Integrated circuit
An integrated circuit is an electronic circuit on a flat piece of semiconductor material. ICs are a cheap way to manufacture circuits in a small package. They are often black and have metal pins to solder them to a PCB. ICs are used in nearly all electronic devices because of their low cost and high performance.
![74HC161N](/media/photos/integrated-circuit.jpg)
IC pinout diagrams
IC pinoutThere are many different ICs, all with their own function. Each of these ICs has a different pin configuration, which can be found in the pinout diagram. ICs have a notch to indicate where the first pin is. Here is an example of the 4017 IC.
4017Click to enlarge
![4017](/media/ic4017.png)