4004 and IC history / was Re: Vintage computer photogallery

[jim s]

Roy J. Tellason wrote:

>
>I've often wondered why it is that 14-pin packages seemed to dominate the 
>early parts so much. 
>
There was a company started up in the 1971 or 1972 time frame in 
Columbia, Missouri that made
a splash in the IC market by offering "cheap" parts.  It was Solid State 
Industries, or SSI and sold
a pretty good mix of 7400 IC's.  They bought the die and packaged them 
in Columbia.  The big cost
was the packaging machine at the time.

That is to some degree what dictated their choices of what to package, 
since they eliminated the
actual silicon fab from their business model.

They kept up for a while but eventually were wiped out the eventual drop 
of prices to a few
cents.

Jim