"Classic" Chips

[Jeff1946]

I was thinking about classic chips.  Obviously Dave's favorite LM555, 741 op amp, LM7805 regulator, MC34063 buck/boost.  Any others come to mind.  I assume that something like an OP27 is what one would use as a general purpose op amp now.

[BrianHG]

LM358...

[schmitt trigger]

The LM339 comparator
A lot of people hate it, but nevertheless is a classic: LM386
TL072 BiFet opamp.

And we could spend pages on classic logic: the 74xx and 40xx series.

[ebclr]

All those are 40-year old ic's, why not something more actual

[james_s]

What do you mean "more actual"? How do you get much more classic than 40 year old ICs that are still made?

What about the 6502? It's iconic, and has been in steady production in one form or another for almost half a century.

[gingpeakin]

LM10. Decent op amp (works down to 1.1V supply) and a band gap reference.  Thanks to Bob Widlar  What's not to like.   Also the old 723.

[TimFox]

The Signetics 5534 and 5532, which may be the first successful op amps specifically designed for audio.

[srb1954]

Some classic chips (not in any particular ranking order) that had a major impact on electronics design :

(1) 7400 logic family - opened the doors for the ubiquitous use of digital equipment we see these days.
(2) Intel 2716 5V only EPROM - made microprocessor systems much easier to implement
(3) Mostek 4116 16k x 1 dynamic RAM - set the pattern for microcomputer memory to reach undreamt of sizes (and unfortunately the software bloat that followed)
(3) National Semiconductor LM317 adjustable regulator - a clever design that greatly simplified variable output regulators
(5) Fairchild uA709 - first practical monolithic op-amp
 

[Zero999]

LM10. Decent op amp (works down to 1.1V supply) and a band gap reference.  Thanks to Bob Widlar  What's not to like.

The price. It's relatively expensive.

[Alex Eisenhut]

6581

[gcewing]

Z80

[David Hess]

I was thinking about classic chips.  Obviously Dave's favorite LM555, 741 op amp, LM7805 regulator, MC34063 buck/boost.

The MC34063 is a simplified version of the original 78S40.

Any others come to mind.  I assume that something like an OP27 is what one would use as a general purpose op amp now.

The OP27 and similar parts are still and always will be expensive compared to general purpose parts because they take more area.  One thing which makes the LM324/LM358 and modern replacements for the 741 inexpensive is that they are designed to be as small as possible.  The OP27 also cannot be a general purpose part because of its limited differential input voltage range, which is a common feature of almost all precision parts.

[themadhippy]

Need a flashing led?  then you need an LM3909

[NivagSwerdna]

Need a flashing led?  then you need an LM3909

Very clever design that. An efficient flasher from a single AA.

[schmitt trigger]

Indeed, the LM3909.
Unfortunately, it has been obsolete for a while.

I also liked the VU-meter LED bargraph driver, LM3916. Also obsolete.

[Alex Eisenhut]

NE567? I seem to remember this one being pretty buzzworthy back in the 80s in hobby magazines.

[John B]

It just depends on whether it's still useful. The TL07x or NE5532 is still my default choice for audio circuits, the LM358 is a cheap and low quiescent current opamp when you need some basic low frequency buffering, linear regs are linear regs and will probably be needed well into the future with little room to improve on them. Though I'm not sure why you'd want to use a 741 anymore, and the MC34063 is kinda crappy.

[rsjsouza]

A few additions:
Silicon General SG3524 - quite popular PWM controller for switching power supplies. My first professional project.
Texas Instruments μA78xx series - THE voltage regulators of the 70s-80s
Texas Instruments TMS32010 - the wildly popular early Digital Signal Processor
Intel MCS51 (8051) family - are they the most popular microcontrollers historically speaking?
Maxim MAX232 - at a certain point, any RS232 had one of these.
Rockwell modem chipsets that popularized the analog baseband modem era. 

[Wolfgang]

LM723J, LM358, LM324, LT1014, AD8307, PIC16F84, OP07, NE555, NE602, TL431A, LM399, LM741, NE5532, LM393 ,LM339 ,LT1028A.

[Mr. Scram]

What do you mean "more actual"? How do you get much more classic than 40 year old ICs that are still made?

What about the 6502? It's iconic, and has been in steady production in one form or another for almost half a century.

I agree with the sentiment. People seem to stick to these ancient chips even though better chips have come after. The MC34063 seems to be a good example. It's a nasty little thing with modern competition both being easier to use and yielding better results. Them being ubiquitous does not mean they're much good.

[Yansi]

NE567? I seem to remember this one being pretty buzzworthy back in the 80s in hobby magazines.

Just used one in a product recently - to detect an ultrasonic control tone embedded in an audio line

[Alex Eisenhut]

General Instrument AY-3-8910 and SPO-256

These were carried in Radio Shack when I was a kid and made me lose my mind a little bit. I got a SPO-256 hooked up to my C64's user port and managed to make it speak. It was kind of hit-or-miss without the accompanying ASCII to phoneme chip, but it wasn't that hard to tweak it manually either.

VCP200 speech recognition chip

NEC V20

68000 + 68881

[thermistor-guy]

FND500 family, 7-segment displays.

2102 family, static ram 1024 x 1 bit. These are still made:
https://www.jameco.com/z/MM2102AN-4L-National-Semiconductor-IC-MM2102AN-4L-NMOS-SRAM-1024-Bit-1024x1-250ns-Low-Power_2287991.html

[tooki]

What do you mean "more actual"? How do you get much more classic than 40 year old ICs that are still made?

He/she means “more modern”.

In many languages, the word “actual”* means “current”, “up to date”.

FYI to all the non-native English speakers: in English, “actual” does NOT mean “up to date”, it means “real”.

*e.g. German “aktuell”, French “actuel”, Italian “attuale”, etc.

[rdl]

LM3914 / LM3915 / LM3916