2010/2/12 Ruben J=F6nsson : > Can you even get components for a 15 year old project? How long will you = have > to support the software. I guess you have the hex file (or S-record or > whatever) that you programmed the chip with so you can burn a new one wit= h a > standalone programmer. But how long would you need to support it for soft= ware > changes? > Yes it is difficult. But that is our continuation engineering guys are doing. Quite often the 15 year or even 20 year old product family still sell really very well in our industry (industrial automation). So part obsolescence is a big problem. Firmware maintenance is also not easy. So sometimes you have to forget about it and develop a new replacement. My colleague just finished one such project -- to redesign a product done in 1994 with 80186 and assembly. There are basically not design reuse for the firmware part. Still we probably need to support the 1994 product for some more years... -- = Xiaofan http://mcuee.blogspot.com -- = http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist