The cost of adding decoupling caps to a design is negligible...you can't
    argue you did it for cost reasons anymore.

Ok, how do you figure that?  Silicon has gotten much cheaper ($1
microcontrollers), but the price of 0.1uF decoupling caps is still up at
close to $0.1 each, at least in hobbyists quantities from hobbyist dealers.
To me, that means the cost of decoupling caps has become MORE significant.

Of course, some of this seems to be "marketing."  Good deals on 0.1uF caps
are hard to find BECAUSE there is a high demand for them, BECAUSE that's
what all the published hobbyist projects use for decoupling.  Pick an
oddball value like .039uF or .047uF, and it will probably still work fine
for most bypass applications, and you're more likely to find a good deal.
(Jameco: .047 disk: $0.07, .1 disk: $0.15.  Of course, also .1 mono $0.07,
so it's not as bad as it could be.)

BillW

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