[vcf-midatlantic] MOS LSI chips time frame

[Herb Johnson]

Ben Greenfield posted: "I’m doing some research on North American 
Aviation/Autonetics artifacts and while researching simply Metal Oxide 
Semiconductor or MOS."

He pointed to some photos of some NAA objects with labels "Autonetics 
MOS/SOS" from Rockwell/Autonetics. Apparent dates 1968 or so.

My interest is in COSMOS products from RCA, particularly the 1802 COSMAC 
microprocessor. A Web search of my site will be informative about that.

RCA produced an LSI chip-pair version later known as the 1801, sometime 
in 1975; followed by the 1802 single-chip. But RCA produced SOS (Silicon 
on Sapphire) COS (complimentary silicon) logic in the early 1970's and 
possibly earlier.

I've not traced the history of RCA's CMOS work but it's likely of the 
same era as the Autonetics/Rockwell work. Ben, I don't know your goals 
or interests. But if I were researching this, I'd look back at the 
electronic trade journals and the IEEE conference journals of the 
period. Those would have names and dates and products and prototypes and 
functionality.

I'd like to be told, if RCA's CMOS work was preceded by work from 
Rockwell slash Autonetics; or if there's some relationship.

Another subtext appears to be "the first microprocessor". I'm not overly 
interested in arguing "firsts", or arguing ABOUT arguing "firsts". The 
RCA COSMAC 1802 is interesting for many reasons.

herb johnson


-- 
Herbert R. Johnson, New Jersey in the USA
http://www.retrotechnology.com OR .net