To designate the stages in the product development cycle, TI assigns prefixes to the part numbers of all MSP MCU devices. Each MSP MCU commercial family member has one of two prefixes: MSP or XMS. These prefixes represent evolutionary stages of product development from engineering prototypes (XMS) through fully qualified production devices (MSP).

XMS – Experimental device that is not necessarily representative of the final device's electrical specifications

MSP – Fully qualified production device

Support tool naming prefixes:

X: Development-support product that has not yet completed Texas Instruments internal qualification testing.

null: Fully-qualified development-support product.

XMS devices and X development-support tools are shipped against the following disclaimer:

"Developmental product is intended for internal evaluation purposes."

MSP devices have been characterized fully, and the quality and reliability of the device have been demonstrated fully. TI's standard warranty applies.

Predictions show that prototype devices (XMS) have a greater failure rate than the standard production devices. TI recommends that these devices not be used in any production system because their expected end-use failure rate still is undefined. Only qualified production devices are to be used.

TI device nomenclature also includes a suffix with the device family name. This suffix indicates the temperature range, package type, and distribution format.