51–60 of 97 posts
As a kid I didn’t understand what the 555 timer chip on the Apple II disk controller was doing but I learned the hard way that when you misalign the pins on the drive connector cable and the 555 chip releases its blue smoke you can’t use the drive anymore :(
The 555 timer is still the most popular chip that hobbyists add to their parts inventory (see rankings at https://partsbox.com/ecdb.html ). I find this both interesting and curious — I'd say it has mostly nostalgic value at this point. Almost every practical problem today is better solved by something else. And yet it persists, I guess mostly because of beginner tutorials and first LED blinky circuits. One nice thing…
I'm curious about this claim. It's certainly easier to just wire up a modern microcontroller, but is there a better option that involves no software and is likely to still work the same today as it did 50 years ago?
The 555 timer is still the most popular chip that hobbyists add to their parts inventory (see rankings at https://partsbox.com/ecdb.html ). I find this both interesting and curious — I'd say it has mostly nostalgic value at this point. Almost every practical problem today is better solved by something else. And yet it persists, I guess mostly because of beginner tutorials and first LED blinky circuits. One nice thing…
> Almost every practical problem today is better solved by something else. I'm curious about this claim. It's certainly easier to just wire up a modern microcontroller, but is there a better option that involves no software and is likely to still work the same today as it did 50 years ago?
For that matter, a 16 pin CH32V003 can emulate a vast array of 7400 series devices as long as you don't need ns timing — no problem for µs. It's also cheaper.
Makes me wonder if we could have a 555 circuit with a trigger time of 55 yrs
Evil Mad Scientist makes a giant, discrete version as a soldering kit: https://shop.evilmadscientist.com/productsmenu/tinykitlist/6... Very cool. (Looks like it uses 26 transistors. I assume the die is similar.)
As a kid I didn’t understand what the 555 timer chip on the Apple II disk controller was doing but I learned the hard way that when you misalign the pins on the drive connector cable and the 555 chip releases its blue smoke you can’t use the drive anymore :(
I have read as well that the 555 was used in the game paddles for the Apple II. 555 + potentiometer (the part you turned) varied the length (duty cycle?) of a square wave which the Apple II used to determine the paddle position.
https://www.applefritter.com/appleii-box/APPLE2/NibbelingAtT...
Can't watch it right now, but upvoted for Dave Jones. He's taught me so much. Absolute treasure, and the host of one of the last great active forums. Thank you for not blackholing all that info on the disaster that is Discord, like so many other communities.
http://ibb.co.com/1Y7QFB8N>
5:55 video released on May 5th, as per description :) For something feeling like a fairly specific IC, I remember seeing many projects that use it throughout the years in wacky ways - and seeing it makes me happy to know that the sentiment for this little piece is shared.
Turns one a single frequency that’s remotely close to one of the two tones of a dial tone will convince it. Wasn’t sine wave either but not a problem! 555 powered by a 9V battery.