The legendary Zilog Z80 CPU is being discontinued after nearly 50 years

[Alfonso Maruccia]

Why it matters: Zilog is retiring the Z80 after 48 years on the market. Originally developed as a project stemming from the Intel 8080, it eventually rose to become one of the most popular and widely used 8-bit CPUs in both gaming and general computing devices.

The iconic IC device, developed by Federico Faggin, will soon be phased out, and interested parties only have a few months left to place their orders before Zilog's manufacturing partner ends support for the technology.

According to Zilog's notification, Wafer Foundry Manufacturer (WFM) will cease accepting "last time buy" (LTB) orders for the remaining Z80 products in mid-June. Zilog will process and schedule LTB orders for the Z80 based on customers' demand, while WFM will provide actual delivery dates thereafter. Depending on the overall LTB demand, the company may impose stricter requirements on minimum and maximum quantities.

Federico Faggin, an Intel engineer, founded Zilog in 1974 after his work on the Intel 4004, the first 4-bit CPU. The Zilog Z80 was then released in July 1976, conceived as a software-compatible "extension" and enhancement of the Intel 8080 processor.

Developed by a team of just 12 people, the Z80 saw remarkable success, leading Zilog to establish its own chip manufacturing plants and expand to over a thousand employees within two years. Like its Intel counterpart, the Z80 was originally designed for embedded systems but went on to become a significant milestone in gaming hardware from the 1970s to the mid-1980s.

The Zilog Z80 is discontinued. pic.twitter.com/oCxVyl7IhT

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Several home computers and gaming consoles were built around the capabilities of the Z80, including Sega's Master System and SG-1000, and Nintendo's Game Boy and Game Boy Color. Many classic arcade games also used the Z80, including the original version of Pac-Man. Additionally, the 8-bit processor was common in military applications, musical synthesizers like the Roland Jupiter-8, and various other electronic devices.

Zilog licensed its Z80 technology to US companies Synertek and Mostek, which aided Faggin's venture with production, as well as to the European manufacturer SGS/STMicroelectronics. The CPU design was later replicated by Japanese, East European, and Soviet manufacturers, while corporations such as NEC, Toshiba, Sharp, and Hitachi produced their own compatible versions of the chip.

In recent years, Zilog has refocused Z80 production on the embedded device market, offering advanced microcontroller products that retain compatibility with the original Z80 and Z180 designs.

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The legendary Zilog Z80 CPU is being discontinued after nearly 50 years

 

[VitalyT]

Who were they selling it to as of lately? It's like hearing about a buggy-whip company retiring today. I cannot fathom how they managed to stay in business this long.

 

[Uncle Al]

Not surprising since the old 8088 was a mainstay in GM vehicles until around 10 years ago. Cheap, powerful, able to do everything cars required and price .... about $2 each. Oh yeah, they never run out of them!

 

[gamerk2]

Who were they selling it to as of lately? It's like hearing about a buggy-whip company retiring today. I cannot fathom how they managed to stay in business this long.

The Z80 (and derivatives) were *very* solid embedded processors for the time, and a lot of long-lived programs used it as a microcontroller. Same reason Intel still has low-rate production of the 286 and 386 CPUs [yay for lifetime supply contracts].

 

[human7]

Who were they selling it to as of lately? It's like hearing about a buggy-whip company retiring today. I cannot fathom how they managed to stay in business this long.

Texas Instruments, if they aren't making their own, I assume. Many of the iconic (and nearly monopolistic) calculators that they produce use the Z80, such as the TI-84. There are certainly other customers, but this is the only one I can think of that would be in the hands of consumers en mass apart from what the article mentioned (or at least were, at a certain, but fairly recent, time. The TI-Nspire doesn't use the Z80).

 

[Ferdzee]

It has been discovered by reverse engineering that the Z80 only had a 4 bit ALU. I am serious. Federico Faggin was a marvelous chip designer.

I was still in college when I started work at Mostek on the Z80 test systems and in the microcomputer department where we build STD Bus and VME bus systems back in the 1970s. Discovered a single opcode virus using the LDIR instruction that could fill all RAM with copies of itself and slow the program counter to a virtual halt. Re-published it at https://mitsi.com in their case studies section on the Fairchild testers. It was a really decent CPU chip with refresh control and a powerful interrupt structure. Sad to see it go.

I still have Zilog EZ80's in the field. It is a 24-bit single chip version of the Z80.

 

[NumberSix]

I hope the one in my ZX Spectrum doesn't pack in.

 

[masaaya4]

So how many have been made in total? Why was it still being made up until now?

 

[TP801]

Z80 was my first computer programming experience with hexadecimal coding. TP-801 based on Z80 was very popular and powerful back in the 80s. Loved it

 

[Allan Ducksworth]

Who were they selling it to as of lately? It's like hearing about a buggy-whip company retiring today. I cannot fathom how they managed to stay in business this long.

Just because I'm not using them they must be obsolete junk!

Only the DIP part is being discontinued. The SMD and embedded versions will continue to be made - that suggests there are probably a lot of designs using this device. Why would you pick something else when this low power, easy to interface device is there for a few bucks?

 

[quadibloc]

This has inspired me to speculate... what if an extension to the 8080 had been made which was similar to the 65816 as an extension to the 6502?
Of course, though, the Z80 had other advantages over the 8080 besides its expanded instruction set. It was able to take care of refreshing dynamic memory itself. It only needed one +5 volt power supply.

 

[NumberNine]

The Z80 and Motorla 68000 powered my childhood.

 

[LetTheWookieWin]

Don’t forget it was the heart of the TRS-80, one of the most popular early home computers.

My dad used to have a Z80 in one of his IC parts bins from a TRS-80 model I (first computer in my household growing up). I think he was able to swap the Z-80 for a Z80A which could run at a higher clock rate of 4 MHz.

I never realized these were still in production until this article.

 

[Nintenboy01]

The Game Boy used a Sharp LR35902 derivative though

 

[Badvok]

No mention of Sinclair? It is sometimes worth using Wikipedia for historic research.

 

[ZedRM]

The Z80 and Motorla 68000 powered my childhood.

For me it was the 6502/65C02/65C816 and the Z80. Good times.