Which analog vendors provide the best data sheets in your view?

Which analog vendors provide the most useful data sheets in your view?

  • Analog Devices (Linear Tech)

    Votes: 4 80.0%
  • Infineon

    Votes: 1 20.0%
  • Microchip

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Monolithic Power

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • NXP

    Votes: 1 20.0%
  • Renesas

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • ST

    Votes: 2 40.0%
  • Skyworks

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Texas Instruments

    Votes: 2 40.0%
  • Other

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Total voters
    5

#12

Joined Nov 30, 2010
18,224
I always liked National and Signetics. I think National is now T.I.
and be careful about who is a vendor and who is a manufacturer.
To me, a vendor is mouser.com or Digikey because they sell parts to me.
The manufacturers don't even want to hear from me.
 

ian field

Joined Oct 27, 2012
6,536
See the poll - feel free to comment on why!
Most are pretty good - sometimes I hear people complaining about TI - their data sheets seem more like hard work.

Sometimes Microchip over do it - settle down for some bedtime reading...............
 

OBW0549

Joined Mar 2, 2015
3,566
The ones I'm most familiar with (Analog Devices, Linear Technology, Microchip, TI) all provide good data sheets, and I wouldn't single out any particular one as "best."
 

ian field

Joined Oct 27, 2012
6,536
The ones I'm most familiar with (Analog Devices, Linear Technology, Microchip, TI) all provide good data sheets, and I wouldn't single out any particular one as "best."
The TI ones seem to have a sort of a typewriter font that takes more effort to read.
 

OBW0549

Joined Mar 2, 2015
3,566
The TI ones seem to have a sort of a typewriter font that takes more effort to read.
I've noticed that at times. Also, your comment about Microchip sometimes overdoing it resonated for me: I'm currently trying to wrap my brain around the dsPIC33EP64GP502, whose data sheet is 500+ pages long and only addresses the highlights; all the detailed info for the on-chip peripherals is in the Family Reference Manual, which has something over two thousand pages.

They're thorough, that's for sure...
 

dl324

Joined Mar 30, 2015
16,839
I prefer National Semiconductor.

I dislike TI now. They add pages and pages of useless information about packaging and you can't get a datasheet under 1MB. They also acquired RCA and the datasheets are just poor copies (literally) of the original RCA datasheets with the same pages and pages of useless packaging information. TI has gone downhill from what they were in the 70's.

But I dislike NXP even more.
 

OBW0549

Joined Mar 2, 2015
3,566
It occurs to me that a good, closely-related question would be, "Which manufacturers provide the most useful application information?" My favored candidates would be Linear Technology, Analog Devices and TI. National Semiconductor's application notes were excellent, too, before they got bought up by TI.
 

dl324

Joined Mar 30, 2015
16,839
National Semiconductor's application notes were excellent
When I left my R&D Technician job in the early 80's, my boss told me to keep any of the databooks I wanted from my bench. I kept all of the National Semiconductor databooks and have read all of them, literally from cover to cover.

The Signetics Analog Applications Manual was also quite edifying.
 

Thread Starter

MrLBS

Joined May 23, 2017
5
It occurs to me that a good, closely-related question would be, "Which manufacturers provide the most useful application information?" My favored candidates would be Linear Technology, Analog Devices and TI. National Semiconductor's application notes were excellent, too, before they got bought up by TI.
Hi dl324,

Could you provide me some context on what makes them more useful? Do you have a concrete example of the difference in quality between an ADI's application information piece versus a smaller analog company's?
 

ian field

Joined Oct 27, 2012
6,536
Compare these datasheets for the same part. Even though the TI and NatSemi datasheets contain basically the same information, TI's is 3X the size.
Everyone has taken over everyone else - there's now very few distinctly separate semiconductor vendors.

Who's got RCA now? - last I heard it was the French Thomson company.

I think ST is a French/Italian merger - the French Thomson and the Italian SGS.
 
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