Hi,
I had always assumed that PIC stands for Peripheral Interface
Controller as the PIC FAQ also states. But I have been having a
disscusion in a usenet group and he seems to beleive otherwise. Could
someone enlighten me?

Below follows the last message.

Regards
Simon


On Sun, 2 Mar 1997 18:31:21 GMT, in alt.satellite.tv.crypt
mzenier@netcom.com (Mark Zenier) wrote:

>in <3318c1b3.1360668@news.demon.co.uk>,
>:  Simon Thompson (simon@tyrant.demon.co.uk) wrote:
>: On Sat, 1 Mar 1997 03:47:41 GMT, mzenier@netcom.com (Mark Zenier)
>: wrote: 
>
>: >Sorry.  According to my 1977 General Instruments Semi. division
>: >(Microchip's corporate predecessor) databook, it was orginally
>: >Programmable Intelligent Computer, but a few years later mutated
>: >into Programmable Intelligent Controller.
>...
>: GI also generated a 16 bit microprocessor, called the CP1600, in the
>: early 70s. This was a reasonable microprocessor, but not particularly
>: good at handling i/os. For some very specific applications where good
>: i/o handling was needed, GI designed a Peripheral Interface Controller
>: (or PIC for short), in around 1975. It was designed to be very fast,
>: since it was i/o handling for a 16 bit machine, but didn't need a huge
>: amount of functionality, so its microcoded instruction set was small.
>
>: Hopefully, you can see what's coming....yes, the architecture designed
>: in '75 is substantially the PIC16C5x architecure today. Granted, the
>: 1975 version was manufactured in NMOS, and was only available in
>: masked ROM versions, but still a good little uC. The market, however,
>: didn't particularly think so, and the PIC remained designed in at a
>: handful of large customers only.
>
>This smells of revisionist history.  The CP1600 was a pared down
>variation of a PDP-11 and would be just as capable of I/O as any
>comparable low end high integration minicomputer of the day.  (That chip
>was typical GI quirky.  It was a 16 bit machine but the instruction set
>only used 10 bits, And GI made 10 bit ROMs for program storage).  At
>that point in time, machines were boxes full of boards connected with a
>bus and I/O would have been implemented at the functional level of
>boards.
>
>A chapter in a computer architecture text from 1982, "Computer
>Structures: Principles and Examples" states some of the design issues
>for the PIC16xx family.  It was designed as a more powerful competitor
>to the 4 bit TMS1000, the main single chip controller of that time.
>(Although the 8048 and 3870 actually ended up the winners, IMHO).
>
>But as for the name, you don't call a Pentium a 586, or Windows 95 by
>Chicago, Spokane, Humptulips, or what ever city name used for the
>internal development at Microsoft.  Likewise, the PIC1650 was named in
>the datasheets as "Programmable Intelligent Computer" back in 1977, and
>according to a history of the chip in "Computer Structures" was changed
>to "Programmable Intelligent Controller" in the 1979 literature.
>
>Unless you can come up with some sales literature that predates that,
>I'd say the Peripheral is a matter of poor memory and spin.
>
>Mark Zenier  mzenier@eskimo.com  mzenier@netcom.com
>