This is awesome. I built a metronome from a Forest Mims book and parts I bought at RadioShack back in the day, so it's nice to see the timer in all it's glory. One of my biggest surprises when I reported for duty on a submarine in the early 80's was that most of the electronic systems were discrete components.<p><a href="https://www.radioshack.com/products/getting-started-in-electronics-by-forrest-mims-ebook" rel="nofollow">https://www.radioshack.com/products/getting-started-in-elect...</a>
I read an interview with the original inventor of the 555.<p>He was actually embarrassed at its crudeness, and would have done it very differently at the later date.<p>I guess there was an attempt at an updated version, but it didn't sell.
Related is EvilMadScientist’s surface mount 555 kit: <a href="https://shop.evilmadscientist.com/productsmenu/922" rel="nofollow">https://shop.evilmadscientist.com/productsmenu/922</a>
People complain about thin computers these days... but this, right here, is the core of the issue: we need thicker ICs, only then will we finally get back our much missed "luggable" computers. No more electron tunnelling, electro migration, super scalar nonsense. We need good ol' fashion sturdy, reliable, hand drawn ICs.
Since the original 555 was developed in 1971, I'm wondering if the inventor[1] or Signetics, the company where he worked, would have made a similar physical mock-up in those days before electronic circuit simulation software existed.<p>[1] Apparently it was a single electronics engineer, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans_Camenzind" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans_Camenzind</a>
What a great project Idea! I have often looked at the internal schematic of the 555 and wondered if it could be made with discrete components - now I know that it is possible :-)
I build something out of a 555 just the other day!<p><a href="https://twitter.com/njcw/status/1467522736000053256" rel="nofollow">https://twitter.com/njcw/status/1467522736000053256</a><p>Its the primary (20kV) for a tesla coil. The 555 toggles a power MOSFET which drives the primary of a car ignition coil making a nice crackly 20 kV spark.<p>The 555 was my first introduction to electronics. I still have the 555 book my dad gave me back in the 80s!
Feel free to double check my math, but a modern M1 CPU with its ~16 billion transistors would be about 380 million times bigger (imagine a square ~1.7 miles on a side)
And the history of the 555:
<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/555_timer_IC" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/555_timer_IC</a>
there's a youtube channel where the guy build a 555 out of vacuum tube:<p><a href="https://youtu.be/bjAlzA4Cyys" rel="nofollow">https://youtu.be/bjAlzA4Cyys</a><p>he also made a working 1 bit processor the same way:<p><a href="https://youtu.be/q9oB-6963DU" rel="nofollow">https://youtu.be/q9oB-6963DU</a>
Interview of the 555 creator, which I find fascinating:<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j3vpu67uu28" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j3vpu67uu28</a>
Direct video link: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GDjzL_fKQDE" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GDjzL_fKQDE</a><p>edited out my comment.