Zilog Ending eZ80 Production?

[Bill McMullen]

I was just looking at Mouser's website and there's an "End of Life" notice for all the remaining eZ80 products.  According to the Sept. 21, 2026 Product Change Notice from IXYS / Littlefuse, they are phasing out ALL remaining active Microcontroller products with a last time buy of Dec. 21.

I'm assuming that means that there will be no active or future Zilog branded processors ... period.  A sad day for Z80 aficionados.

DigiKey recently received a batch of eZ80F91 processors.  Their price in Qty 10 used to be close to Mouser's but this new batch is now about 40% more expensive.

[Dean Netherton]

A little more sadness for this broken world.

But, sniff sniff, I refuse to let it get to me. 

🙁

[Richard Deane]

And so it was I entered the broken world
To trace the visionary company of ICs, their voice
An instant in the wind (I know not whither hurled)
But not for long to hold each desperate choice.

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[Harry Speer]

Please forgive me if this is a "stupid question" but what about the open-source 

Z80 ??  I have not kept up with the progress (if any)  on this project.  

But I am guessing that the Cost Each of these Open-Source Z80-

-Compatible chips is still way too high for most people who want to use

one ??  

  

https://github.com/rejunity/z80-open-silicon?tab=readme-ov-file

  
I'm just wondering, WHAT, If any, Z80-family CPU chips can still be

bought.  I'm guessing lack of supply drives Cost Each higher and 

likewise the chances of receiving a  "Fake"  Z80 from some sellers

on Ebay or other Websites ???  

I'm guessing also that these days one has to Test each CPU 

because the probability of receiving a "Fake" is pretty High 

these days ??

 And if this is an inappropriate question, I apologize. 

  

 I am still interested in the CPM-80 2.2 OS on Zilog CPU's

 or equivalent, including the Z180, Z280, Z380, and eZ80 

"Extended Z80 CPU's" so to speak. 

 

I'm also wondering how long Kits with an Included Z80 

Family CPU may become "Out Of Stock" fairly quickly ??  

  
So is this one of those "Buy them before they are all

gone" things ??  

Lots of questions, I know. Sorry.

 Harry

[Bill McMullen]

I'm just wondering, WHAT, If any, Z80-family CPU chips can still be bought.

The question is better phrased as "What Z80-family chips can be bought from authorized distributors?"  Likewise, "What Z80-family chips can be bought from ISO-certified suppliers?".  Of course there's lots of Z80-family chips available on eBay, AliExpress etc. but some of them are very obviously fakes or relabeled devices.  My last order of Z8S18033F chips from Utsource were obviously relabeled and they even admitted as much.

So is this one of those "Buy them before they are all gone" things ??

That certainly wasn't the objective of my post.  The eZ80 F91, F92 & F93 chips are available immediately or via back order from authorized distributors like Mouser and DigiKey.  HOWEVER, as previously noted, the latest batch of F91 processors that recently arrived at DigiKey have increased VERY significantly in price.  Other Z80-family chips are available from ISO-certified distributors but many (most?) of them have minimum purchase amounts and only use courier delivery.

FYI: I do have various eZ80 systems for sale: the Min-eZ system with the F91 plus both eZ-Tiny and eZT-RCB systems with the F92 variant.  At this time, I have no plans to build more of the F92 systems but I do have the parts to build about a dozen more of the Min-eZ F91-based systems.

The price of many of the most expensive components (processors & memory) have gone up in price perhaps 40% - 60% at Mouser & DigiKey since my last major purchase.  As many or my systems are for sale and have a lot of individual parts, I choose to primarily use these mainstream distributors rather than multiple dubious sources from the Far East.  I assume much of these price increases are due to things like tariffs and fuel surcharges.  As a direct result of these increased costs, once my current inventory is exhausted, I plan to only work on personal projects rather than making systems available to the retro community.  Of course I will still support any system that I've sold.

[Steve Cousins]

I purchased large stocks of Z80 CPU and Z80 SIO/2 from Mouser and RS during the last order window. I expect my stock will for last years of my kit sales. I also offer the individual chips on my website.

Fortunately, most of the parts I use in my kits are still in production. The only parts I have to buy from suspect sources are 68B50 and Z180 family CPUs. I have to test these which is not ideal. Currently, dual-in-line FLASH chips are in their last order window from major distributors.

Another component that concerns me is the 512k byte RAM. I'm wondering if this part will also be pulled soon. They are getting very expensive and I don't want to risk the money required to buy lots of them.

Steve

[Tom Storey]

Now even the eZ80 parts have been EOL'd, with last buys later this year.

Sad times for the whole Z80 family these recent years.

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[Bill McMullen]

Even crazier are the current prices from authorized distributors.  Given DigiKey's price increase, yesterday I bought another ten eZ80F91 chips from Mouser for possible future experiments.  Later in the day someone else bought a significant portion of their remaining stock.  Today they've increased the price on the remaining 47 devices by +29% overnight !!!

The various memory devices I use have risen in price from perhaps 40% to over 100%.  This is getting ridiculous and certainly isn't doing anything to spur small business development and innovation.  Luckily I have enough components in stock for a final batch of 50 MHz Min-eZ systems plus my future eZ80 experiments.

[Alan Cox]

On Wed, 7 Oct 2026 at 17:56, Bill McMullen <mcmull...@gmail.com> wrote:

Even crazier are the current prices from authorized distributors.  Given DigiKey's price increase, yesterday I bought another ten eZ80F91 chips from Mouser for possible future experiments.  Later in the day someone else bought a significant portion of their remaining stock.  Today they've increased the price on the remaining 47 devices by +29% overnight !!!

Capitalism at work. Demand and supply. Shortly to be followed by fake ones all over ebay 8)

Alan

 

[T Gerbic]

I bought the last two yesterday from Mouser at the old price to put in stock for now. eZ80 seems like a great part so believe I will use them in the future. Just looked and Bill is right about the price change. Glad I did not wait 12 more hours to order these this morning. 

I also bought the last four of the DLP UART modules mentioned in another thread for my Z80 Master board. Glad I got those as they still have not come back into production. Might need a clone of these or a design change on the Z80 Master board going forward. 

Also had to source some other parts from an liquidator a few months back. I would use Octopart once in a long time but it is becoming my new best friend. 

[Dean Netherton]

This was very annoying timing for me.

I have been working on a new backplane/base for my eZ80 setup. I had wanted to get fast zero wait state ram.  This is difficult to achieve over a stock RCBus backplane - with its single ground trace return.  Attempting to operate at the 20Mhz++ frequencies, and with the latency introduced with the 74HCT245 buffers - fast ram access just proved to not be possible reliably over the stock bus.

So I created a new design to allow for memory boards to be connected directly to the CPU.  Still keeping the 245 buffers to level shift and slow down the rise/fall times for the bus connectors.  Updated the buffer for the data lines to a 74AHCT245 to avoid bus conflicts - and some 47ohm resistors to ease up the rise/fall times.

I have achieved 4MB of SRAM @ 0 W/S with the CPU over-clocked to 30Mhz (remember I use to lower spec 20Mhz version)

It was a good learning experience for me trying to understand how to achieve better ram performance - using the just the skills I have.

The RAM modules have a 78 keyed connector - with lots of GND connections -- and when measured with my scope, the ringing and reflections seem to be low and within tolerances.  

I am using 10ns SRAM surface mounted chips - been slowly improving my skills when it comes to hand soldering surfaced mounted stuff. 

I am on my 3rd iteration and just testing the SPI interface - when the news broke.  And I had check prices and availability of the eZ80 cpu just a couple of weeks before.

I have a few cpus on backorder from mouser/digikey.... but I am not sure if backorder means I am assured I will get any.

--------

I suppose this was inevitable.  I guess even the eZ80 is over 20 years -- and with the supply costs these days ...

I still remember, when i first got into this, and was building some of Spencer's Z80 based kits - to be absolutely amazed that I could still purchase brand new Z80 CPUs at the time - its seem totally bizarre to be able buy a brand new recently manufactured CPU that was designed in the 1970s.  

But I am not giving up just yet....

Dean

[T Gerbic]

I was looking at some programmer support for my Xeltek last night and noticed some new part numbers on the list. Looking one up for fun I found it is a new chip with the 8051 core inside, plus a few new peripherals added. I had used MCS-48 and MCS-51 chips since 1980. It is good to see I can still get new production 8051 chips today, especially since they are in the 30Mhz to 100Mhz variants.  The thing about it is that I would never have guessed from the part number, this was an 8051 family device.  Just wondering if any other Z80s are hidden behind other non-obvious part numbers.

[7alken]

hi Dean, very nice :-) ... its question whats left at TI stocks from theirs calculators
P.