WD was first and its line of FDCs with compatible suppliers competed with NEC/INTEL's line, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Digital_FD1771
The IBM PC's usage of the uPD765 gave prominence to the NEC/Intel line. At this point I can't really say which if either came to dominate the market but in the end the function wound up in the "southbridge" and then pretty much disappeared. I suspect NEC/Intel might have won - the Microchip (SMSC) FDC37C78 was one of the last if not last chip in production - it was a "Licensed CMOS 765B Floppy Disk Controller" and may have been in production as late as 2013 There are lots of chips for sale on the Internet but they look to me to be salvaged or surplus chips - does anyone know of chips in current production? Was Microchip/SMSC the last (Microchip acquired SMSC in 2012)? Some other late chips with dates from documents: * Toshiba TC8569AF 1989? * Hynix GM82C765B * Intel 82078 1996? Tom -----Original Message----- From: Chuck Guzis [mailto:ccl...@sydex.com] Sent: Saturday, September 03, 2022 8:47 AM To: jim stephens via cctalk Subject: [cctalk] Re: Floppy Disk Drive Controller History On 9/3/22 02:07, jim stephens via cctalk wrote: > I hope you get information on Don Tarbell's work included. He had an > early single density controller. Then later a high (double) density > controller. I purchased Don's SD controller way back when--and assembled it myself. I still have it, and his manual. I got it to replace the 2-board IMSAI controller that used an NEC 8080A. That board was far from reliable. Don's controller used the WD1771, so I don't know what that has to do with Intel and NEC. --Chuck
