How many silicon chips do you have in your house?

Just wondering – almost everything we buy seems to have a computer in it somewhere these days – certainly far more than in 70s and 80s when consumer goods were far more mechanical/analogue
– smartphones, washing machines, fridges, smart meters, wifi, PC/Mac, TV, iPods etc etc etc. Let alone cars…

How many silicon chips in the typical UK household?

Got 10 11 objects containing silicon chips on my desk

If by silicon chip you mean a distinct package with pins on the outside and silicon inside a plastic package, then even more than you’re initially assuming. A typical circuit board in most of those things you mention has 10s of those, and even such innocuous things as wall chargers, remote controls etc. will have a couple.

seven in my house I think, but it is just me here.
Edit…that is to say I have seven devices which I assume have that sort of technology in them. I wouldn’t have a clue how many actual chips that involves!

1700+

You’ve probably got one on your drive masquerading as a car.

Everything we have now is a computer pretending to be an appliance!

I would have a guess at somewhere near 1000.

I’d be amazed if you really have that few – I reckon I take 4 distinct devices containing them when I go for a bike ride, and if I just include the chargers used for those and nothing else I’m already up to 7.

More than most people here at a guess….

I’d be amazed if you really have that few – I reckon I take 4 distinct devices containing them when I go for a bike ride.

I was counting my tv, laptop, iPad, phone, garmin, echo, galaxy watch. I do have a washing machine, kettle, toaster, bike lights & hi-fi but was only counting internet enabled stuff before. There may well be other things that I haven’t realised should be included as well. 🙂

seven in my house I think, but it is just me here.

I’ve got more than that on a keyring. There’s 26 in my ZX Spectrum.

on my desk now

cordless phone
tablet
laptop
screen
2 cordless mice
camera
several (5?) chargers
ipod dock * speakers
Nas drive
remote control for dock
phone

I reckon that’s 17 devices, probably a hundred chips in them alone

Well of the stuff you weren’t counting, washing machine, hi-fi and bike lights (assuming they’re modern LED ones) definitely have silicon chips in, toaster probably. Plus as I mentioned before, the chargers for most of the other things you did include. I don’t think anybody else mentioned anything about being internet enabled!

Only 3 on mine – I’d forgotten about that, so typically 7 devices when I go for a bike ride.

Bear in mind,

There’s probably fewer ICs in modern devices than you might think. The Speccy I mentioned before had one custom chip, the rest are off-the-shelf components. These days it’s typical to have more all-in-one ICs – the fewer chips the lower the production cost.

This is a (fairly) modern graphics card:

And this is a CGA graphics adapter (from the IBM 5150, so early 80s vintage):

I’ve got a toddler who must have a couple of dozen.

Every toy she has that talks, sings or has flashing lights will have an IC in it. Aside from straight forward stuffed toys, duplo and the wooden train set that’s pretty much all of them.

Good point – I’d already checked out the obvious bits of kit where I could count ICs – this is a complete computer (which includes all the functionality of either of your cards):

…actually we can do better – this is a complete computer including graphics card (and unlike the one above there are no components at all on the bottom):

Main stuff: 2 laptops, 1 pc, 2 iPads, 2 iPhones, 2 iPod Touches, Sky box, 2 iPods, 4 iPod nanos, 2 Kindles, Garmin, TomTom, DVD recorder, washing machine, See.Sense bike light.

does nobody here have a CH timer, or even a modern boiler?

I’d surprised if I had less than 1000 in my place of abode (helped by me still having an Atari ST, shed loads of old motherboards, RAM DIMMs etc.).

How do you count silicon chips, and what integrated packages do you include?
Just so we’re counting on the same level, what do people think the silicon chip count is on the RPiB+ and RPi0 above?

On my desk right now:
Laptop
Surface Pro + dock
2x wireless mice
Camera
2x phones
LED desk lamp with motion sensor
2x portable drives
2x USB drives
Portable USB power source
Keyless car fob
Car key with remote locking
2x quartz watches
Wallet with contactless bank cards
Contactless entry card for work
NCD X Terminal motherboard – that alone has 52 discrete ICs…

god knows, they’re in everthing, from computers, to guitars, to effects pedal, to washing machines to blenders, good luck counting them all up.

A scientific estimate = shitloads.

You get them in nuclear reactors, they’re called Fission Chips 😉

does nobody here have a CH timer, or even a modern boiler?

Not me.. my thermostat is a gold square with a slider up the side!

An interesting point – I don’t have a B+, but I’m going for 3 on the first edition model B I do own as it has components labelled IC1, IC2 and IC3! It gets trickier when you start labelling such items with “U” – though in fact despite Cougar’s comment there are actually far more multi-legged packages on the later B+.

3 packages with a “U” on the zero where it’s a bit easier to count – I’m guessing the labelling is carried over from the B as there is no U2, but there is a U8 on the left which presumably is a BGA as no sign of legs. If we’re using the conventional definition of “silicon chip” then Q5 on the left isn’t as given that designation it’s presumably a discrete transistor (though it does contain a bit of silicon).

RFID chips count?

I’d probably count packages with IC or U designations (but not Q).
My first guess would be 3 for the Pi0, and 8 for the top side of that PiB+, but I’d need to see one up close, not a pic.
Others might count both as 2-3 chips.

If RFID contains a chip then it’s a chip.
And I’d also count chips on substrates other than silicon as being “silicon chips”.

My old coffee maker had a PIC chip in it. Only found that out when I smashed it to pieces, because it was rubbish and broke anyway.

There are five in my wallet!

Considering the level of complexity in even making a simple chip its amazing how many people have and how cheap they are.

…..and the chips from the company I work for have 30 billion transistors in them. I never quite understand how we get them to work!

The more interesting question is not the total number of chips (ie, the number of single wafer integrated circuits) but the total number of transistors in your house!

A typical, modern 32b ARM processor, as found in most consumer devices contains around 25 million transistors in it, and a “pc” type processor a 1000 milion or more!

TranstorCountWiki

Mine wasn’t a typo maxtorque, I work in the division of Intel that make the Stratix10 device listed in your link. Granted, unless you live in a datacenter[sic] you’ll not have one in your house!

One desktop, one laptop, one mobile phone, one digital camera, one reasonably modern tv with remote. Does my old skool stereo have one? Washing machine probably has one

Can’t think of anything else with one.

On the cutting edge of technology 😉

e-bike?

Aracer – Ah – presumably that does have a chip or two in the controller. CH time clock will have one as well. Digital alarm clock? Boiler doesn’t

TJ, got chip and pin debit card? That’s a chip. Memory stick? Spare memory cards? Hard drive? Your stereo will have a few. Each device you list has dozens in it. Bike computer? Spot tracker? LED bike lights? Car remote key fob? Wifi router has a few. Central heating boiler likewise. Electronic thermostat? Digital watch? Cooker clock?

Boilers have to be pretty old not to have electronics in. Our boggo cheap one from ten years ago has a circuit board with quite a few on.

We’re not talking about microprocessors here – an IC can be a tiny basic component worth 5p.

I prefer natural over silicon.

So none.

chip and pin card – only one. Memory stick – nope. Spare memory cards – 2, spare hard drive yup. Stereo – not sure being all over 20 years old – guess the cd player will. Don’t remember seeing any when I opened up the amp. Bike commuter – nope. Led bike lights – home made – dunno if the drivers do – probably. Digital watch – nope, spot tracker – nope. Car remote – what car 😉 Cooker clock is mechanical, boiler does not have them – had the board apart recently wifi router yes. Most of my consumer goods are more than 20 years old and I don’t have lots of electronic gizmos

Stereo – not sure being all over 20 years old

It probably does – we’re not talking microprocessors here. You have been able to get signal amplifiers on a chip for 30 odd years.

I bet there are more than you realise. They were still common 20 years ago.