Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
I can recommend the Pic24/dspic33 series chips. I spent a bunch of time looking at different options, and ended up with the pic family. There are a lot of really nice micros out there now. Not like years ago. The Pic's aren't the fastest chips out there, they aren't the newest chips out there, they aren't the best chips out there. What they are is a great compromise, with lots of options available. The learning curve is a bit steep, but documentation is there on their site. (It will take a while to navigate that alone). They also have lots of examples. The reason I ended up with the PIC, was the probability of long term support. They still sell pics that are decades old. In 10 years, there will still probably be pics available, or at least an upgrade path option that isn't terribly painful. Since I don't do a lot of micro based projects, this was important to me. I didn't want a canned PC on a board type thing, as some of my projects go into small productions scales and the cost would be prohibitive. After I started to play with them, I started to really like the hardware. I ended up going with C, although I would have initially preferred ASM. (C in these is still bloated and much slower than ASM, if you look at some of the ASM listings from C you will really begin to wonder...) The interrupt controller is very powerful, which is nice. The hardware peripherals are nice, but they are usually spread around the chip, which can be a pain. I really really like the high speed PWM, 1.04nS resolution is nice for digital power!!! The thing I hate about them, is the port/pin mapping. They never seem to map a whole 8 or 16 bit port out to pins that is easy to get to. There always seems to be a missing pin here or there, which is really annoying! If you want to do anything on a word or byte wide bus, it will be a pain. The new X-IDE with an ICD-3 is a nice way to go, albeit a bit expensive. A good starting point is Programming 16-Bit Microcontrollers in C, Learning to fly the Pic 24) second edition by Di Jasio). It'll get you on your feet quick. Hope this helps. Feel free to contact me for more info. Thanks, Dan On 5/25/2013 12:00 PM, time-nuts-requ...@febo.com wrote: I've decided I finally want to tackle learning how to use a PIC chip for some smaller projects. Can someone recommend me a good (and cheap) PIC, and possible some literature (be it a book or website)? I have a fairly recent willem eprom programmer that I'm hoping I can use. I don't know what all the features PICs have, but for my first project I would like to have it connected to a serial port on one of my Soekris' where it can grab info (i.e. the current time, or NTP/GPS info) and output that on a little LED display. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
Well, its a matter of opinions I guess. The RPi has one UART which is also the console port, so so much for that, and 17 IOs in total from the link in the message below. On the other hand, the BeagleBone Black has 96 IOs including several UARTs. I have one of each at the moment, and it seems like the Pi is a better toy if one wants to hook up a keyboard and monitor, but the BBB is a better tool for embedded systems. I am also bothered by the closed nature of the RPi while the BBB is completely open. The RPi has sold many times more units, so there is more info and more resources also on the net. For a beginner wanting to learn, the RPi is probably a better choice. Didier == Didier, It's easy to use the UART on the RPi for other work, e.g. GPS NMEA, as shown in the descriptions I've previously referenced. Edit a couple of files. Using SSH you can easily access the RPi over the network for test and, if you need it, graphics. I don't think that my latest two have ever had a keyboard or monitor attached. Of course there /are/ differences, and one would choose the device most suited to the task in use. Cheers, David -- SatSignal Software - Quality software written to your requirements Web: http://www.satsignal.eu Email: david-tay...@blueyonder.co.uk ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
On Sun, 26 May 2013 00:12:58 + li...@lazygranch.com wrote: If you go arm cortex A little note here: Arm Cortex are multiple families of processors for different uses. And they vary a lot! Cortex-M: This family is ment to replace the old ARM7TDMI chips that are so ubiquitous. They are microcontrollers optimized for low power consumption with still a lot of peripherals and enough computation power to do things that recently needed a much larger and power hungry chip. They usually are run with the application writtend directly for the bare metal, ie without an OS. Or at most with a very thin layer of an RTOS. This family currently splits into three types of cores: Cortex-M3: this is the wast majority of todays new Arm uC chips. General purpose, does fit for most of the projects that require an uC. Cortex-M4: an upgraded version of the M3 that can run at higher clocks (i've seen up to 180MHz) and contains a single precision floating point unit. Mainly thought for projects that need a little bit more computing power or those that would benefit from floating point arithmetic. Cortex-M0: This can be seen as a shrunk down version of the M3. It is optimized for lower power applications than the M3 and meant to replace the 16bit uCs with a more versatile and easier to code for 32bit uC. Cortex-A: This family are the so called application processors and are the replacement for the venerable ARM9 and ARM11 families. They are supposed to run Linux, QNX or something similar, and on top of that your application. These parts start from 500MHz clock and go to 1.5GHz, from single core to quad core. So you have a damn lot of computation power. The usual use case for those is to control a user interface on an LCD with touch screen, do complex network protocols and stuff like that. Anything you wouldnt want to code yourself but a modern OS provides you for free. Big disadvantage of those cores is, that they are only available in BGA cases (i've not yet seen one available in QFP, if you are limited to that, choose from an ARM9), hence you usually want to buy a board that contains such a processor including its power supply and basic peripherals. E.g. the beaglebone black. Cortex-R: This family goes also into the category of application processors, but are optimized for real time applications. I did not have the chance to have a deeper look into them, yet. Thus i cannot say much about them. and linux, you will need to make your code a service. You will want it to start up by itself and if for some reason it crashes, you will want it to restart itself. The buzzword is harden and the techniques vary depending on the distribution. The advantage of running within an OS is that you can do that easily. You don't have to rely on external components like watchdogs to catch you in case something goes wrong. Also debugging is a lot easier as you are working in user space instead of on bare metal. Unfortunately, this makes people to code more sloppy, and together with more code that is run on such systems, the application gets a lot more fragile. But if you keep writing clean code, such applications are as stable and hard as on microcontrollers. You should check the architecture of the system. I didn't realize many of these boards run the ethernet off the usb hub. My recollection is the a10 used by Allwinner does not do that. I think you mean the Raspberry Pi here. It's the only one i'm aware of that provides an ethernet interface on board, although it doesn't have an ethernet MAC on-chip. I especially want to point out here that the processor of the RPI was originally designed as a setop box processor. That's why it looks like a huge GPU with a tinsy CPU attached. It also explains the lack of documentation (everything is under NDA) and why the interfaces are so quirky. For most projects, i would advise against the use of the RPI unless you are building something that relies heavily on a GPU and needs little else. There are other, better boards to choose from that are in the same price range or even cheaper. Examples are the aformentioned beaglebone black (using an Ti AM3359), or the two olixino boards (one featuring a Freescale i.MX23 and the other an AllWinner A10). Attila Kinali -- The people on 4chan are like brilliant psychologists who also happen to be insane and gross. -- unknown ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
John, for guys like us who grew up with basic, there is an excellent (compiled) pic basic from http://www.protonbasic.co.uk/ I had a look at c, but decided at my time of life I wanted to produce working projects not learn new (cryptic to me) languages so I stuck with what I was comfortable with. As others have already said, occasionally you may need a tight bit of assembler for critical things but otherwise the high-level languages are the way to go. Ken, vk7krj www.vk7krj.com On Sun, May 26, 2013 at 1:47 PM, johncr...@aol.com wrote: Nice topic. I learned at bit. One source of info on the PIC is a course book and programming kit, programmer, prototype board and components set up by the ARRL. www.arrl.org You get all the stuff you need to get going. Software and a integrated development environment is provided. All in one package. They also have a couple of new courses on the Raspberry PI and the Arduino. I got into the PIC course last summer, read the extensive course book and learned to program the things. Made lights blink - also made LCD say Hi Hottie to my wife. My only comments - 1. Nice course for a beginner - my roots are old and in BASIC and FORTRAN Still used today, on junker laptops. So it was fun go fool with assembly for while. 2. My impression is that the PICs are powerful if you do a lot with one, but there is a lot of work involved to get up the learning curve. 3. My conclusion is that my next venture - should it occur will be with an integrated product that I can program in high level, with good input and some display capability, because I just want to get on with the project, but then I am not making a production device. Others comments re the more complex boards appreciated and noted for future reference. -73 john k6iql - ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
Hi At least with the newer versions ( the X stuff), they really seem to want to see the PIC Kit 3. Bob On May 25, 2013, at 10:20 PM, Herbert Poetzl herb...@13thfloor.at wrote: On Sat, May 25, 2013 at 10:04:59PM -0400, Bob Camp wrote: Hi If you are putting money into a Microchip programmer, I'd probably head over to the PIC Kit 3 rather than the 2. It will do debug as well as programming on the range of parts. Unfortunately the command line support is missing in the PICkit 3, although there was/is an efford to make the 'new' PICkit 3 compatible with the PICkit 2. (as usualy, marketing decisions ... :) And the PICkit 2 can do all the debugging the PICkit 3 does plus it can work as UART and Logic Analyzer as well. Having breakpoints and debug is a *good* thing. Depends, using breakpoints and/or debug on time critical stuff (like software PWM or UART) usually results in unexpected results, more often it is simpler to add one or more LEDs to display a state or do 'printf' style debugging via serial (UART/I2C/SPI). But as always, YMMV. best, Herbert Bob On May 25, 2013, at 9:44 PM, Herbert Poetzl herb...@13thfloor.at wrote: On Sat, May 25, 2013 at 08:46:03AM -0500, Jason Rabel wrote: I've decided I finally want to tackle learning how to use a PIC chip for some smaller projects. Can someone recommend me a good (and cheap) PIC, and possible some literature (be it a book or website)? I have a fairly recent willem eprom programmer that I'm hoping I can use. Microchip has good product selection tools like this one: http://www.microchip.com/maps/microcontroller.aspx (note the plus signs on the right side of each section) I don't know what all the features PICs have, but for my first project I would like to have it connected to a serial port on one of my Soekris' where it can grab info (i.e. the current time, or NTP/GPS info) and output that on a little LED display. Depending on the type of LED display you have in mind, you want to have PWM capabilities (multiplexing) and high current source/sink, as well as an (E)U(S)ART for the serial communication. A four digit LED display can be easily controlled by a PIC16F1503 (price about 0.8 USD, 14 pins) and the required documents are available on the Microchip site: http://www.microchip.com/wwwproducts/Devices.aspx?dDocName=en553475 You can do the UART part in software for low data rates or simply take the PIC16F1508/9 which already includes an EUSART (price about 1.3 USD, 20 pins) One programmer for many PIC chips (8 bit to 32 bit) is the PICkit2 which can be bought for less than 30 USD (via usb, works fine on Linux and MacOS as well) HTH, Herbert ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
Hi One of the original starting points was a free tool chain. Paying major money for a compiler is moving a bit far from that. You would have to do a *lot* of home projects to justify that cost. Bob On May 25, 2013, at 10:17 PM, Clint Turner tur...@ussc.com wrote: Having used PICs since 1990, I've designed them into projects rather than getting a board like a Parallax or Arduino (either of which are far more expensive than the chip and the few components required to make it work) and then shoehorning someone else's board into my project. Since the late 90's, I've used the PICC compiler (by CCS) which - once you know it - can produce reasonably tight code that is can also be fast: I've done a number of audio DSP projects on 16F platforms - mostly in C - and had plenty of horsepower. A bit expensive, but I updated only every 4-7 years and with as many projects that I've done (I have used rails of the things with personal/amateur/work projects as well as some commercial prototypes) the time/power is worth the cost. The PICs that I use the most are the 12F683 - an 8-pin device with 10 bits of A/D and a 10 bit PWM: With a 20 MHz xtal, I've done audio DSP with this. As it turns out, a great many projects require =6 pins (the PIC using an internal R/C clock - 1 of the pins is input-only) and this will do the trick. The other one that I use is the 16F88 - It has the A/D, PWM as well as I2C/SCL and USARTs and internal clocks - an 18 pin device, 16 of which can be used for I/O (1 of those only does I). With more RAM/Program memory, one can do more DSP than with the '683... For more horsepower I'll often use the 18F2620/18F4620's - 28/40 pin devices (respectively) and these have more I/O and peripherals. There's are close cousins of this that also has hardware-based USB (I don't recall the number of an example, however...) I've yet to do anything with the 24F and dsPICs, but maybe, the next time I update the compiler... 73, Clint KA7OEI ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
Hi I started out loading Unix via tape on a PDP-11 back in 1974. C has been around for a while. It's also got a bit of baggage from those roots. I do indeed code quite a bit in C, I just don't use it for everything. Different tools for different jobs. Bob On May 25, 2013, at 10:52 PM, Orin Eman orin.e...@gmail.com wrote: On Sat, May 25, 2013 at 6:39 PM, Didier Juges shali...@gmail.com wrote: While I have often said that I have more time than money, I still consider that my time is too scarce (or valuable) for assembly language. My opinion is that the language for small embedded devices is C. Some may disagree, but after over 40 years of writing software for a whole bunch of platforms (obviously not all in C), I see no reason to switch to something else for small embedded systems. Therefore make sure you select a chip/family/architecture for which you can get a decent C compiler. Friends don't let friends write in assembly. I agree entirely. C is pretty close to assembly itself in a way... given its history where *p1++ = *p2++; was one PDP-11 instruction. It's so much easier to get a program going in C than PIC assembly; now which way around do I have to put the operands to subtract a constant? (I had macros to do such things before I switched to a C compiler.) I have tried a few PIC C compilers and actually paid money for the SourceBoost compiler. I look at the assembly output and it usually does at least as good a job as I would. If not and it's timing critical, I can embed some assembly, though the little review I just did showed that the timing critical parts were in C! Orin. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
Hi Jason, Firstly I'm pro PIC so what I say is likely biased ;-) Look at one of the Microchip PicKit 3 (or even PicKit 2) starter kits. See http://www.microchip.com/stellent/idcplg?IdcService=SS_GET_PAGEnodeId=1406dDocName=en538340 The DV164131PicKit 3 Debug Express is about $70 and includes a development board, in-circuit programmer/debugger and C complier. The programmer will also program the earlier series Flash PICs. Pics are great for little projects were an Arduino is to costly or big. The little 8 and 16pin PICs are cheap enough to replace things like 555 timers, discrete logic etc. Throw in an onboard comparator, ADC and PWM you have a whole host of applications it can cope with. If you are not a C person look at ME Labs PicBasicPro, www.melabs.com Don't go for the high end devices and DSPic unless you really need their capabilities. Robert G8RPI. From: Jason Rabel ja...@extremeoverclocking.com To: time-nuts@febo.com Sent: Saturday, 25 May 2013, 20:08 Subject: Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project? My reasoning for using a PIC (or similar) is mostly two factors. First, simplicity... The few things I have in my head that I've wanted to do aren't complicated or require special busses. It is things that you could *probably* do with a whole pile of logic chips, or keep it simple with just one PIC. ;) Second, cost... Spending $30-$40 for a one time project is fine. But say after 10 or so, the cost savings of a $2 chip vs $30 embedded system starts to add up. I agree with you that I need to figure out the project details first and what I'm trying to integrate with and work backwards. I'm really glad people are giving me feedback though I didn't know so many different options existed (and at so many different price points). If you don't ask, you will never learn. ;) Both the Arduino and TI Launchpad offerings look very intriguing. I'm on no deadline, so time is not an issue. I just wanted a new challenge and this is something I've wanted to dive into for a long time. Learning a programming language is not an issue. While I mostly write code in PHP, Perl, and shell scripts these days, I used to and am still somewhat familiar with C/C++. Most other programming languages I've used in the past are now probably considered archaic or defunct. ;) Looks like I have a lot of reading to do now. Everyone's responses have been most helpful! Jason How did you decide to use a PIC and not one of the others such as the AVR MSP or whatever? I don't want to argue for any of the others but if you can't list 5 or 6 good reasons to use a PIC and you are not able to say why the oters cn't work for you then you've just selected something at random without thinking. SO as a check, see if you can list pros and cons. You have to decide what you are going to USE the device for first. Some are bets for different purposes. And also how much time you are willing to invest in learning. How much programming experience do you have? ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
On Sun, May 26, 2013 at 07:48:08AM -0400, Bob Camp wrote: Hi At least with the newer versions ( the X stuff), they really seem to want to see the PIC Kit 3. As I said, it's a marketing move: the PICkit 2 was declared obsolete after the main developer left Microchip and the PICkit 3 was marketed as an 'improved' version, and all new software was geared toward the 'new' PICkit 3, despite the fact that it is inferior to the PICkit 2 in almost all regards Recent updates to the PICkit 3 made it more and more compatible with the PICkit 2 but it is still missing certain features like the uart or logic analyzer. Just google for a comparison (PICkit 2 vs PICkit 3) to get an idea :) Best, Herbert Bob On May 25, 2013, at 10:20 PM, Herbert Poetzl herb...@13thfloor.at wrote: On Sat, May 25, 2013 at 10:04:59PM -0400, Bob Camp wrote: Hi If you are putting money into a Microchip programmer, I'd probably head over to the PIC Kit 3 rather than the 2. It will do debug as well as programming on the range of parts. Unfortunately the command line support is missing in the PICkit 3, although there was/is an efford to make the 'new' PICkit 3 compatible with the PICkit 2. (as usualy, marketing decisions ... :) And the PICkit 2 can do all the debugging the PICkit 3 does plus it can work as UART and Logic Analyzer as well. Having breakpoints and debug is a *good* thing. Depends, using breakpoints and/or debug on time critical stuff (like software PWM or UART) usually results in unexpected results, more often it is simpler to add one or more LEDs to display a state or do 'printf' style debugging via serial (UART/I2C/SPI). But as always, YMMV. best, Herbert Bob On May 25, 2013, at 9:44 PM, Herbert Poetzl herb...@13thfloor.at wrote: On Sat, May 25, 2013 at 08:46:03AM -0500, Jason Rabel wrote: I've decided I finally want to tackle learning how to use a PIC chip for some smaller projects. Can someone recommend me a good (and cheap) PIC, and possible some literature (be it a book or website)? I have a fairly recent willem eprom programmer that I'm hoping I can use. Microchip has good product selection tools like this one: http://www.microchip.com/maps/microcontroller.aspx (note the plus signs on the right side of each section) I don't know what all the features PICs have, but for my first project I would like to have it connected to a serial port on one of my Soekris' where it can grab info (i.e. the current time, or NTP/GPS info) and output that on a little LED display. Depending on the type of LED display you have in mind, you want to have PWM capabilities (multiplexing) and high current source/sink, as well as an (E)U(S)ART for the serial communication. A four digit LED display can be easily controlled by a PIC16F1503 (price about 0.8 USD, 14 pins) and the required documents are available on the Microchip site: http://www.microchip.com/wwwproducts/Devices.aspx?dDocName=en553475 You can do the UART part in software for low data rates or simply take the PIC16F1508/9 which already includes an EUSART (price about 1.3 USD, 20 pins) One programmer for many PIC chips (8 bit to 32 bit) is the PICkit2 which can be bought for less than 30 USD (via usb, works fine on Linux and MacOS as well) HTH, Herbert ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
On Sun, May 26, 2013 at 4:50 AM, Bob Camp li...@rtty.us wrote: Hi One of the original starting points was a free tool chain. Paying major money for a compiler is moving a bit far from that. You would have to do a *lot* of home projects to justify that cost. Indeed. I wouldn't pay commercial prices for a PIC C compiler for home projects. The 'Lite' version of SourceBoost that I actually bought is a whopping $5 and in spite of its RAM/ROM limitations, it's been good enough for me. If I ever sell a product that uses it, I'd need the commercial version at $150 - fair enough IMO. Orin. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
Probably, one of the best advantages of AVR over PIC is that with avr you can use the GCC compiler. Gcc of course is the compiler used everywhere and supports real ANSI C and has a good optimizer and it's free. So if you use AVR you can port most C code you find that was written for UNIX directly to the AVR As was said early in this thread, if you want to write in C, AVR is designed from the ground up for C. The PIC is older and has a very simple assembly language that is easy to learn. But the PIC C compilers are either expensive or crippled. The good thing about using gcc is that it also runs on the PC or Mac OS X so you can write test cases and run the code on your desktop. I lie to unit test the software in the larger computer using data from files to fully exercise the code before downloading it to the chip. Using the same compiler for the PC/Mac and the chip makes this easier. On Sun, May 26, 2013 at 10:34 AM, Orin Eman orin.e...@gmail.com wrote: On Sun, May 26, 2013 at 4:50 AM, Bob Camp li...@rtty.us wrote: Hi One of the original starting points was a free tool chain. Paying major money for a compiler is moving a bit far from that. You would have to do a *lot* of home projects to justify that cost. Indeed. I wouldn't pay commercial prices for a PIC C compiler for home projects. The 'Lite' version of SourceBoost that I actually bought is a whopping $5 and in spite of its RAM/ROM limitations, it's been good enough for me. If I ever sell a product that uses it, I'd need the commercial version at $150 - fair enough IMO. Orin. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. -- Chris Albertson Redondo Beach, California ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
Well, its a matter of opinions I guess. The RPi has one UART which is also the console port, so so much for that, and 17 IOs in total from the link in the message below. On the other hand, the BeagleBone Black has 96 IOs including several UARTs. I have one of each at the moment, and it seems like the Pi is a better toy if one wants to hook up a keyboard and monitor, but the BBB is a better tool for embedded systems. I am also bothered by the closed nature of the RPi while the BBB is completely open. The RPi has sold many times more units, so there is more info and more resources also on the net. For a beginner wanting to learn, the RPi is probably a better choice. Didier David J Taylor david-tay...@blueyonder.co.uk wrote: The Pi has virtually no IOs, not good for any embedded system. The BeagleBone Black on the other hand has plentt of IOs Didier You can see the RPi I/O connections here: http://elinux.org/RPi_Low-level_peripherals#General_Purpose_Input.2FOutput_.28GPIO.29 Hardly virtually no IOs, and some of the pins can be re-assigned. Cheers, David -- SatSignal Software - Quality software written to your requirements Web: http://www.satsignal.eu Email: david-tay...@blueyonder.co.uk ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. -- Sent from my Motorola Droid Razr 4G LTE wireless tracker while I do other things. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
In message CABbxVHvP0JmXo=ObnZUmtTH=7-ohixswixa0hy3svgo4gqd...@mail.gmail.com , Chris Albertson writes: Probably, one of the best advantages of AVR over PIC is that with avr you can use the GCC compiler. I recently had enough of all the trouble with both AVR and PIC chips and went ARM, which gives you way better C-language support than either has ever done. My current preference for random hacks is this one: https://www.olimex.com/Products/ARM/NXP/LPC-P1343/ This one has the neat feature that the firmware-load mode gives you are 32KB USB-stick with a single file called firmware.bin which means that even your grandmother can figure out how to update the firmware if need be... -- Poul-Henning Kamp | UNIX since Zilog Zeus 3.20 p...@freebsd.org | TCP/IP since RFC 956 FreeBSD committer | BSD since 4.3-tahoe Never attribute to malice what can adequately be explained by incompetence. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
Hi Actually GCC does support *some* of the PICs. I'd prefer to go with a = PIC24 and run the free version of the Microchip compiler rather than GCC in this case. The optimization isn't quite as neat in the free Microchip compiler, but the price is right and the thing does work. Bob On May 26, 2013, at 3:19 PM, Chris Albertson albertson.ch...@gmail.com wrote: Probably, one of the best advantages of AVR over PIC is that with avr you can use the GCC compiler. Gcc of course is the compiler used everywhere and supports real ANSI C and has a good optimizer and it's free. So if you use AVR you can port most C code you find that was written for UNIX directly to the AVR As was said early in this thread, if you want to write in C, AVR is designed from the ground up for C. The PIC is older and has a very simple assembly language that is easy to learn. But the PIC C compilers are either expensive or crippled. The good thing about using gcc is that it also runs on the PC or Mac OS X so you can write test cases and run the code on your desktop. I lie to unit test the software in the larger computer using data from files to fully exercise the code before downloading it to the chip. Using the same compiler for the PC/Mac and the chip makes this easier. On Sun, May 26, 2013 at 10:34 AM, Orin Eman orin.e...@gmail.com wrote: On Sun, May 26, 2013 at 4:50 AM, Bob Camp li...@rtty.us wrote: Hi One of the original starting points was a free tool chain. Paying major money for a compiler is moving a bit far from that. You would have to do a *lot* of home projects to justify that cost. Indeed. I wouldn't pay commercial prices for a PIC C compiler for home projects. The 'Lite' version of SourceBoost that I actually bought is a whopping $5 and in spite of its RAM/ROM limitations, it's been good enough for me. If I ever sell a product that uses it, I'd need the commercial version at $150 - fair enough IMO. Orin. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. -- Chris Albertson Redondo Beach, California ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
Hi It is interesting how the various outfits sneak around the flash loader issue on their low end boards. Some of the dual CPU approaches I've seen actually have as much horsepower in the loader CPU as they do in the target. I'm not complaining about getting 2 usable cpu's for a bit over $10…. Bob On May 26, 2013, at 3:47 PM, Poul-Henning Kamp p...@phk.freebsd.dk wrote: In message CABbxVHvP0JmXo=ObnZUmtTH=7-ohixswixa0hy3svgo4gqd...@mail.gmail.com , Chris Albertson writes: Probably, one of the best advantages of AVR over PIC is that with avr you can use the GCC compiler. I recently had enough of all the trouble with both AVR and PIC chips and went ARM, which gives you way better C-language support than either has ever done. My current preference for random hacks is this one: https://www.olimex.com/Products/ARM/NXP/LPC-P1343/ This one has the neat feature that the firmware-load mode gives you are 32KB USB-stick with a single file called firmware.bin which means that even your grandmother can figure out how to update the firmware if need be... -- Poul-Henning Kamp | UNIX since Zilog Zeus 3.20 p...@freebsd.org | TCP/IP since RFC 956 FreeBSD committer | BSD since 4.3-tahoe Never attribute to malice what can adequately be explained by incompetence. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
In message eed8cc97-4c42-4eed-93fa-b52073051...@rtty.us, Bob Camp writes: It is interesting how the various outfits sneak around the flash loader issue on their low end boards. Some of the dual CPU approaches I've seen actually have as much horsepower in the loader CPU as they do in the target. I'm not complaining about getting 2 usable cpu's for a bit over $10=85. In this case it's the same single chip doing the work. You can even access the subroutines from your own code, in case you want to implement a FAT-disk on the USB port. I generally use the USB port as a serial (CDC) device though. -- Poul-Henning Kamp | UNIX since Zilog Zeus 3.20 p...@freebsd.org | TCP/IP since RFC 956 FreeBSD committer | BSD since 4.3-tahoe Never attribute to malice what can adequately be explained by incompetence. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
Hi Jason: I've done a number of PIC projects in assembly language because it like it. I like the 8 pin parts where they are all that's needed. But if you want to have USB or LAN connections then you'll need one of the much bigger parts or better already assembled boards. With a simpler part there's less to learn. Here's an example of a circuit that has 12 LEDs all driven from 4 PIC pins. http://www.prc68.com/I/PRC68COM.shtml#12LED This is an LCD clock and it uses the PIC 16F88 and is interrupt based, where assembly coding is mandatory because every machine cycle is critical in how the interrupts are handled. This is a time nuts clock where the external frequency reference is the heartbeat of the micro controller. The time can be set to a millisecond (the 1 PPS output is as good as the reference oscillator) and the date functions go back to fifteen hundred something as well as day of the week. http://www.prc68.com/I/PRC68COM.shtml#07092006 Have Fun, Brooke Clarke http://www.PRC68.com http://www.end2partygovernment.com/2012Issues.html Jason Rabel wrote: I've decided I finally want to tackle learning how to use a PIC chip for some smaller projects. Can someone recommend me a good (and cheap) PIC, and possible some literature (be it a book or website)? I have a fairly recent willem eprom programmer that I'm hoping I can use. I don't know what all the features PICs have, but for my first project I would like to have it connected to a serial port on one of my Soekris' where it can grab info (i.e. the current time, or NTP/GPS info) and output that on a little LED display. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
For some of the TI and NXP boards I have seen, the debug chip is clearly bigger than the target, probably due to the fact that the debut chip has USB and USB is typically only supported in the bigger chips. Didier Bob Camp li...@rtty.us wrote: Hi It is interesting how the various outfits sneak around the flash loader issue on their low end boards. Some of the dual CPU approaches I've seen actually have as much horsepower in the loader CPU as they do in the target. I'm not complaining about getting 2 usable cpu's for a bit over $10…. Bob On May 26, 2013, at 3:47 PM, Poul-Henning Kamp p...@phk.freebsd.dk wrote: In message CABbxVHvP0JmXo=ObnZUmtTH=7-ohixswixa0hy3svgo4gqd...@mail.gmail.com , Chris Albertson writes: Probably, one of the best advantages of AVR over PIC is that with avr you can use the GCC compiler. I recently had enough of all the trouble with both AVR and PIC chips and went ARM, which gives you way better C-language support than either has ever done. My current preference for random hacks is this one: https://www.olimex.com/Products/ARM/NXP/LPC-P1343/ This one has the neat feature that the firmware-load mode gives you are 32KB USB-stick with a single file called firmware.bin which means that even your grandmother can figure out how to update the firmware if need be... -- Poul-Henning Kamp | UNIX since Zilog Zeus 3.20 p...@freebsd.org | TCP/IP since RFC 956 FreeBSD committer | BSD since 4.3-tahoe Never attribute to malice what can adequately be explained by incompetence. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. -- Sent from my Motorola Droid Razr 4G LTE wireless tracker while I do other things. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
-- Kenton A. Hoover ken...@nemersonhoover.org +14158305843 On Sunday, May 26, 2013 at 12:35, Didier Juges wrote: Well, its a matter of opinions I guess. The RPi has one UART which is also the console port, so so much for that, and 17 IOs in total from the link in the message below. On the other hand, the BeagleBone Black has 96 IOs including several UARTs. I have one of each at the moment, and it seems like the Pi is a better toy if one wants to hook up a keyboard and monitor, but the BBB is a better tool for embedded systems. I am also bothered by the closed nature of the RPi while the BBB is completely open. The RPi has sold many times more units, so there is more info and more resources also on the net. For a beginner wanting to learn, the RPi is probably a better choice. Didier David J Taylor david-tay...@blueyonder.co.uk wrote: The Pi has virtually no IOs, not good for any embedded system. The BeagleBone Black on the other hand has plentt of IOs Didier You can see the RPi I/O connections here: http://elinux.org/RPi_Low-level_peripherals#General_Purpose_Input.2FOutput_.28GPIO.29 Hardly virtually no IOs, and some of the pins can be re-assigned. Cheers, David -- SatSignal Software - Quality software written to your requirements Web: http://www.satsignal.eu Email: david-tay...@blueyonder.co.uk ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. -- Sent from my Motorola Droid Razr 4G LTE wireless tracker while I do other things. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
[time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
I've decided I finally want to tackle learning how to use a PIC chip for some smaller projects. Can someone recommend me a good (and cheap) PIC, and possible some literature (be it a book or website)? I have a fairly recent willem eprom programmer that I'm hoping I can use. I don't know what all the features PICs have, but for my first project I would like to have it connected to a serial port on one of my Soekris' where it can grab info (i.e. the current time, or NTP/GPS info) and output that on a little LED display. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
Hi PIC's have been around for a *long* time. The PIC16's came early on and were followed by the PIC18's. Both are a bit dated at this point. The PIC24's and dsPIC33's are actually very similar parts. The PIC33's form a third family pretty much on their own. A modern version of the Microchip programmer will flash any of the parts. I have never seen a cheap eprom programmer that will program a PIC. The Microchip programmers are dirt cheap, so that's not a real problem. I'd strongly recommend getting one of the starter kits for the dsPIC33 and play with it for a while. It should come with a cpu, a programmer, and a ton of information. The toolchain is pretty simple to use and it's free. - All that said, the Arduino empire is pretty hard to beat when it comes to mashing together a simple little light blinker. The key issue is being able to use cheap China assembled boards off of the auction sites. Time wise, and even cost wise it's better than doing layouts and soldering up stuff. Another option are the demo boards that the semiconductor companies flog off for next to nothing. The Freescale Freedom board ($12) is one example out of hundreds. The project cost is *never* about the CPU, it's always about all the other stuff around it. If the objective is to complete a very simple, low powered project and be done with it, go with the Arduino. If the objective is to learn an empire, be very careful about which empire you pick. The ARM boys are quickly gobbling up a lot of territory that once was populated by a number of competing CPU's. Learning this stuff, and getting good at it is a significant investment of time. Bob On May 25, 2013, at 9:46 AM, Jason Rabel ja...@extremeoverclocking.com wrote: I've decided I finally want to tackle learning how to use a PIC chip for some smaller projects. Can someone recommend me a good (and cheap) PIC, and possible some literature (be it a book or website)? I have a fairly recent willem eprom programmer that I'm hoping I can use. I don't know what all the features PICs have, but for my first project I would like to have it connected to a serial port on one of my Soekris' where it can grab info (i.e. the current time, or NTP/GPS info) and output that on a little LED display. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
I started with just the PIC datasheet to learn about the hardware architecture and the MPASM to write (in assembler) the first try at a PIC16C84 (at that time the PIC16F84 was not yet available). There are plenty of sites about PICs and relative projects. The Shera controller is based on PICs. On Sat, May 25, 2013 at 3:46 PM, Jason Rabel ja...@extremeoverclocking.com wrote: I've decided I finally want to tackle learning how to use a PIC chip for some smaller projects. Can someone recommend me a good (and cheap) PIC, and possible some literature (be it a book or website)? I have a fairly recent willem eprom programmer that I'm hoping I can use. I don't know what all the features PICs have, but for my first project I would like to have it connected to a serial port on one of my Soekris' where it can grab info (i.e. the current time, or NTP/GPS info) and output that on a little LED display. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
Hi I started out with the PIC16's as well, I did projects using a number of them, and moved to the PIC18's long ago. If you were starting out today - which family would you start with? Bob On May 25, 2013, at 10:03 AM, Azelio Boriani azelio.bori...@screen.it wrote: I started with just the PIC datasheet to learn about the hardware architecture and the MPASM to write (in assembler) the first try at a PIC16C84 (at that time the PIC16F84 was not yet available). There are plenty of sites about PICs and relative projects. The Shera controller is based on PICs. On Sat, May 25, 2013 at 3:46 PM, Jason Rabel ja...@extremeoverclocking.com wrote: I've decided I finally want to tackle learning how to use a PIC chip for some smaller projects. Can someone recommend me a good (and cheap) PIC, and possible some literature (be it a book or website)? I have a fairly recent willem eprom programmer that I'm hoping I can use. I don't know what all the features PICs have, but for my first project I would like to have it connected to a serial port on one of my Soekris' where it can grab info (i.e. the current time, or NTP/GPS info) and output that on a little LED display. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
On 5/25/13 7:22 AM, Bob Camp wrote: Hi PIC's have been around for a *long* time. The PIC16's came early on and were followed by the PIC18's. Both are a bit dated at this point. The PIC24's and dsPIC33's are actually very similar parts. The PIC33's form a third family pretty much on their own. A modern version of the Microchip programmer will flash any of the parts. I have never seen a cheap eprom programmer that will program a PIC. The Microchip programmers are dirt cheap, so that's not a real problem. I'd strongly recommend getting one of the starter kits for the dsPIC33 and play with it for a while. It should come with a cpu, a programmer, and a ton of information. The toolchain is pretty simple to use and it's free. - All that said, the Arduino empire is pretty hard to beat when it comes to mashing together a simple little light blinker. The key issue is being able to use cheap China assembled boards off of the auction sites. Time wise, and even cost wise it's better than doing layouts and soldering up stuff. Another option are the demo boards that the semiconductor companies flog off for next to nothing. The Freescale Freedom board ($12) is one example out of hundreds. The project cost is *never* about the CPU, it's always about all the other stuff around it. If the objective is to complete a very simple, low powered project and be done with it, go with the Arduino. If the objective is to learn an empire, be very careful about which empire you pick. The ARM boys are quickly gobbling up a lot of territory that once was populated by a number of competing CPU's. Learning this stuff, and getting good at it is a significant investment of time. If you're interested in ARM (in the long run), and find the arduino ecosystem interesting :there are enormous numbers of add on shields for Arduino, and lots of example code of varying quality around. take a look at the Teensy3 from PJRC.. $19, it's a Freescale Kinetis microcontroller with ARM, a fair amount of RAM and flash, but can use either the Arduino IDE (teensyduino.. has all the libraries, in source, to support the plethora of onchip peripherals in the Kinetis) or native tools for the ARM. One Arduino peripheral that's not readily available, and would be of interest to time-nuts, is a high resolution DAC. the Arduino (and teensy, for that matter) have the usual PWM. You can get a I2C interface MCP4725 12-bitDAC from adafruit on a little daughter card (with bypass caps, etc.), but I've not found something like a low noise 16bit DAC. A decent DAC and the teensy, and I think you could do a very nice Disciplined XO.. the Kinetis has a pretty complete set of counters/timers/what-have-you that you can interconnect by setting bits in the hundreds of control registers, once you figure out how (yep, you'll love that 1600 page manual) ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
How did you decide to use a PIC and not one of the others such as the AVR MSP or whatever? I don't want to argue for any of the others but if you can't list 5 or 6 good reasons to use a PIC and you are not able to say why the oters cn't work for you then you've just selected something at random without thinking. SO as a check, see if you can list pros and cons. NONE of these chips are expensive. You can get them for under $2. But what you need is the development system. Here are some things to look at: 1) Arduino: If you are new to programming micro processors and wht to get started building things quickly and can afford to spend $30 this is the best option. It is very easy to use. It has a huge amount of suport and books and example code and it works with Windows, Linux and Mac OS X. 2) If cost is an issue look at TI's launchpad. They are noow $10 (shipping included) For that you get two chips the programmer board. You can use the board in your projects (it is credit card sized) or pull off the programmed ship and use that. The MSP chip uses micro watts and can run for years on a battery. 3) the Pi is almost PC-like and very easy to use. Costs about $40 4) PICs are good too. but they are the oldest technology and limey have a steeper learning curve. You will need some kind of programmer and software but the parts are inexpensive. You have to decide what you are going to USE the device for first. Some are bets for different purposes. And also how much time you are willing to invest in learning. How much programming experience do you have? On Sat, May 25, 2013 at 6:46 AM, Jason Rabel ja...@extremeoverclocking.com wrote: I've decided I finally want to tackle learning how to use a PIC chip for some smaller projects. Can someone recommend me a good (and cheap) PIC, and possible some literature (be it a book or website)? I have a fairly recent willem eprom programmer that I'm hoping I can use. I don't know what all the features PICs have, but for my first project I would like to have it connected to a serial port on one of my Soekris' where it can grab info (i.e. the current time, or NTP/GPS info) and output that on a little LED display. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. -- Chris Albertson Redondo Beach, California ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
My reasoning for using a PIC (or similar) is mostly two factors. First, simplicity... The few things I have in my head that I've wanted to do aren't complicated or require special busses. It is things that you could *probably* do with a whole pile of logic chips, or keep it simple with just one PIC. ;) Second, cost... Spending $30-$40 for a one time project is fine. But say after 10 or so, the cost savings of a $2 chip vs $30 embedded system starts to add up. I agree with you that I need to figure out the project details first and what I'm trying to integrate with and work backwards. I'm really glad people are giving me feedback though I didn't know so many different options existed (and at so many different price points). If you don't ask, you will never learn. ;) Both the Arduino and TI Launchpad offerings look very intriguing. I'm on no deadline, so time is not an issue. I just wanted a new challenge and this is something I've wanted to dive into for a long time. Learning a programming language is not an issue. While I mostly write code in PHP, Perl, and shell scripts these days, I used to and am still somewhat familiar with C/C++. Most other programming languages I've used in the past are now probably considered archaic or defunct. ;) Looks like I have a lot of reading to do now. Everyone's responses have been most helpful! Jason How did you decide to use a PIC and not one of the others such as the AVR MSP or whatever? I don't want to argue for any of the others but if you can't list 5 or 6 good reasons to use a PIC and you are not able to say why the oters cn't work for you then you've just selected something at random without thinking. SO as a check, see if you can list pros and cons. You have to decide what you are going to USE the device for first. Some are bets for different purposes. And also how much time you are willing to invest in learning. How much programming experience do you have? ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
If you have enough software development experience then maybe you don't need the Arduino. It is best if you have none. And as you say, you need to spend $30 per project. But you might still consider some kind of flash based chip. These can download new revisions of your software nearly instantly. If yu are writing code the ability to quickly make an edit and re-test speeds up the process. If you have to move a chip from you project to a programmer board, re-burn the ROM then move the chip back. It will take forever. THat is what people used to do. But if the chip has a boot loader and FLASH then you have a faster development cycle. Also if you even publish the design others will not need a programmer The chip hardly matters. It's the development environment that matters. Flash-based boot loaders make for easy development and unless you are building 100,000 units the extra $1 they add to the chip is not worth worrying about On Sat, May 25, 2013 at 12:08 PM, Jason Rabel ja...@extremeoverclocking.com wrote: My reasoning for using a PIC (or similar) is mostly two factors. First, simplicity... The few things I have in my head that I've wanted to do aren't complicated or require special busses. It is things that you could *probably* do with a whole pile of logic chips, or keep it simple with just one PIC. ;) Second, cost... Spending $30-$40 for a one time project is fine. But say after 10 or so, the cost savings of a $2 chip vs $30 embedded system starts to add up. I agree with you that I need to figure out the project details first and what I'm trying to integrate with and work backwards. I'm really glad people are giving me feedback though I didn't know so many different options existed (and at so many different price points). If you don't ask, you will never learn. ;) Both the Arduino and TI Launchpad offerings look very intriguing. I'm on no deadline, so time is not an issue. I just wanted a new challenge and this is something I've wanted to dive into for a long time. Learning a programming language is not an issue. While I mostly write code in PHP, Perl, and shell scripts these days, I used to and am still somewhat familiar with C/C++. Most other programming languages I've used in the past are now probably considered archaic or defunct. ;) Looks like I have a lot of reading to do now. Everyone's responses have been most helpful! Jason How did you decide to use a PIC and not one of the others such as the AVR MSP or whatever? I don't want to argue for any of the others but if you can't list 5 or 6 good reasons to use a PIC and you are not able to say why the oters cn't work for you then you've just selected something at random without thinking. SO as a check, see if you can list pros and cons. You have to decide what you are going to USE the device for first. Some are bets for different purposes. And also how much time you are willing to invest in learning. How much programming experience do you have? ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. -- Chris Albertson Redondo Beach, California ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
Hi If you are going to code on a cheap PIC (the PIC16 series) you will likely need to learn PIC assembler. All my coding on those parts was in assembly language. They are old enough / slow enough / small RAM enough that things like C (or the other high level languages you listed) really don't do well on them. A PIC might cost you $1.31. The pc board it goes on will likely cost you $10 in quantity. The regulators and clock source might cost you $2. Throw in $3 for resistors, capacitors, and connectors. If you go for a one up PC board, figure $50 or so. All of that is before you do anything related to your project. That will likely add cost for a power supply, an enclosure, and often a display. It is not at all unusual for your total outlay for even a simple project to hit $100. In that case the micro is 1% of the total cost. A very fancy, factor of 100 better micro than a basic PIC is *maybe* $6 these days. Depending on how you define and measure better, the answer could be $3. There really is no way to use a PIC without something around it. The chip can't just float in mid air. You will always have the stuff that goes around it. It's never really a choice between a single IC and an entire assembly. Bob On May 25, 2013, at 3:08 PM, Jason Rabel ja...@extremeoverclocking.com wrote: My reasoning for using a PIC (or similar) is mostly two factors. First, simplicity... The few things I have in my head that I've wanted to do aren't complicated or require special busses. It is things that you could *probably* do with a whole pile of logic chips, or keep it simple with just one PIC. ;) Second, cost... Spending $30-$40 for a one time project is fine. But say after 10 or so, the cost savings of a $2 chip vs $30 embedded system starts to add up. I agree with you that I need to figure out the project details first and what I'm trying to integrate with and work backwards. I'm really glad people are giving me feedback though I didn't know so many different options existed (and at so many different price points). If you don't ask, you will never learn. ;) Both the Arduino and TI Launchpad offerings look very intriguing. I'm on no deadline, so time is not an issue. I just wanted a new challenge and this is something I've wanted to dive into for a long time. Learning a programming language is not an issue. While I mostly write code in PHP, Perl, and shell scripts these days, I used to and am still somewhat familiar with C/C++. Most other programming languages I've used in the past are now probably considered archaic or defunct. ;) Looks like I have a lot of reading to do now. Everyone's responses have been most helpful! Jason How did you decide to use a PIC and not one of the others such as the AVR MSP or whatever? I don't want to argue for any of the others but if you can't list 5 or 6 good reasons to use a PIC and you are not able to say why the oters cn't work for you then you've just selected something at random without thinking. SO as a check, see if you can list pros and cons. You have to decide what you are going to USE the device for first. Some are bets for different purposes. And also how much time you are willing to invest in learning. How much programming experience do you have? ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
On 5/25/13 10:55 AM, Chris Albertson wrote: 3) the Pi is almost PC-like and very easy to use. Costs about $40 and requires a HDMI or DVI monitor.. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
*Jim Lux* S*at May 25 16:53:50 EDT 2013* * 3) the Pi is almost PC-like and very easy to use. Costs about $40***and requires a HDMI or DVI monitor.. A $9 USB to 3.3V serial adapter connects to the serial console unless you prefer ssh or VNC. Likewise the Beaglebone. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
Le 25 mai 2013 à 22:53, Jim Lux a écrit : On 5/25/13 10:55 AM, Chris Albertson wrote: 3) the Pi is almost PC-like and very easy to use. Costs about $40 and requires a HDMI or DVI monitor.. If you don't need graphics it runs fine headless using putty to ssh into. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
For the original Arduino Uno the $30 cost may be true, but there are lots of other options in the Arduino family. The Pro Mini (https://www.sparkfun.com/products/3) is only $10, being that it uses an external serial to USB adapter (such as the https://www.sparkfun.com/products/9718). The $18 cost of the adapter cable is spread across all one's projects, reducing the average. Obviously this would not be the case for any project requiring a dedicated Arduino to PC connection. The Pro Mini would also work with a MAX232 chip and an RS-232 serial port, if that's what you have. Bare DIP chips with the Arduino bootloader can be had for $5 or less for those who want to build from scratch. Even cheaper are the raw Atmel ATMEGA328 chips, usable with the Arduino environment once flashed with the proper bootloader. Not hard to do if you have the low-cost AVR programmer from Pololu (http://www.pololu.com/catalog/product/1300). Bob LaJeunesse From: Chris Albertson albertson.ch...@gmail.com To: Discussion of precise time and frequency measurement time-nuts@febo.com Sent: Sat, May 25, 2013 4:15:33 PM Subject: Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project? I... And as you say, you need to spend $30 per project. ... ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
3) the Pi is almost PC-like and very easy to use. Costs about $40 and requires a HDMI or DVI monitor.. It's got an ethernet. You can ssh in to it from your PC. Headless is the buzzword. It may be easier to get started if you plug in a display and keyboard. http://www.penguintutor.com/linux/raspberrypi-headless -- These are my opinions. I hate spam. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
Even with graphics it works fine (I think it works better) headless using X or VNC Sent from my iPhone On May 25, 2013, at 17:05, mike cook mc235...@gmail.com wrote: Le 25 mai 2013 à 22:53, Jim Lux a écrit : On 5/25/13 10:55 AM, Chris Albertson wrote: 3) the Pi is almost PC-like and very easy to use. Costs about $40 and requires a HDMI or DVI monitor.. If you don't need graphics it runs fine headless using putty to ssh into. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
I agree with everything below. It is a good argument for AVR. The AVR was designed specifically wit the needs of the compliter writer in mind. Because of this C compilers can generate very good AVR code and there is rarely a good reason to program an AVR in assembly, although you can. The low-end AVRs start at under $1 for an 8-pin model and go up. As was said below the total cost of a project. But with uP being so cheap you might use several. Perhaps one just to read a rotary shaft encoder and the rest of the front panel. Use another one to red sensors and so on. At $1 each it is some time easier to use several then to figure out how to multi-task a larger controller. But as was said be me and others the tool chain matters a lot. These chips are so cheap at $1 each that cost is not an issue but your TIME is. So what you might do is download the tool chains. Try them out. You don't need tha hardware to compile a program. Some might even have simulators. So try out developmnt systsms and shee which of them you like.The Arduimo is self contained, as is TI's launch pad. Some AVR or PIC tool chains are DIY with terminal windows, and text editors or you can use Eclipse. Set up a few and find which you think you like. On Sat, May 25, 2013 at 1:22 PM, Bob Camp li...@rtty.us wrote: Hi If you are going to code on a cheap PIC (the PIC16 series) you will likely need to learn PIC assembler. All my coding on those parts was in assembly language. They are old enough / slow enough / small RAM enough that things like C (or the other high level languages you listed) really don't do well on them. A PIC might cost you $1.31. The pc board it goes on will likely cost you $10 in quantity. The regulators and clock source might cost you $2. Throw in $3 for resistors, capacitors, and connectors. If you go for a one up PC board, figure $50 or so. All of that is before you do anything related to your project. That will likely add cost for a power supply, an enclosure, and often a display. It is not at all unusual for your total outlay for even a simple project to hit $100. In that case the micro is 1% of the total cost. A very fancy, factor of 100 better micro than a basic PIC is *maybe* $6 these days. Depending on how you define and measure better, the answer could be $3. -- Chris Albertson Redondo Beach, California ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
On 5/25/2013 1:22 PM, Bob Camp wrote: If you are going to code on a cheap PIC (the PIC16 series) you will likely need to learn PIC assembler. All my coding on those parts was in assembly language. They are old enough / slow enough / small RAM enough that things like C (or the other high level languages you listed) really don't do well on them. Several years back I did a bunch of stuff with various PIC16 series chips. All of it, except for some minor assembler tweaks, was done in C. Glad I did not know it wasn't practical. I would have wasted a lot of time coding it in assembler. Of course my goal was just getting something done, not being elegant or very efficient. Time-nutty stuff like TVB's frequency divider may require the detail and efficiency only provided by assembler. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
On 25 May 2013, at 15:22, Bob Camp wrote: If you are going to code on a cheap PIC (the PIC16 series) you will likely need to learn PIC assembler. All my coding on those parts was in assembly language. They are old enough / slow enough / small RAM enough that things like C (or the other high level languages you listed) really don't do well on them. Well, not to be argumentative, but that certainly hasn't been my experience. The overwhelming majority (95+%) of code I've written for PICs (numbering in the high tens of thousands of lines) has been written in C and with overwhelming success. I've used it both professionally and casually on 8-bit devices ranging from PIC18F all the way down to PIC10F with little trouble. While I agree there will always be a place for assembly language on smaller devices and for certain applications, I would never conclude that well written C doesn't do well on PIC16s. Furthermore, today's PIC16F product line is quite broad, including several higher-performance parts which make coding in C even more attractive. They aren't all old and all slow, at least in their product class. 73, Brent, KD0GLS, Minneapolis ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
In general PICs need assembly language for many things. AVRs almost never need assembly. The reason is that the AVR designers studied C compilers and made the AVR an easy compiler target. A compiler writer like to have an orthogonal instruction set and some other features. So the AVR compirrs generate very good code and there is little reason to resort to assembly On Sat, May 25, 2013 at 2:24 PM, Rex r...@sonic.net wrote: On 5/25/2013 1:22 PM, Bob Camp wrote: If you are going to code on a cheap PIC (the PIC16 series) you will likely need to learn PIC assembler. All my coding on those parts was in assembly language. They are old enough / slow enough / small RAM enough that things like C (or the other high level languages you listed) really don't do well on them. Several years back I did a bunch of stuff with various PIC16 series chips. All of it, except for some minor assembler tweaks, was done in C. Glad I did not know it wasn't practical. I would have wasted a lot of time coding it in assembler. Of course my goal was just getting something done, not being elegant or very efficient. Time-nutty stuff like TVB's frequency divider may require the detail and efficiency only provided by assembler. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. -- Chris Albertson Redondo Beach, California ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
Hi At least on the code I've tried both ways, there's about a 2:1 difference in what you can get done on a low end PIC with assembly vs C. There are a lot of things you can get away with in assembler that drive a C compiler a bit nuts…. Bob On May 25, 2013, at 5:24 PM, Rex r...@sonic.net wrote: On 5/25/2013 1:22 PM, Bob Camp wrote: If you are going to code on a cheap PIC (the PIC16 series) you will likely need to learn PIC assembler. All my coding on those parts was in assembly language. They are old enough / slow enough / small RAM enough that things like C (or the other high level languages you listed) really don't do well on them. Several years back I did a bunch of stuff with various PIC16 series chips. All of it, except for some minor assembler tweaks, was done in C. Glad I did not know it wasn't practical. I would have wasted a lot of time coding it in assembler. Of course my goal was just getting something done, not being elegant or very efficient. Time-nutty stuff like TVB's frequency divider may require the detail and efficiency only provided by assembler. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
Hi It always depends on what you are trying to do and what you are happy with as a result. Back when packing lots of stuff into a PIC mattered, the only way I could get it done (literally millions of lines of code spread across many dozens of projects) was with assembler. The C compilers that were available back then, and the compromises they required just didn't get enough done … Bob On May 25, 2013, at 6:39 PM, KD0GLS kd0...@mninter.net wrote: On 25 May 2013, at 15:22, Bob Camp wrote: If you are going to code on a cheap PIC (the PIC16 series) you will likely need to learn PIC assembler. All my coding on those parts was in assembly language. They are old enough / slow enough / small RAM enough that things like C (or the other high level languages you listed) really don't do well on them. Well, not to be argumentative, but that certainly hasn't been my experience. The overwhelming majority (95+%) of code I've written for PICs (numbering in the high tens of thousands of lines) has been written in C and with overwhelming success. I've used it both professionally and casually on 8-bit devices ranging from PIC18F all the way down to PIC10F with little trouble. While I agree there will always be a place for assembly language on smaller devices and for certain applications, I would never conclude that well written C doesn't do well on PIC16s. Furthermore, today's PIC16F product line is quite broad, including several higher-performance parts which make coding in C even more attractive. They aren't all old and all slow, at least in their product class. 73, Brent, KD0GLS, Minneapolis ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
If you go arm cortex and linux, you will need to make your code a service. You will want it to start up by itself and if for some reason it crashes, you will want it to restart itself. The buzzword is harden and the techniques vary depending on the distribution. You should check the architecture of the system. I didn't realize many of these boards run the ethernet off the usb hub. My recollection is the a10 used by Allwinner does not do that. Opensuse has JEOS, which stands for Just Enough OS. Less is more! ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
On 5/25/13 2:10 PM, Paul wrote: *Jim Lux* S*at May 25 16:53:50 EDT 2013* * 3) the Pi is almost PC-like and very easy to use. Costs about $40***and requires a HDMI or DVI monitor.. A $9 USB to 3.3V serial adapter connects to the serial console unless you prefer ssh or VNC. Once you have it up and running, sure.. heck, you could use Ethernet and telnet or ssh or and presumably set it up so it will boot off the network. But you need that way to get it configured. Or maybe, someone has a SD image that you can just dump onto an SD, stick it in, it recognizes, boots and you're happy, and never hook up a monitor. A bit of googling did find such a thing, using Raspian Wheezy on a SD that has ethernet built into it, so it goes out and hits your dhcp daemon and then you can ssh to it this *is* a bit more of a pain than install IDE from install set, connect USB cable, start programming but it does give you access to a more sophisticated platform. Albeit, I'm not as sure it's as low level hardware control oriented, but it would probably be ok. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
Hi If you want Linux, you probably also want something like an A9 or better. The M0 and even the M4's MCU's are not really targeted at Linux. Can you pack it into a big M4 - sure, it'll be a tight fit and you may not have everything you really wanted to have. Oddly enough some of the M4's have better native ethernet than some of their big brothers. Weird…. Bob On May 25, 2013, at 8:12 PM, li...@lazygranch.com wrote: If you go arm cortex and linux, you will need to make your code a service. You will want it to start up by itself and if for some reason it crashes, you will want it to restart itself. The buzzword is harden and the techniques vary depending on the distribution. You should check the architecture of the system. I didn't realize many of these boards run the ethernet off the usb hub. My recollection is the a10 used by Allwinner does not do that. Opensuse has JEOS, which stands for Just Enough OS. Less is more! ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
I suspect Linux based systems are a few sigma away from the original goal of a cheap pic choice...:) But to get back to the original point, you can get samples of most of the PIC chips from MicroChip for free. I think the limit is 3 per week. Or 30 days, I don't remember. Bob On May 25, 2013, at 20:36, Bob Camp li...@rtty.us wrote: Hi If you want Linux, you probably also want something like an A9 or better. The M0 and even the M4's MCU's are not really targeted at Linux. Can you pack it into a big M4 - sure, it'll be a tight fit and you may not have everything you really wanted to have. Oddly enough some of the M4's have better native ethernet than some of their big brothers. Weird…. Bob On May 25, 2013, at 8:12 PM, li...@lazygranch.com wrote: If you go arm cortex and linux, you will need to make your code a service. You will want it to start up by itself and if for some reason it crashes, you will want it to restart itself. The buzzword is harden and the techniques vary depending on the distribution. You should check the architecture of the system. I didn't realize many of these boards run the ethernet off the usb hub. My recollection is the a10 used by Allwinner does not do that. Opensuse has JEOS, which stands for Just Enough OS. Less is more! ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
On Sat, May 25, 2013 at 04:03:36PM -0700, Chris Albertson wrote: In general PICs need assembly language for many things. AVRs almost never need assembly. I've done quite a number of PIC projects, from low end 8 bit up to the high end 32 bit controllers, and except for a really time critical software PWM solution I never had to write in assembler (although I'm quite comfortable with assembler code :) The reason is that the AVR designers studied C compilers and made the AVR an easy compiler target. A compiler writer like to have an orthogonal instruction set and some other features. So the AVR compirrs generate very good code and there is little reason to resort to assembly Recent PIC toolchains use gcc which allows for inline assembly and provides a reasonable set of builtin instructions to allow for handling almost everything within C. The compiler does a good job, and there are proprietary compilers available if you need to achieve really high optimization (size or speed wise) best, Herbert On Sat, May 25, 2013 at 2:24 PM, Rex r...@sonic.net wrote: On 5/25/2013 1:22 PM, Bob Camp wrote: If you are going to code on a cheap PIC (the PIC16 series) you will likely need to learn PIC assembler. All my coding on those parts was in assembly language. They are old enough / slow enough / small RAM enough that things like C (or the other high level languages you listed) really don't do well on them. Several years back I did a bunch of stuff with various PIC16 series chips. All of it, except for some minor assembler tweaks, was done in C. Glad I did not know it wasn't practical. I would have wasted a lot of time coding it in assembler. Of course my goal was just getting something done, not being elegant or very efficient. Time-nutty stuff like TVB's frequency divider may require the detail and efficiency only provided by assembler. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. -- Chris Albertson Redondo Beach, California ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
On Sat May 25 20:18:20 EDT 2013 A $9 USB to 3.3V serial adapter connects to the serial console unless you prefer ssh or VNC. Once you have it up and running, sure... Or maybe, someone has a SD image that you can just dump onto an SD The Pi, unlike the the Beaglebone Black (BBB) doesn't come with an OS. The two images I've used both support a serial console (via the USB port or the UART) where you can run the standard Pi set-up program to enable ssh. The BBB cleverly presents itself as a disk volume and then lets you ssh in via a virtual network running over the USB port on your computer that's also providing power. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
Hi To *maybe* bring this back to a bit more timing related region of internet space: To make any of these parts really do timing stuff (as opposed to simply display strings) you need some glue. A CPLD or better yet an FPGA can give you a *lot* of glue for the money. A board with a Cyclone V and a K60 CPU might be able to do quite a bit for not a lot of money. Get some guy in Australia to make them up cheap …. Duck and run for cover ….. Bob On May 25, 2013, at 9:21 PM, Paul tic-...@bodosom.net wrote: On Sat May 25 20:18:20 EDT 2013 A $9 USB to 3.3V serial adapter connects to the serial console unless you prefer ssh or VNC. Once you have it up and running, sure... Or maybe, someone has a SD image that you can just dump onto an SD The Pi, unlike the the Beaglebone Black (BBB) doesn't come with an OS. The two images I've used both support a serial console (via the USB port or the UART) where you can run the standard Pi set-up program to enable ssh. The BBB cleverly presents itself as a disk volume and then lets you ssh in via a virtual network running over the USB port on your computer that's also providing power. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
On Sat, May 25, 2013 at 08:46:03AM -0500, Jason Rabel wrote: I've decided I finally want to tackle learning how to use a PIC chip for some smaller projects. Can someone recommend me a good (and cheap) PIC, and possible some literature (be it a book or website)? I have a fairly recent willem eprom programmer that I'm hoping I can use. Microchip has good product selection tools like this one: http://www.microchip.com/maps/microcontroller.aspx (note the plus signs on the right side of each section) I don't know what all the features PICs have, but for my first project I would like to have it connected to a serial port on one of my Soekris' where it can grab info (i.e. the current time, or NTP/GPS info) and output that on a little LED display. Depending on the type of LED display you have in mind, you want to have PWM capabilities (multiplexing) and high current source/sink, as well as an (E)U(S)ART for the serial communication. A four digit LED display can be easily controlled by a PIC16F1503 (price about 0.8 USD, 14 pins) and the required documents are available on the Microchip site: http://www.microchip.com/wwwproducts/Devices.aspx?dDocName=en553475 You can do the UART part in software for low data rates or simply take the PIC16F1508/9 which already includes an EUSART (price about 1.3 USD, 20 pins) One programmer for many PIC chips (8 bit to 32 bit) is the PICkit2 which can be bought for less than 30 USD (via usb, works fine on Linux and MacOS as well) HTH, Herbert ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
While I have often said that I have more time than money, I still consider that my time is too scarce (or valuable) for assembly language. My opinion is that the language for small embedded devices is C. Some may disagree, but after over 40 years of writing software for a whole bunch of platforms (obviously not all in C), I see no reason to switch to something else for small embedded systems. Therefore make sure you select a chip/family/architecture for which you can get a decent C compiler. Friends don't let friends write in assembly. Nowadays, the Cortex M0 is on par price-wise with 8 bit controllers. If I had to start over today, I would probably start there. Didier KO4BB Jason Rabel ja...@extremeoverclocking.com wrote: My reasoning for using a PIC (or similar) is mostly two factors. First, simplicity... The few things I have in my head that I've wanted to do aren't complicated or require special busses. It is things that you could *probably* do with a whole pile of logic chips, or keep it simple with just one PIC. ;) Second, cost... Spending $30-$40 for a one time project is fine. But say after 10 or so, the cost savings of a $2 chip vs $30 embedded system starts to add up. I agree with you that I need to figure out the project details first and what I'm trying to integrate with and work backwards. I'm really glad people are giving me feedback though I didn't know so many different options existed (and at so many different price points). If you don't ask, you will never learn. ;) Both the Arduino and TI Launchpad offerings look very intriguing. I'm on no deadline, so time is not an issue. I just wanted a new challenge and this is something I've wanted to dive into for a long time. Learning a programming language is not an issue. While I mostly write code in PHP, Perl, and shell scripts these days, I used to and am still somewhat familiar with C/C++. Most other programming languages I've used in the past are now probably considered archaic or defunct. ;) Looks like I have a lot of reading to do now. Everyone's responses have been most helpful! Jason How did you decide to use a PIC and not one of the others such as the AVR MSP or whatever? I don't want to argue for any of the others but if you can't list 5 or 6 good reasons to use a PIC and you are not able to say why the oters cn't work for you then you've just selected something at random without thinking. SO as a check, see if you can list pros and cons. You have to decide what you are going to USE the device for first. Some are bets for different purposes. And also how much time you are willing to invest in learning. How much programming experience do you have? ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. -- Sent from my Motorola Droid Razr 4G LTE wireless tracker while I do other things. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
The Pi has virtually no IOs, not good for any embedded system. The BeagleBone Black on the other hand has plentt of IOs Didier Jim Lux jim...@earthlink.net wrote: On 5/25/13 10:55 AM, Chris Albertson wrote: 3) the Pi is almost PC-like and very easy to use. Costs about $40 and requires a HDMI or DVI monitor.. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. -- Sent from my Motorola Droid Razr 4G LTE wireless tracker while I do other things. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
Hi I have had several conversations with 16 bit chip designers over the past couple of years. Each time the M0 or similar ARM parts has come up. The consensus seems to be that getting (internal) funding for future 16 bit parts is going to be tough. The tiny 8 bit parts will survive and move forward. Getting the money for the next big thing in 16 bits - not likely. Bob On May 25, 2013, at 9:39 PM, Didier Juges shali...@gmail.com wrote: While I have often said that I have more time than money, I still consider that my time is too scarce (or valuable) for assembly language. My opinion is that the language for small embedded devices is C. Some may disagree, but after over 40 years of writing software for a whole bunch of platforms (obviously not all in C), I see no reason to switch to something else for small embedded systems. Therefore make sure you select a chip/family/architecture for which you can get a decent C compiler. Friends don't let friends write in assembly. Nowadays, the Cortex M0 is on par price-wise with 8 bit controllers. If I had to start over today, I would probably start there. Didier KO4BB Jason Rabel ja...@extremeoverclocking.com wrote: My reasoning for using a PIC (or similar) is mostly two factors. First, simplicity... The few things I have in my head that I've wanted to do aren't complicated or require special busses. It is things that you could *probably* do with a whole pile of logic chips, or keep it simple with just one PIC. ;) Second, cost... Spending $30-$40 for a one time project is fine. But say after 10 or so, the cost savings of a $2 chip vs $30 embedded system starts to add up. I agree with you that I need to figure out the project details first and what I'm trying to integrate with and work backwards. I'm really glad people are giving me feedback though I didn't know so many different options existed (and at so many different price points). If you don't ask, you will never learn. ;) Both the Arduino and TI Launchpad offerings look very intriguing. I'm on no deadline, so time is not an issue. I just wanted a new challenge and this is something I've wanted to dive into for a long time. Learning a programming language is not an issue. While I mostly write code in PHP, Perl, and shell scripts these days, I used to and am still somewhat familiar with C/C++. Most other programming languages I've used in the past are now probably considered archaic or defunct. ;) Looks like I have a lot of reading to do now. Everyone's responses have been most helpful! Jason How did you decide to use a PIC and not one of the others such as the AVR MSP or whatever? I don't want to argue for any of the others but if you can't list 5 or 6 good reasons to use a PIC and you are not able to say why the oters cn't work for you then you've just selected something at random without thinking. SO as a check, see if you can list pros and cons. You have to decide what you are going to USE the device for first. Some are bets for different purposes. And also how much time you are willing to invest in learning. How much programming experience do you have? ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. -- Sent from my Motorola Droid Razr 4G LTE wireless tracker while I do other things. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
Hi If you are putting money into a Microchip programmer, I'd probably head over to the PIC Kit 3 rather than the 2. It will do debug as well as programming on the range of parts. Having breakpoints and debug is a *good* thing. Bob On May 25, 2013, at 9:44 PM, Herbert Poetzl herb...@13thfloor.at wrote: On Sat, May 25, 2013 at 08:46:03AM -0500, Jason Rabel wrote: I've decided I finally want to tackle learning how to use a PIC chip for some smaller projects. Can someone recommend me a good (and cheap) PIC, and possible some literature (be it a book or website)? I have a fairly recent willem eprom programmer that I'm hoping I can use. Microchip has good product selection tools like this one: http://www.microchip.com/maps/microcontroller.aspx (note the plus signs on the right side of each section) I don't know what all the features PICs have, but for my first project I would like to have it connected to a serial port on one of my Soekris' where it can grab info (i.e. the current time, or NTP/GPS info) and output that on a little LED display. Depending on the type of LED display you have in mind, you want to have PWM capabilities (multiplexing) and high current source/sink, as well as an (E)U(S)ART for the serial communication. A four digit LED display can be easily controlled by a PIC16F1503 (price about 0.8 USD, 14 pins) and the required documents are available on the Microchip site: http://www.microchip.com/wwwproducts/Devices.aspx?dDocName=en553475 You can do the UART part in software for low data rates or simply take the PIC16F1508/9 which already includes an EUSART (price about 1.3 USD, 20 pins) One programmer for many PIC chips (8 bit to 32 bit) is the PICkit2 which can be bought for less than 30 USD (via usb, works fine on Linux and MacOS as well) HTH, Herbert ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
Having used PICs since 1990, I've designed them into projects rather than getting a board like a Parallax or Arduino (either of which are far more expensive than the chip and the few components required to make it work) and then shoehorning someone else's board into my project. Since the late 90's, I've used the PICC compiler (by CCS) which - once you know it - can produce reasonably tight code that is can also be fast: I've done a number of audio DSP projects on 16F platforms - mostly in C - and had plenty of horsepower. A bit expensive, but I updated only every 4-7 years and with as many projects that I've done (I have used rails of the things with personal/amateur/work projects as well as some commercial prototypes) the time/power is worth the cost. The PICs that I use the most are the 12F683 - an 8-pin device with 10 bits of A/D and a 10 bit PWM: With a 20 MHz xtal, I've done audio DSP with this. As it turns out, a great many projects require =6 pins (the PIC using an internal R/C clock - 1 of the pins is input-only) and this will do the trick. The other one that I use is the 16F88 - It has the A/D, PWM as well as I2C/SCL and USARTs and internal clocks - an 18 pin device, 16 of which can be used for I/O (1 of those only does I). With more RAM/Program memory, one can do more DSP than with the '683... For more horsepower I'll often use the 18F2620/18F4620's - 28/40 pin devices (respectively) and these have more I/O and peripherals. There's are close cousins of this that also has hardware-based USB (I don't recall the number of an example, however...) I've yet to do anything with the 24F and dsPICs, but maybe, the next time I update the compiler... 73, Clint KA7OEI ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
On Sat, May 25, 2013 at 10:04:59PM -0400, Bob Camp wrote: Hi If you are putting money into a Microchip programmer, I'd probably head over to the PIC Kit 3 rather than the 2. It will do debug as well as programming on the range of parts. Unfortunately the command line support is missing in the PICkit 3, although there was/is an efford to make the 'new' PICkit 3 compatible with the PICkit 2. (as usualy, marketing decisions ... :) And the PICkit 2 can do all the debugging the PICkit 3 does plus it can work as UART and Logic Analyzer as well. Having breakpoints and debug is a *good* thing. Depends, using breakpoints and/or debug on time critical stuff (like software PWM or UART) usually results in unexpected results, more often it is simpler to add one or more LEDs to display a state or do 'printf' style debugging via serial (UART/I2C/SPI). But as always, YMMV. best, Herbert Bob On May 25, 2013, at 9:44 PM, Herbert Poetzl herb...@13thfloor.at wrote: On Sat, May 25, 2013 at 08:46:03AM -0500, Jason Rabel wrote: I've decided I finally want to tackle learning how to use a PIC chip for some smaller projects. Can someone recommend me a good (and cheap) PIC, and possible some literature (be it a book or website)? I have a fairly recent willem eprom programmer that I'm hoping I can use. Microchip has good product selection tools like this one: http://www.microchip.com/maps/microcontroller.aspx (note the plus signs on the right side of each section) I don't know what all the features PICs have, but for my first project I would like to have it connected to a serial port on one of my Soekris' where it can grab info (i.e. the current time, or NTP/GPS info) and output that on a little LED display. Depending on the type of LED display you have in mind, you want to have PWM capabilities (multiplexing) and high current source/sink, as well as an (E)U(S)ART for the serial communication. A four digit LED display can be easily controlled by a PIC16F1503 (price about 0.8 USD, 14 pins) and the required documents are available on the Microchip site: http://www.microchip.com/wwwproducts/Devices.aspx?dDocName=en553475 You can do the UART part in software for low data rates or simply take the PIC16F1508/9 which already includes an EUSART (price about 1.3 USD, 20 pins) One programmer for many PIC chips (8 bit to 32 bit) is the PICkit2 which can be bought for less than 30 USD (via usb, works fine on Linux and MacOS as well) HTH, Herbert ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
On Sat, May 25, 2013 at 6:39 PM, Didier Juges shali...@gmail.com wrote: My opinion is that the language for small embedded devices is C. Some may disagree, but after over 40 years of writing software for a whole bunch of platforms (obviously not all in C), I see no reason to switch to something else for small embedded systems. Therefore make sure you select a chip/family/architecture for which you can get a decent C compiler. I've been at this for a long time too, Yes C is the language now for embedded devices but sometimes you need assembly for some odd-ball critical case. If so you can mix C and Assembly. Typically you would only ever write at most a few critical sections in assembly. That is the best advice, find a good C compiler. UNLESS this is all new to you and you don't have years of programming experience. In that case get an Arduino. -- Chris Albertson Redondo Beach, California ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
On Sat, May 25, 2013 at 6:39 PM, Didier Juges shali...@gmail.com wrote: While I have often said that I have more time than money, I still consider that my time is too scarce (or valuable) for assembly language. My opinion is that the language for small embedded devices is C. Some may disagree, but after over 40 years of writing software for a whole bunch of platforms (obviously not all in C), I see no reason to switch to something else for small embedded systems. Therefore make sure you select a chip/family/architecture for which you can get a decent C compiler. Friends don't let friends write in assembly. I agree entirely. C is pretty close to assembly itself in a way... given its history where *p1++ = *p2++; was one PDP-11 instruction. It's so much easier to get a program going in C than PIC assembly; now which way around do I have to put the operands to subtract a constant? (I had macros to do such things before I switched to a C compiler.) I have tried a few PIC C compilers and actually paid money for the SourceBoost compiler. I look at the assembly output and it usually does at least as good a job as I would. If not and it's timing critical, I can embed some assembly, though the little review I just did showed that the timing critical parts were in C! Orin. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
Nice topic. I learned at bit. One source of info on the PIC is a course book and programming kit, programmer, prototype board and components set up by the ARRL. www.arrl.org You get all the stuff you need to get going. Software and a integrated development environment is provided. All in one package. They also have a couple of new courses on the Raspberry PI and the Arduino. I got into the PIC course last summer, read the extensive course book and learned to program the things. Made lights blink - also made LCD say Hi Hottie to my wife. My only comments - 1. Nice course for a beginner - my roots are old and in BASIC and FORTRAN Still used today, on junker laptops. So it was fun go fool with assembly for while. 2. My impression is that the PICs are powerful if you do a lot with one, but there is a lot of work involved to get up the learning curve. 3. My conclusion is that my next venture - should it occur will be with an integrated product that I can program in high level, with good input and some display capability, because I just want to get on with the project, but then I am not making a production device. Others comments re the more complex boards appreciated and noted for future reference. -73 john k6iql - ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
I'm surprised not to have seen the picaxe(s) mentioned. cheap enough, easily programmed, large amount of re-useable code chunks, etc. Not for production, but good enough for a few-off or individual projects, cheaper than Arduinos... Of course, I like New Micros. expensive (relatively) but directly programmable in Forth G BTW, an Arduino can be converted to Forth as well. Don johncr...@aol.com Nice topic. I learned at bit. One source of info on the PIC is a course book and programming kit, programmer, prototype board and components set up by the ARRL. www.arrl.org You get all the stuff you need to get going. Software and a integrated development environment is provided. All in one package. They also have a couple of new courses on the Raspberry PI and the Arduino. I got into the PIC course last summer, read the extensive course book and learned to program the things. Made lights blink - also made LCD say Hi Hottie to my wife. My only comments - 1. Nice course for a beginner - my roots are old and in BASIC and FORTRAN Still used today, on junker laptops. So it was fun go fool with assembly for while. 2. My impression is that the PICs are powerful if you do a lot with one, but there is a lot of work involved to get up the learning curve. 3. My conclusion is that my next venture - should it occur will be with an integrated product that I can program in high level, with good input and some display capability, because I just want to get on with the project, but then I am not making a production device. Others comments re the more complex boards appreciated and noted for future reference. -73 john k6iql - ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. -- Neither the voice of authority nor the weight of reason and argument are as significant as experiment, for thence comes quiet to the mind. De Erroribus Medicorum, R. Bacon, 13th century. If you don't know what it is, don't poke it. Ghost in the Shell Dr. Don Latham AJ7LL Six Mile Systems LLP 17850 Six Mile Road POB 134 Huson, MT, 59846 VOX 406-626-4304 www.lightningforensics.com www.sixmilesystems.com ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Good (cheap) PIC chip choice for project?
The Pi has virtually no IOs, not good for any embedded system. The BeagleBone Black on the other hand has plentt of IOs Didier You can see the RPi I/O connections here: http://elinux.org/RPi_Low-level_peripherals#General_Purpose_Input.2FOutput_.28GPIO.29 Hardly virtually no IOs, and some of the pins can be re-assigned. Cheers, David -- SatSignal Software - Quality software written to your requirements Web: http://www.satsignal.eu Email: david-tay...@blueyonder.co.uk ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
