Microcontrollers, A Tortoise Journey

[Jugurtha]

/*
*For memo, today is Friday, October 14th 2011.
*If you are reading this and many years have passed, this is probably out-dated *and you might want *to check for new things.
*/


This post is written for those with absolutely no clue of where to start to get going with Microcontrollers.

Since it is me who’s writing, I get to chose which microcontroller (Shut up) ... I will begin with Microchip PIC Microcontrollers.

I have searched a lot, I mean A LOT as expected, in this Forum and on Google. Various sites, various info, too much info that ended up confusing me even more.
Starting Point : Expected reading, this thread in Electro-Tech-Online http://bit.ly/uControllersStart..

• Which Tutorial to chose ?
In that thread alone, there are a lot of them. So, I would pick one.

- Before I came to this Board, students in my University (because we study in French) started with Bigonoff’s Course found here http://bit.ly/Bigonoff

This course covers 16F84, 16F87X and 18Fxx8.
We’re talking about roughly 1300 pages tutorial, covering these families starting from the inner workings, pages of Data sheets are more than often pointed (so we get to learn where to look), etc… I started reading, what I liked is that it wasn’t done by « An Academic », you know what I mean.. It’s not a « school book ». It’s a hands-on thing.


- Before I came here too, I’ve found interesting sites



It turns out it is 3v0 and Nigel Goodwin, who are on this very Forum..


All right, so … Tutorial Question: Check (For additional ones, read the thread).


• Which PIC to chose ?

Now, when I started looking out for a PIC to chose, the one that popped and was dangling pushed on my face was… The 16F84… What else.


On the thread they say 16F628A it the one to go with for a beginner.
A post I’ve read yesterday late at night was basically Nigel Goodwin answering someone starting out.

What I got from that post was that the PIC16F84 was what Ulysse used to control the doors of Troy… And that, the Iliade made it so famous that beginners still want to use that.

In other words, this PIC16F84 is OLD. As Nigel Goodwin said, the reason it’s still circulating, is basically clueless guys like me not knowing what to use and following old tutorials copied and pasted.

I think that I will start the Bigonoff Course starting from the PIC16F84 having that in mind (That it’s not the PIC I’ll be using for practical stuff) and gowing up to get an understanding of it (It’s a course with loads of practical example, and discussing each family apart) .

• Which PROGRAMMER to chose ?

Booooooy .. This question was the one that caused me to itch and frustrated me the most… Lots of students go with Serial programming, Parallel Programming, lots of schematics.. I have NEVER got a single decent answer from a student to this simple question… They all say « Well, there are lots of schematics available on the internet, you just pick one ».. Yes, WHICH one did YOU chose ? … They all become like the White Rabbit « I’m late, I’m late »..

All right…In the Expected Reading thread here.. They talk about JDM, RCD, PARALLEL, etc…

Keep in mind that that thread was last edited on February 11th, 2007. The JDM page was last updated on February 3 2000 (I was 13. I’m 24 this year). The PICKit2/3 aren’t even mentioned and the links there, lots of them are dead or it’s that thing where I can’t access from the country I’m in. I don’t know.

This may seem obvious to you, and seem trivial … But for a guy like me who hangs on the tiniest bit of information, it’s exhausting to finally, after soooo many research, after so many hours, find out that these programmers are … Well, old too.

The thing that most people agree TODAY on is that : BUYING PICKit2 is WORTH the Price, because it is a good quality thing and stuff.

PICKit3 ? There is a Review of Dave Jones which you can watch here : http://bit.ly/PICKit3ReviewEEVBLOG

Now… The famous question of the : What if I (for whatever reason) I want to build one myself… I’m interested because the shop is kind of far, and it’s not sure they got them, and if they got them, they would be high priced.

The simplest I have seen is found here **broken link removed**

Another one (An In Circuit Debugger ICD) is here : **broken link removed**

I found this site : http://bit.ly/Ali3en and this link to a GTP USB Lite PIC Programmer http://bit.ly/oEPFsl .

The page links to a page in Spanish, here’s the page translated : **broken link removed**

Now, I’ve seen links to Blueroomelectronics for a Junebug programmer. For reasons I am not aware of, I can’t access the site.

Now, given all of this… I will try to do it Cro-Magnon style, probably with the Cable thingy..

Then, I’ll try the other ones…

Here are some great sites as well, someone might update the thread (And if you are reading this and it’s 2021, don’t laugh at how out-dated we were, some day you will be out-dated too  ) :
**broken link removed**

http://picprojects.org.uk/projects/pictop.htm

**broken link removed**

http://www.gooligum.com.au/tutorials.html

**broken link removed**


If you know MORE about this topic… Don’t only feel free to chime in, feel COMPELLED and COERCED to do so




Jugurtha Hadjar.

 

[DerStrom8]

Wait....what?????

 

[BrownOut]

I'm not really familiar with PIC's, but I'm a new embedded programmer using Altera's Nios II processor. All I can say on the matter is this; the system I'm using provides the most extensive support I've ever seen with a product ( probably because Altera has annual revenues of almost $2 billion dollars, so they can afford to provide excellent support ) So, as to the question of where to start, I'd choose which ever processor had the best support in terms of a high-level compiler, supported hardware abstraction layer, board support packages, ROTS and example programs. Because I was provided all of that in my system, I was able to get my embedded project up and running in just a coulpe weeks, despite the fact that I had never done an embedded design before. Does any of the PIC's provide that kind of support? I don't know the answer, but if they did, I would jump on them!

 

[Nigel Goodwin]

Does any of the PIC's provide that kind of support? I don't know the answer, but if they did, I would jump
on them!

You seem to be missing the point

Spending hundreds of dollars on a huge development kit as opposed to a small plastic chip that often costs less than a dollar.

PIC's are cheap enough, and small enough, to replace simple things like a 555 timer IC - and you find PIC's almost everywhere, it's amazing what they are used in.

 

[BrownOut]

You seem to be missing the point

Spending hundreds of dollars on a huge development kit as opposed to a small plastic chip that often costs less than a dollar.

PIC's are cheap enough, and small enough, to replace simple things like a 555 timer IC - and you find PIC's almost everywhere, it's amazing what they are used in.

You seem to miss my point. I'm not advocating spending hundreds of dollars on a huge development system. I'm suggesting the OP find the product with the best support within his budget. I only used my dev system to illustrate the different support elements that are available, and how they help to jumpstart a project.

PS: another point; there are dev systems that are affordable for the hobbist. Many include compilers and other features. I haven't used any of them, but as a place to start, that's where I would look.

 

[BrownOut]

As an example of an affordable dev system, **broken link removed** For $59 US, it has many of the elements I mentioned. I might just have to order one

 

[Nigel Goodwin]

As an example of an affordable dev system, **broken link removed** For $59 US, it has many of the elements I mentioned. I might just have to order one

That's also a pretty high spec processor, obviously the price is a lot lower than the Nios - but it's still massive overkill for a great many jobs (including the vast majority of hobbiest jobs).

Incidently, talking higher end PIC's, you might have a look at the Maximite:

**broken link removed**

A PIC32 processor running a BASIC interpreter, and also driving a VGA or Composite monitor - pretty impressive, I'm playing with one at the moment. Haven't times changed from 6502/Z80 and a cassette interface?

 

[BrownOut]

but it's still massive overkill for a great many jobs (including the vast majority of hobbiest jobs).

I'm sure it is overkill. The good news is, if a noob developer really catches fire with programming and developing, there is room to grow. I'm not so familiar with the PIC community, but in every other community I've had experience with, the tools and applications grow exponitially. It was only a few years ago that the programmable logic I use didn't offer support for embedded processors. That's why I'm so blown away by what has become available. I also look at what's been done in the shareware community and such. The needs and tools that are available never seem to stop growning.

Haven't times changed from 6502/Z80 and a cassette interface?

And my RS-Coco with 16K of RAM and basic interpretor, which took up half of the available memroy

I'd like to further explore low cost uC's, but I'm so past using low-level languages and makeing my own tools. Been there and done that. My focus now is rapid development and prototyping. That's how I pay my bills. I'm happy to see better dev tools becomming available for these products.

 

[Nigel Goodwin]

And my RS-Coco with 16K of RAM and basic interpretor, which took up half of the available memroy

I had 10K of Microsoft BASIC, but it was in nice secure ROM - it would have been a pain having to load it from tape.

My inital tape interface required you to type in the receive routines, using a HEX keypad, you could then load the save routines from tape (having previously typed them in and saved them). The board it was on had EPROM sockets for an extension to the 'OS' which provided better tape routines in ROM along with an assembler (which I purchased as soon as I could afford it) - the rest of the sockets were for the BASIC interpreter.

So initially I had to hand assemble all my code, and then type it in using a HEX peypad - those were the days

Mind you - at least it wasn't as bad as using rows of toggle switches!.

 

[Jugurtha]

Great insights, guys ...

I will get to the "big dogs" eventually. In the meantime, I want to start small, real small, doing a DIY programmer small. I opened a thread

https://www.electro-tech-online.com...th-cadsoft-eagle-critique-appreciated.122577/

Where I posted some schmatics and would appreciate feedback. I want to cover the basics first..

Again, thanks for the advice.