Need a modest Arm Cortex-A CPU in your custom chip? Just apply online. Plus $125,000 In 2018, a crack commando CPU was sent to an ASIC by a military court for a crime it didn't commit. This processor core promptly escaped from a maximum-security system-on-chip to the Los Angeles underground. Today, still wanted by the government, it survives as a soldier of fortune. If you have a problem, if no one else can …
And how much is an Atom core (why would you want one anyway if not running Windows + GUI?)?
Compared to overall cost of staff, premises, gear and fabrication, this is very little for a CPU core in a true custom chip, an ASIC. It's expensive for an FPGA, but then there have been FPGAs with ARM cores for some time even before recent announcement of Free.
The x86 and x86-64 is increasingly only relevant in desktop (inc ultrabooks) and servers. Even the Atoms use too much power and too much chip/transistors for sensible use as a core in an ASIC. Intel maybe a bit hasty selling off most of StrongARM to Marvell. Pity about DEC.
It's why serious embedded devs are paid very well. If they're going to make a zillion of something, being able to use a few pennies cheaper cpu * millions, or even hundreds thousands, will amortize a heck of a lot of NRE - your pay and bennies. Hard job to get - there aren't that many around working for the big boys, but it's a real good place to be...I liked it when I was there.
The mantra is creating the response "I didn't know such a cheap thing could even DO that".
Get there and it's winning.
When everyone started putting windows CE or linux onto everything, it all got really sloppy and bloated. Sigh. Now you see these killer chips (compared to the 6502/8051/PIC "you name it") used for stuff you could almost do in a 555.
You mean an AVR (or maybe ARM M0)
PICs are expensive, often more than double the price of an AVR or ARM M core in the same package.
An SMT 555 timer is about 50p, an 8-pin PIC about 70p, and a similar AVR is about 30p.
I don't actually see why people use PIC in new designs these days. I'm sure there are good reasons for certain designs, but I don't know what they are.
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