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This question crossed my mind today.

What is the history of the MSP430? When did it start, what did it evolve from, why was it made (i.e. what goals was it trying to achieve/what technical limitations with current uC was it trying to address), and why is it called the "MSP430"?

An internet search only revealed this power point, which doesn't say much.

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    \$\begingroup\$ Here's a brief history from TI. The Wikipedia article lists all the different versions but no dates. \$\endgroup\$
    – tcrosley
    Commented Sep 11, 2014 at 2:13
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    \$\begingroup\$ Back in 2006, I was at a talk given by TI to a small group of students and engineers. It was mentioned that predecessors of MSP430 were ASICs developed previously by TI. The major requirements for those ASICs were low power and good A/D capabilities. I don't have hard reference for this, so this is hearsay to some extent. \$\endgroup\$
    – Nick Alexeev
    Commented Sep 11, 2014 at 2:20
  • \$\begingroup\$ Nick, I think the "ASICs" you mention were the TSS400 stated in my answer, or perhaps a predecessor of the TSS400. The low power and good A/D capabilities (for the time) were definitely characteristic of the TSS400, though since the TSS400 was offered as a standard product, it wouldn't normally be considered an ASIC. \$\endgroup\$
    – Eric Smith
    Commented Nov 19, 2014 at 0:56

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There was a little-known predecessor to the MSP430 series in the early 1990s, which was the TSS400 "uPower Programmable High-Precision Sensor Signal Processor". It had only an 8-bit processor, and the ROM contained an interpreter for a language called SMPL, so it was not intended that it be customer-programmed in machine language (or C, or any other "normal" programming language).

While the TSS400 showed promise, ultimately customers wanted a more powerful processor, and the MSP430 was the result.

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  • \$\begingroup\$ Now that's interesting. I would have never thought this would have been the back story, but given the state of the industry at that time I believe it. Do you know of any products that uses the TSS400? \$\endgroup\$
    – TRISAbits
    Commented Nov 18, 2014 at 16:22
  • \$\begingroup\$ I don't know of any specific products using the TSS400. I expect that it saw a lot of use in relatively obscure embedded systems, for stuff like industrial controls. \$\endgroup\$
    – Eric Smith
    Commented Nov 19, 2014 at 0:52
  • \$\begingroup\$ Thanks for shedding light on this: knowing the past is the best way of understanding the future. \$\endgroup\$
    – TRISAbits
    Commented Nov 19, 2014 at 5:00

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