The fall of the Roman Empire.

[moodz]

Texas Instruments (TI) silently released a major update to the datasheet and manufacturing process for the classic NE5532 audio op-amp. Because the part number remained identical, this sparked significant backlash in the engineering and audio communities over hardware compatibility and legacy design support.
Here is a breakdown of the design changes made to the chip:

• Supply Voltage Reduction: The maximum operating supply voltage was downgraded from ±22V to ±18V (with a recommended maximum of ±15V).
• ESD Protection: The Human Body Model (HBM) ESD rating was cut in half, dropping from 2kV to 1kV.
• Input Protection Diodes Removed: The internal reverse-protection diodes between the positive and negative inputs were eliminated.
• Slew Rate & Topology Shifts: The input topology shifted from NPN to PNP, and the slew rate was changed (from 9V/μs down to around 5V/μs in testing), resulting in behavior more similar to an RC4580 op-amp.

Its really a different chip ... but they kept the badge ???? There will be some products that will be caught out by this change.

... and everyone thinks the chinese are bad or it could be a cunning stunt Trump plan to make chinese products look good.

PS there are noises in the air that the NE5534 is getting the "improvement" next so buy up some retirement stocks before they run out.

[ivconic]

One of my more important hobbies is going to junkyards and rummaging through piles.
I've been practicing it for years.
Great fun!
Are you wondering why?
Another thing; I never throw away used electronics, I store them in the attic.
Things are pretty clear, the world is slowly going downhill.
Chinese goods cannot be trusted and Western goods are rapidly declining in quality.
These are pictures of 1/100 of the material I have and keep.
Note the "military standard" opamps in metal housings.
Most are LM308H and few 741. There are also some other very interesting ones.
Most good components can be found on used and vintage medical equipment.
As for NE5534 and NE5532; quality pieces can be found in discarded musical equipment.
Audio mixers, preamps etc.

[ivconic]

It appears Texas Instruments has quietly replaced a beloved classic with something that merely wears its clothes.
The voltage has been tamed, the protection halved, the very soul reworked—yet the name remains, a cheerful little lie on a shabby chip.
One might say this is a perfectly unremarkable metaphor for the age.
The West, once fond of advertising its robustness and legacy, now slips in subtle downgrades while hoping no one checks the fine print.
Meanwhile, the attic groans with the weight of what actually worked—military-grade metal cans, scavenged from the bones of old equipment.
The inference, if one were so inclined to make it, is not that things have simply broken.
It is that they have been gently, politely hollowed out.
And this quiet substitution—this slow erosion of standards across both hemispheres—feels less like a crisis and more like a prelude.
Not the fall, you understand. Just the soft, prolonged hum before the lights go out.
Unknown AI poet...

[profesor]

I have some gold-plated Russian op-amps. They're all brand new. 1,200 K140UD units. Does anyone have any ideas on how I can sell them? К140УД1.
https://shop.a-lisa.org/?product=is-ou-k140ud1-au.

[ivconic]

It is much closer in performance to very early op-amps such as the µA702 than to the later LM741.
Other words...

[boilcoil]

Texas Instruments (TI) silently released a major update to the datasheet and manufacturing process for the classic NE5532 audio op-amp.

The most tragic change is with the slew rate. Although they have increased the unitygain bandwidth to 12MHz, lowering the SR to 5V/us will in any case reduce the dynamic performance of the chip. So with the new chip we will be able to listen to Vivaldi beautifully, but Wagner poorly.

[ivconic]

Is there any logical explanation from their side, about the reasons...
or they simply did not give reasons and left it to us to develop various theories (conspiracies)?

[boilcoil]

I guess it won't be just for NE 5532. I expect revisions to appear for some other "old" chips with good parameters.
According to rumors, Texas Instruments has closed the whole 150nm US fab, which will affect to other components manufactured there, before the closure of the plant.
And why is it being done - because the business is run by financiers, not engineers.

[Carl-NC]

Is there any logical explanation from their side, about the reasons...
or they simply did not give reasons and left it to us to develop various theories (conspiracies)?

The reason is that old chips like the 5532 are made in old fabs with old equipment that hasn't been made for 30 years. After a while, maintaining the fab becomes a money-losing endeavor. Fab processes are very specific recipes and you can't just move a part to a new process and expect it to work. This is especially true with linear chips. My guess is that TI is shutting down the old 5532 wafer fab and will produce it in a different fab, which likely means they had to do a fairly complete redesign of the circuitry just to make it work to the new specs. It was either that, or kill the product. Usually a major change like this adds a letter to the part number, like NE5532A.

[ivconic]

This would not be a problem if more modern alternatives with the same (logically preferably better) specs were easily available everywhere in the world and at similar acceptable prices.
Here and today after so many years we are discussing the LF357 which is hard to replace and hard to obtain in some parts of the world.
Of course there are better alternatives and of course I can find some of them even here in local stores.
But the price is from 30x to 50x higher!
That makes it totally pointless to make detectors both for sale and especially for DIY.
I still have option; a "lottery" with Aliexpress. I bought 10x LF357's which don't work at all... but a month ago I "won the lottery" by buying 10x CA3130's which exceeded my expectations.
Last year I bought 50x J113s that don't work, and a couple of weeks later 30x J113s that are awesome.
That's why it's a "lottery".
But I expected that from Aliexpress anyway.
However, this news about NE5534/2 shocked me a bit.

[Repwoc]

... resulting in behavior more similar to an RC4580 op-amp.

Apparently they now use the same die. So they are exactly the same.

https://e2e.ti.com/support/audio-gro...ymatch=ne5532#