomk 11y agoThe biggest seller might actually be one particular lithium battery protection chip, because it seems to show up all over the place with less variation than the actual charging chips.
- userbinator 11y agoThe DW01? It's certainly one of the high-volume chips, but consider that there are also quite a lot of products that don't use lithium batteries.
- xt00 11y agoYea so true.. that chip is very popular in many lipo packs.. It would be interesting to see how many gazillions of those that are sold..