LM8560, the eternal chip from the 1980 years

This summer I've made indoor (no direct sunlight) solar powered kitchen timer and I used STM32L011, it's winter and it's still working and voltage is stable. The power consumption is 100-150uA (28uA for display, 80uA for mcu, the rest is 1.2-to-3V boost). But it's only on when I cook (maybe 1h a day).

As an electronics experimenter I would have to say the REAL eternal chip is the 555 introduced in 1972. It's become a bit of a meme: You could have used a 555 for that!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/555_timer_IC

Great passion for the subject, definitely doesn't get discouraged by their less than perfect command of English and didn't use an LLM to butcher the text's authentic character.

I find that in my own writing I no longer strive for perfect grammar and polish since nowadays it actually cheapens the end result, everybody has perfect grammar today.

Hah, what a coincidence this post is.

Just last week I had to open first time alarm clock with green 7-segment display. Because I accidentally dropped it while vacuuming and antenna cord broke as it was so firmly under picture frame holding nail. And while open cleaned interior from dust, used greasy PRF to lubricate pots, switches and tuning wheel. If I recall correctly it did have that LM8560 chip in int and with display looked almost exactly what was in subject article inside.

Label on bottom claims: -----------------------------

     Luxor CR 9016
  NOKIA Consumer Electronics 
   International S.A
  (FI)(N)(S)[x] 230V ~ 50Hz
              Battery 9 V
  MADE FOR NOKIA IN CHINA

  -----------------------------

  SERIAL NO.
  9302-00106

Q: But why the device is branded Luxor and it's made for NOKIA? A: Because NOKIA bought bit earlier that year (1985) Swedish Luxor consumer electronics. And I guess they did not had yet time redo chassis with NOKIA printed on and this was a still products transition period.

NOKIA was still at that time making also TV sets and was about to bring two years later its first completely new way of implementing analog TV using digital processing chips, which allowed quite nice fieatures like PIP which was great help making VHS recording without ads. I had one of those TV-sets (M-model) and used it about 10 years.

But that alarmclock radio from -85 is still going strong, good shape and it definitely was good purchase about 40 years ago.

e: Sorry about formatting, I tried to find how to format literally, but couldn't find. OK, good enough now.

The article bringing up flip-flop clocks reminded me of another mechanical digital clock that I can not quite remember the name of. It was from roughly the same time period as the flip-flop alarm/radio clocks but the numbers were wire grids or cutouts in wire grids and as the numbers changed they sort of faded from one digit to the next. I can't quite remember how the mechanism worked and the only clock of this sort I have ever seen was the one I bought ~20 years ago just to take apart and see how it worked. Anyone know what I am talking about?

The mechanism was surprisingly simple once I got it opened and saw how it worked but from the outside made no sense, I probably stared at that clock for an hour trying to figure out how it worked before I finally opened it up to see what was inside. I might still have the clock mechanism in a box out in the garage.

Edit: I suspect these clocks were actually from the time period at the end of flip-flops, showed up too late to become common, LEDs/LCDs killed them. The digits were on the dim side, perfectly fine for a bedside alarm clock and quite good for that situation but you had to be fairly close to clock to read it in a well lit room. Better than a flip-flop in a dark room but worse than an LCD in the light.

One of the most interesting aspects it that it's all state machines and logic, with no CPU. This explains the weird glitches, e.g. having to not release one button while pressing another to avoid erroneous time setting. It shows what we take for granted that's trivial to do in software.

A retro red LED clock actually adds to the calm atmosphere of my bedroom. I can’t really sleep without one now.

On the other hand, the only saving grace about my bright green and blue LED router is that someone whose hand should be shaken thought to allow software disabling or even a scheduled disabling of the LEDs.