The size and shape may have changed since the 90s, but the inner workings have remained largely the same. AVR ATmega microcontrollers are still based on the modified Harvard architecture, utilizing an 8-bit Reduced Instruction Set Computing (RISC) design. Sporting a whopping 1 Mega Instructions Per Second(MIPS) , for every 1 MHz of clock speed.

On top of this, the AVR family was among the first to feature on-chip flash memory for program storage, marking a significant shift from the one-time programmable ROM, EPROM, or EEPROM that competing microcontrollers relied on during that period.

Atmel first released the AVR family of chips in the late 90s, and within just five years it had sold around 500 million units, with the ATmega series making up the majority of those sales.

The demand for these chips was nearly insatiable, much like a freshly opened bag of their potato-based cousins with a nearby bowl of dip. They found their way into all sorts of products, from smart home devices and wearables to even the automotive industry.

Even though most of us know that everything the automotive industry touches tends to turn into a snoozefest with unhappy endings, luckily this wasn’t the case with the ATmega. A big part of its success was thanks to Arduino, a company that had the brilliant idea to take the ATmega, namely the ATmega328P, and mount it on a PCB called UNO, with easily accessible GPIOs and standardized programming interfaces. The Arduino UNO made microcontroller development accessible to hobbyists without needing an electrical engineering degree beforehand.

And the rest, as they say, is history. The ATmega family remains the backbone of countless embedded applications, proving that sometimes the simplest solutions can have the most lasting impact. So, the next time you feel ”simple”, remember you just need to last long enough to make an impact.