This question started out as an offshoot of the thread about Douglas Self's new book. Rather than continuing it there, I've brought it here to a new post. It confirms some of the snippets from that thread about the origins of the 5534. The following email is quoted from some correspondence I had with Johan Huisjing about the origin of the 5534:
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Dan,
I phoned Theo van Kessel and Rudy van der Plasche.
Theo is not the designer of the TDA1034 / NE5534.
I know he has come up with feed-forward compensation.
And that might be used by the designer.
The NE5534 is designed by someone at a Philips site in Caen, France as the TDA1034 in 1975.
The TDA1034 later became the Signetics NE5534.
This is all I know for now.
It appears, I do not know the designer.
Regards,
Johan
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*******************************************************
Dan,
I phoned Theo van Kessel and Rudy van der Plasche.
Theo is not the designer of the TDA1034 / NE5534.
I know he has come up with feed-forward compensation.
And that might be used by the designer.
The NE5534 is designed by someone at a Philips site in Caen, France as the TDA1034 in 1975.
The TDA1034 later became the Signetics NE5534.
This is all I know for now.
It appears, I do not know the designer.
Regards,
Johan
*********************************************************
Problem is if it was done in 1975, I doubt they have the design folder now. That's almost 40 years ago, so getting the name of the designer from design file records will be nearly impossible. Maybe there are some older Philips guys around who might remember.
Something I read on this ic on another forum:
Pro Audio Design Forum • View topic - Rare NE5534 IC Die Photo
Pro Audio Design Forum • View topic - Rare NE5534 IC Die Photo
If the lead designer is still alive, what would he change, modify or do differently now to improve it?
It's too bad that we didnt find the designer(s) sooner, though. Many unsung hero's whose knowledge is lost forever. No doubt, knowledge only to be reinvented and discovered again, later.
Thx-RNMarsh
It's too bad that we didnt find the designer(s) sooner, though. Many unsung hero's whose knowledge is lost forever. No doubt, knowledge only to be reinvented and discovered again, later.
Thx-RNMarsh
I wondered why Phillips bought Signetics. Might have had a big Accounts Receivable bill for royalties.
Signetics was a tragedy of the 1975-80 IC boom. They developed the 555,they had the world class 5532, they owned the phase lock loop business for a while with the 567. but they wasted money producing commodity parts like 7400 TTL. They developed a microprocessor with development board about a year after Intel, who remembers that? And all those lovely white hardbound catalogs they gave away, application notes in the back, the best in the business. Motorola never gave me any literature, and look whose semiconductor factory is still operating in Mexico. the whole business changed about 1980 when the custom IC "founderies" got started in Taiwan. companies didn't need to put IC's on PCB's anymore, they could get the interconnects in the IC itself at the factory, so the volume business moved overseas and the US factories were left with the onesy twosy prototype business and the commodity parts. Intel excepted, whose 8085 was adopted by IBM and ensured their future (up to now).
Signetics was a tragedy of the 1975-80 IC boom. They developed the 555,they had the world class 5532, they owned the phase lock loop business for a while with the 567. but they wasted money producing commodity parts like 7400 TTL. They developed a microprocessor with development board about a year after Intel, who remembers that? And all those lovely white hardbound catalogs they gave away, application notes in the back, the best in the business. Motorola never gave me any literature, and look whose semiconductor factory is still operating in Mexico. the whole business changed about 1980 when the custom IC "founderies" got started in Taiwan. companies didn't need to put IC's on PCB's anymore, they could get the interconnects in the IC itself at the factory, so the volume business moved overseas and the US factories were left with the onesy twosy prototype business and the commodity parts. Intel excepted, whose 8085 was adopted by IBM and ensured their future (up to now).
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