On 5/20/06, Wouter van Ooijen wrote: > > What is the track record of this company for long-term availability? I think Freescale's track record for long term availability is good. Anyway they are very strong in the automotive market and one prerequisite is the long term availability in that market. The outdated parts can be expensive but they are in general still available, albeit with higher price tag. The problem with the old Motorola SPS was the availability of MCUs in small quantity, service, high cost of development tools. Now Freescale is trying to correct these problems. They now are getting better especially in the development tools part. They start to give away 16k/32k limited C compiler. They also have cheaper ICD2 like JTAG/BDM tools now. Still they have lost to Microchip in the 8-bit market and others in the 16-bit/32bit market and it will take them quite some time to capature the market share back. Regards, Xiaofan -- http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist