[chbot] Eprom programmer.

[Helmut Walle]

To be pedantic, EEPROM is electrically erasable per definition. The UV-erasable flavour is 
called EPROM. And yes, they are definitely still with us, and probably will be for quite a 
while. While the underlying semiconductor technology has converged with Flash, they key 
difference is in the granularity of addressability and erasability. Flash usually only allows 
erasing at some level of bulk volume (512-byte page or similar), whereas EEPROM accommodates 
byte-size transactions. This allows Flash to achieve higher data density as it gets away with 
less infrastructure, whereas EEPROM is more flexible if only small amounts of data need to be 
changed frequently, but does require a bit more internal complexity. Practical use case examples 
would be device or system configuration switches that would be written to EEPROM, whereas larger 
amounts of data would go into Flash. While EEPROM is very common as an on-chip feature of 
microcontrollers or processors, it is also still available as external components in tiny SMT 
packages, typically with some sort of serial interface Like SPI or I2C to keep the pin count, 
and thus the package size, small.

Kind regards,

Helmut.

On 12/02/2023 17:20, william fleete wrote:
> They are very much still with us. Usually flash based or electrically erasable now instead of UV 
> erasable. One time programmable or mask ROM for mass produced fixed code that doesn’t need updating
> 
> On Sun, 12 Feb 2023 at 16:57, Volker Kuhlmann <list57 at top.geek.nz <mailto:list57 at top.geek.nz>> 
> wrote:
> 
>     On Sun 12 Feb 2023 01:25:39 NZDT +1300, william fleete wrote:
> 
>      > I have one of those generic ones that plugs into a USB port
> 
>     Ooh nifty, tell more please. Didn't EEPROMs go out of fashion before USB
>     was invented?
> 
>     Volker
> 
>     -- 
>     Volker Kuhlmann
>     http://volker.top.geek.nz/ <http://volker.top.geek.nz/>      Please do not CC list postings
>     to me.
> 
>     _______________________________________________
>     Chchrobotics mailing list Chchrobotics at lists.ourshack.com
>     <mailto:Chchrobotics at lists.ourshack.com>
>     https://lists.ourshack.com/mailman/listinfo/chchrobotics
>     <https://lists.ourshack.com/mailman/listinfo/chchrobotics>
>     Mail Archives: http://lists.ourshack.com/pipermail/chchrobotics/
>     <http://lists.ourshack.com/pipermail/chchrobotics/>
>     Meetings usually 3rd Monday each month. See http://kiwibots.org <http://kiwibots.org> for
>     venue, directions and dates.
>     When replying, please edit your Subject line to reflect new subjects.
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Chchrobotics mailing list Chchrobotics at lists.ourshack.com
> https://lists.ourshack.com/mailman/listinfo/chchrobotics
> Mail Archives: http://lists.ourshack.com/pipermail/chchrobotics/
> Meetings usually 3rd Monday each month. See http://kiwibots.org for venue, directions and dates.
> When replying, please edit your Subject line to reflect new subjects.