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question about microcontoller life span...

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louislu

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hi everyone...currently i m doin a microcontroller project...i want to know if i let my microcontroller running (scanning the switch by pooling method) continuesly without pause...wil it shorten my microcontroller life span?let's say the system is running for year or what...n it is a must for my system to run for years...

bcos i was thinking whether want to put my microcontroller in idle mode to prevent it from over exhausted.or does anyone know how other designer do when their microcontroller is free of task...

thanks
 

If you are worried about life span of a microcontroller you will have to look into so called MTBF (mean time before failure): http://www.answers.com/topic/mean-time-between-failures .
But keep in mind that before anything wrong may happen to your microcontroller there are components which have much much more chances to fail.
Lets look at capacitors, for example.
Here you can read about MTBF of capacitors:
**broken link removed**
And here you can read about ICs (with links to different manufacturers):
http://www.interfacebus.com/Design_MetaStable.html
 

microcontrollers are actually designed to work continously executing instructions till power down. the manufacturers would specify the normal and maximum working voltages, current, ambient heat, stress, vibration etc. when these specifications are
taken care during designing the applications using micro will work as long as any other components whose life span is shorter like cap, regulator, resistor breaks down. no semiconductor manufacturer can guarrentee you that his micro can work for this much years continuously.

Better use a wake on interrupt mode and put hte micro to sleep, this way your micro may be made to consume less power.
 

hi...thanx for helps....

if put the micro to idle mode does it means that the micro can works longer?
i know all the semi conponent has a lifespan but jus wondering if i let my micro keep working without rest would it shorten my chip...

thanz
 

The question about the semiconductors life duration is very complicated. One example. Some times ago the Allegro cancelled it's A3971 motor controller chip. It worked wery reliable in full power mode, but died after about 50 hours without load or/and in idle mode.
So nobody will tell you a right answer, unless he made a special research for a specific chip.

Varuzhan
 

emm....well...but for my project my microcontroller wil need to wait for user response by pressing a button.so actually if nothing happen my microcontroller will jus polling to detect the button pressed.so far what i did is:


scan: jnb p1.0,scan
wait: jb p1.0,wait
xxxx
xxxx

so my concern is shl i put a interrupt to p1.0 n put my microcontroller to idle mode to save power or make it can last longer?is there any different to these 2 method?i means pooling n interrupt methods?
 

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