DIP packages (was Re: Help resurrect my Xerox Alto)

[Eric Smith]

  Brent Hilpert wrote:
 > Well, if you can't find a (reasonably-priced) 14-pinner, the pinout 
patterns
 > of the 8 and 14-pin DIP versions are the same, so an 8-pin is a drop-in
 > replacement for the the 14-pin.

 > Begs the question of why the 14-pin version was ever produced,
 > machine insertion/handling perhaps.

Perhaps. Also the 14-pin DIP was probably invented and standardized 
(TO-116) several years before the 8-pin DIP. The 14-pin DIP appears to 
date back to 1965 or earlier. I don't have any information suggesting 
when the 8-pin DIP appeared. Was the μA709 the first monolithic op-amp 
offered in a DIP package? The earlier μA702 was available in a 14-pin 
DIP by 1976, but I don't think it was offered in a DIP at its introduction.

Fairchild had one part that was in a 36-pin DIP in 1969. I've never seen 
that used for any other part.

Early on (late 1960s, early-to-mid 1970s), some of the Japanese 
semiconductor vendors such as NEC seemed to like the 42-pin DIP.