I am working identifying a problem in a VFD for a friend’s belt grinder, and I’ve ID’d the other ICs on but, but I wasn’t able to ID this last 8-pin one. I know it’s made by Microchip, but couldn’t pull anything up from the codes on the front.

It’s possible this is an encryption key chip with some obfuscated info on the front. However, I don’t know how common that actually is.

Any help is appreciated.

UPDATE: Looks like this one’s solved. I went back and double-checked the code, and it looks like y’all were correct on it being ‘4A08I’ and not ‘4A081’. This chip is also the closest IC to the MCU which lines up perfectly with this being an EEPROM.

I appreciate everyone’s input and help with this!

  • SpaceNoodleEnglish
    9·
    2 days ago

    Can you get a clearer photo? Having trouble telling B from 8.

    It could also help to see the rest of the circuit - the other components may provide context clues.

    • JayDeeOPEnglish
      3·
      2 days ago

      So I think the answer was found by a couple of the others, but I will still follow through with other photos.

      Here’s a (if only slightly) clearer image of the IC code

      And here is a zoomed-out shot of the entire board. You can see the tiny IC in question to the left of the MCU with the ‘56/1.10’ sticker on it.

      • SpaceNoodleEnglish
        4·
        2 days ago

        Great photo! Clearly two eights and an I. And the proximity to the MCU corroborates the EEPROM theory.

    • JayDeeOPEnglish
      6·
      2 days ago

      I will grab a better photo when I get home in 12-ish hours.

      The code is 4A081 8444QC as far as I can tell. I didn’t get any matches for an 8-pin IC of that code unfortunately.