All the places that google brings up want to sell me a 1000 pieces, only want one, or perhaps two incase i break one. Pulling my hair out as its the perfect ic for the job, just cant buy any. even *bay turned up 0 results. ↲↲andrew.
Digikey. $2.54 for quantities less than 25.
ok thats interesting, but the shipping is rather a deal breaker for me, they both seem to charge £12 international, hmm. Gonna give the Cat4003 from farnell a try, the 32 digital levels of output current is a bit awkward but should be easily overcome with a bit more programming in the microcontroller.