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Renesis

Thu May 06 2010, 06:02PM

Registered Member #2028 Joined: Mon Mar 16 2009, 08:13PM
Location: Norway
Posts: 319

Yesterday i found three IC's on a very, very old motherboard, with windows! Thats kinda neat, but im stumped as to what the purpose of this is? Was it used during fabrication, perhaps?

The one in the picture has 40 pins, and since it says INTEL '77 i suspect that this might be a processor. The other two are somewhat smaller, and has TI's logo printed on them.

Oh, and if any hobby photographers knows how to take good closeups with a cheap digital camera, without using a big magnifier glass, im all ears. This image was the best of 20.

IntraWinding

Thu May 06 2010, 06:23PM

Registered Member #2261 Joined: Mon Aug 03 2009, 01:19AM
Location: London, UK
Posts: 581

EPROM is Erasable Read Only Memory. It's non volatile (keeps its contents when the power goes off) but you can wipe it by exposing it to UV light and then reprogram it. Seems rather quaint now but it was quite cool at the time and you get to look at the chip too!
I think mainly you found it with just purely EPROM chips, but there where some CPU's that had inbuilt EPROM that were windowed too I think.
On the down side, the optical quality of the window is generally abismal, but you can still have some fun with a microscope.
Wiki

Renesis

Thu May 06 2010, 07:25PM

Registered Member #2028 Joined: Mon Mar 16 2009, 08:13PM
Location: Norway
Posts: 319

IntraWinding wrote ...

EPROM is Erasable Read Only Memory. It's non volatile (keeps its contents when the power goes off) but you can wipe it by exposing it to UV light and then reprogram it. Seems rather quaint now but it was quite cool at the time and you get to look at the chip too!
I think mainly you found it with just purely EPROM chips, but there where some CPU's that had inbuilt EPROM that were windowed too I think.
On the down side, the optical quality of the window is generally abismal, but you can still have some fun with a microscope.
Wiki

I've always wondered how UV exposures were done in practice, shining through a normal IC sounds pretty intense. It makes more sense now, thank you.

I just wish i had my microscope here now.

Dr. Drone

Thu May 06 2010, 09:13PM

Registered Member #290 Joined: Mon Mar 06 2006, 08:24PM
Location:
Posts: 1673

Turkey9

Thu May 06 2010, 11:03PM

Registered Member #1451 Joined: Wed Apr 23 2008, 03:48AM
Location: Boulder, Co
Posts: 661

I collected four or five of those.... Along with an Intel processor that's DIP! about 40 pins like Dr. Spark mentioned. All of those chips i found had the windows covered by a sticker, did you're have that? I assume it was to prevent sunlight from wiping the chip

IntraWinding

Fri May 07 2010, 12:13AM

Registered Member #2261 Joined: Mon Aug 03 2009, 01:19AM
Location: London, UK
Posts: 581

I think they were playing it safe with the stickers, to keep light out. I never heard of RF wiping before. Sounds like degaussing. EPROM's aren't that old by the way. I think the BIOS on my last PC (KT7-RAID) was on an EPROM - had a holographic sticker on it though to make look snazzy

Hon1nbo

Fri May 07 2010, 01:44AM

Registered Member #902 Joined: Sun Jul 15 2007, 08:17PM
Location: Pacific Northwest USA
Posts: 1042

Renesis wrote ...

Yesterday i found three IC's on a very, very old motherboard, with windows! Thats kinda neat, but im stumped as to what the purpose of this is? Was it used during fabrication, perhaps?

The one in the picture has 40 pins, and since it says INTEL '77 i suspect that this might be a processor. The other two are somewhat smaller, and has TI's logo printed on them.

Oh, and if any hobby photographers knows how to take good closeups with a cheap digital camera, without using a big magnifier glass, im all ears. This image was the best of 20.

a lot of cameras, even cheap ones, tend to have a Macro mode of some kind, look for a mode with the picture of a flower, which is a common way of identifying it on most cameras I've seen that aren't high end.
Also, ignore using the zoom on the lens, it will send your focus range farther than the object, so if necessary rely on digital zoom which will drop your resolution but it will still be in focus.

-Jimmy

Renesis

Fri May 07 2010, 12:02PM

Registered Member #2028 Joined: Mon Mar 16 2009, 08:13PM
Location: Norway
Posts: 319

Turkey9 wrote ...

All of those chips i found had the windows covered by a sticker, did you're have that?

Yes, in fact they did. Removing it was a mere coincidence.

DaJJHman wrote ...

a lot of cameras, even cheap ones, tend to have a Macro mode of some kind, look for a mode with the picture of a flower, which is a common way of identifying it on most cameras I've seen that aren't high end.

That seems to work, thank you.

MinorityCarrier

Fri May 07 2010, 10:35PM

Registered Member #2123 Joined: Sat May 16 2009, 03:10AM
Location: Bend, Oregon
Posts: 312

I think the claim of erasing EPROMs with RF is bogus. The ex-INTELista I work with never heard of that being done, UV erasure was used. What's the mechanism for RF causing gate charge electrons on a floating EPROM gate to tunnel away? Why doesn't address line 'antenna effect' introduce charge?

A 10,000 pin socket part with a core dissipating 264 watts sounds untenable. A co-worker with a spouse still working at Intel hasn't heard of that, or about Intel Pathfinder Engineering working with that. What's the socket designation? Address size?

Just asking.

klugesmith

Fri May 07 2010, 11:36PM

Registered Member #2099 Joined: Wed Apr 29 2009, 12:22AM
Location: Los Altos, California
Posts: 1716

MinorityCarrier wrote ...
A 10,000 pin socket part with a core dissipating 264 watts sounds untenable.

I agree with you there. But can attest that there are 10,000 pin automatic chip testers (I just touched one). They go with robotic handlers to connect hundreds of chips for concurrent testing. Ever figure how many minutes of write, read, and erase cycles it takes to properly test a flash memory chip on the factory test floor?

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