On Thu, 28 Aug 1997 14:43:49 -0400 Walter Banks writes: >It is interesting that technology is only a small part of the >equation and information and availability is quite a large part. This is true, once the technology is adequate for the job at hand then additional technology is usually of little use. This is especially true for something like a toaster; the quality of toast produced depends not at all on the MIPS rating of the processor. But the usual sales approach is to get in early, wow 'em with technology (before the project has developed enough to know what technology is actually needed), and get 'em hooked on your chip. The salesforce seems to believe (maybe correctly) that only a few, if any, designers will strongly consider small increments of price and the availability / nonavailability in the early stages. And they are probably right, since the designer is just trying to get something, anything, to work. Throwing as much technology as possible at it seems to make the job easier as well as providing lots of up-to-date jargon to use at meetings. A superior may ask "Does this design use 'FLASH'?" and it seems a lot better to be able to answer "yes, of course it does, what am I, a stick in the mud?" rather than try and explain why not. In my opinion, in-circuit reprogrammable means in-circuit deprogrammable, so if it is a relatively simple product that you want to send out the door and never see again, OTP is good. Besides lower cost (and OTP will always cost less than flash since it is the same thing with several wiring paths removed and a less critical tolerance on the oxide thickness), it likely takes a much higher surge of voltage applied to the chip to accidentally tear up the program in it. The ability to use EEPROM or Flash parts for early development is a fairly strong point, however a major customer will likely use an ICE since the cost is only $1-5K and its usefullness is much higher than Flash parts, on-chip debugging, and other glitzy technology.