puzzled about BGA package, lot more Flash and RAM

Thread Starter

bug13

Joined Feb 13, 2012
2,002
Microchip has many *different* devices.
Still doesn't make sense, they cost about the same. But more Flash/Ram/peripherals/GPIO etc... For me, there is no reason to me to choose the SAMD21 instead of SAMD10, except the BGA is not so DIY friendly.

But getting a loaded PCB from China is pretty cheap these day.
 

Thread Starter

bug13

Joined Feb 13, 2012
2,002
It all comes down to measuring area in picoacres. More picoacres means more flash and RAM
I don't know much about picoacres, but I think I got what you are saying.

However, form a marketing point of view, it's silly not to charge more for the one with more Flash/Ram/GPIO/Peripheral? And also, from an application point of view, why would I choose the lower spec one instead of the higher spec one, considering they are the same price.

The only thing I can think of is BGA is harder to work with during development. And maybe need a 4 layer board instead of two layers?
 

Travm

Joined Aug 16, 2016
363
I don't know much about picoacres, but I think I got what you are saying.

However, form a marketing point of view, it's silly not to charge more for the one with more Flash/Ram/GPIO/Peripheral? And also, from an application point of view, why would I choose the lower spec one instead of the higher spec one, considering they are the same price.

The only thing I can think of is BGA is harder to work with during development. And maybe need a 4 layer board instead of two layers?
Cost is the sum of all development costs and materials, plus delivery.
In this scenario materials and delivery likely make up 99% of the cost, and the materials are the same, so is delivery.
There's lots more differences between chips than memory and Ram also, this comparison is likely over simplified.
 

upand_at_them

Joined May 15, 2010
940
Still doesn't make sense, they cost about the same. But more Flash/Ram/peripherals/GPIO etc... For me, there is no reason to me to choose the SAMD21 instead of SAMD10, except the BGA is not so DIY friendly.
Heck, Microchip still makes the PIC16F84A! It's a version of a chip they've been making for, what, two decades? It's more expensive than so many PIC's, all of which are better in every way. But people still want it, they may still be using old designs and don't want to change. If Microchip weren't selling any they would stop making it.
 

Thread Starter

bug13

Joined Feb 13, 2012
2,002
Heck, Microchip still makes the PIC16F84A! It's a version of a chip they've been making for, what, two decades? It's more expensive than so many PIC's, all of which are better in every way. But people still want it, they may still be using old designs and don't want to change. If Microchip weren't selling any they would stop making it.
OK, I think it makes sense now. The SAMD10 is properly selling to support order design, so they can sell at a higher price (because of lesser demand, so higher cost average chip)

While the SAMD21 is newer chip, can sell at lower cost (in term of flash/ram/peripherals), as more demand and because of economic of scale, it sells at lower price.
 

Papabravo

Joined Feb 24, 2006
21,159
I don't know much about picoacres, but I think I got what you are saying.

However, form a marketing point of view, it's silly not to charge more for the one with more Flash/Ram/GPIO/Peripheral? And also, from an application point of view, why would I choose the lower spec one instead of the higher spec one, considering they are the same price.

The only thing I can think of is BGA is harder to work with during development. And maybe need a 4 layer board instead of two layers?
Not if you want to drive sales. Picoacres is a unit of area on a silicon chip of 1E-12 acres or a square about 63+ microns on a side. My point was that more area with smaller feature sizes means more stuff on a standard size chip or more chips per standard size wafer. Talking about chip area in picoacres is like measuring the speed of light in furlongs per fortnight, as part of the FFF system of measurement. That's Furlong Firkin Fortnight.
 

nsaspook

Joined Aug 27, 2009
13,081
In you o[pinion, what is the major deal killer in that extensive list?
For this device [A..D] Revisions have functionality bugs on things that are pretty basic and fixed with later revisions.
It's usually things that kill normal operation of the device like not waking up from sleep, memory corruption bugs or device clock bugs. Early Revs have all of these, so why use it for a new design if there is a better version.
 

Papabravo

Joined Feb 24, 2006
21,159
For this device [A..D] Revisions have functionality bugs on things that are pretty basic and fixed with later revisions.
It's usually things that kill normal operation of the device like not waking up from sleep, memory corruption bugs or device clock bugs. Early Revs have all of these, so why use it for a new design if there is a better version.
Agreed. Probably competitive pressure to rush product into the marketplace only to have it turn around and byte you in the rear.
 
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