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Good point... my perception on power usage was absolutely wrong.

MSP's are aging a bit though. At least the ones in my drawer. Is the hw platform being actively developed or has it plateau'd?

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I think the platform is very much still alive and kicking. It is still the only uP platform I am aware of which is available with embedded FRAM which is low power, non volatile, extremely more write durable than flash and rad hard. Again, maybe not top selling features for a hobbyist project but absolutely compelling for certain industrial use cases.

Thanks - you got me excited about MSP430 again. I am wondering if I should build an AC motor controller for fun, since I happen to have an AC motor on my bench.

No problem! You are not the first person I've heard express the impression that the MSP430 is slipping into irrelevance, and while I agree the places it shines may be getting squeezed by low power ARM parts I think they can be pretty compelling for applications where they are a good fit. They are simple, yet modern enough to support full featured c compilers, have a history of focusing on low power and the FRAM is a pretty solid differentiator if your use case can take advantage of it. Jay's article here can't really show any of that off because the one dollar price point is below the sweet spot where most of the nice features kick in

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