Hi people,

Well, here are some results of my assessement.

Note that this is an overview of the synthesis I made because I've spent two months working with differents toolchains, having meetings with manufacturers and some results of my choice are also subjective due to my feeling. I'm sure some of you won't agree with my choice because their criterions are not the same...


My citerions for the assessement were :

- Whole range of chip covering from very small to huge 8 bits using the same toolchain
- Flash (quantity depending on application)
- ADC 10 bits
- EEPROM or small sector in flash for calibration storage
- communication interface (LIN, UART, SPI/SCI)
- possibility to have parts specified at -125°C or at least +105°C
- MIPS level
- cost per chip (less than 1$)
- toolchain performances and easyness to use
- Notoriety of the manufacturer in automotive market
- Quality of technical support (1 guy responsible for chips and toolchain)

The quantities for quotations were 1 million parts/year with production date from 2005.

My results :
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- Philips 8051. My beloved core, but no chip fitting all my requirements : No flash with ADC 10 bits

- Microchip PIC : Microchip is the 1st supplier of 8 bits. RISC architecture with clock prescaler by 4 ! So it has the disadvantage of the limited instruction set of the RISC without the advantage of the MIPS powerful of a RISC architecture. So I prefer use a CISC.
Moreover, integration of third party compiler (HITEC) in MPLAB is not very good. Next, no support from Microchip on the third party compilers. Finally, costs are quite high regarding the others manufacturers I've selected.

- Atmel : The AVR core seems very powerful : true RISC core, 10 bits ADC on the whole range of products, very cheap parts (ATtiny13). Unfortunately, no chip in the small range (8 pin) with communication interface. Moreover, Atmel had a serious financial issue in 2001 (turnover from 2 billions to 1.2 billions in 1 year due to the drop of flash prices)

- Motorola : The core isn't my prefered one. But there is a large range of products with the same toolchain.
There is a chip with all the peripherals I need for my first project, Motorola notoriety is good in automotive, Motorola has baught its third party compiler Metrowerks and the technical support is global, the Codewarrior IDE from Metrowerks is quite good, costs per chip are quite good also.


So I've selected Motorola as supplier for 8 bits microcontrollers.


Some of you have mentionned some manufacturers like Cygnal, hitachi, national, atmel (8051), ....
When I've started the assessement, I've sorted all the manufacturers (30 or 40) and I've removed from the assessment all the ones who havn't a range covering from small to high 8 bits (Cygnal for example hasn't any small 8 pin chip), I've also removed all the ones without extended temperature option, I've removed all the ones without good notoriety in automotive, and so on... Only 4 were remaining.

Well, If you have comments or questions, feel free to let me know.

Regards
Stephane