Lynn,

How will increasing the code space in a replacement part help? While your customers might not have to requal their product unless there's a board change, don't they have to requalify their products if they change the code set?

Making the code space bigger doesn't buy much. There are plenty of parts out there already that have expanded code space, (just look at Dallas, among others) but other problems like FLASH reliability for a number of reasons, particularly as relates to 805x RESET issues, and you'll see an opportunity to exploit the low cost and large size of FLASH memory.

From where I sit, it's the performance issues that require attention.

If you're providing drop-in replacements, as Maxim/Dallas, among others, does, there'll be an external memory bus, right? Performance is the issue that holds out the most promise. If you can replace a part operating at the input oscillator divided by 12 with one that operates at that rate divided by one, yet allows access to external resources in the formerly usual way, by means of programmable stretched bus cycles, as the Dallas guys did it, you can have the "replacement" part far more capable, yet still compatible with its environment, without adding any code space. However, if you used the excess FLASH as a way of ensuring that the FLASH was actually still healthy, and repairing any flaws that might arise, THAT would be an enhancement worth noting.

RE