Zilog Z80 discontinued after nearly 50 years

[celltx]

The legendary Zilog Z80 CPU is being discontinued after nearly 50 years

https://www.techspot.com/news/102684-zil...years.html

What does it say about TI-84 calcs? Discontinued too?

[Dave Britten]

I think (based on what I heard) that the discontinued parts are all the legacy DIP versions. Stuff like the eZ80, which is used in the TI-84 Plus CE, won't be going anywhere for the foreseeable future.

[brouhaha]

(04-22-2024 12:36 PM)Dave Britten Wrote:  I think (based on what I heard) that the discontinued parts are all the legacy DIP versions. Stuff like the eZ80, which is used in the TI-84 Plus CE, won't be going anywhere for the foreseeable future.

Not just DIP. It's older parts in older CMOS processes. Apparently sales are not sufficient to justify the NRE to tape out in a newer process, and they might not be able to match the electrical specs in a new process.

The eZ80 are apparently in a somewhat newer process, so as you say, not going end-of-life yet.

Does the TI 84 Plus CE still contain a actual Zilog part? I thought that TI had moved all the calcs to higher integration ASICs, containing equivalent cores. (The opposite direction of how HP calculators have evolved, moving to standard microcontrollers.)

[Adriweb]

(04-26-2024 08:24 PM)brouhaha Wrote:  Does the TI 84 Plus CE still contain a actual Zilog part? I thought that TI had moved all the calcs to higher integration ASICs, containing equivalent cores. (The opposite direction of how HP calculators have evolved, moving to standard microcontrollers.)

TI has indeed been using the Zilog IP in ASICs directly and not as discrete chips for around 20 years now!