New to Pic....

[Rescue1]

Hello everybody.I am just starting to learn about the PIC microcontroller in my spare time.I bought the book "PIC:your personal introductory course" and have found it very interesting.I have not completed reading it yet,but have tried my hands at compiling some code written in notepad. My first question is what is the best way to write code? I see some people using an old BASIC format among others and was wondering what is easier and possibly the pros and cons of each.Next, is there a website that has schematics to build your own programmers,or do I have to buy one.I will be starting out programing the 16c54 -55 and then move on to more advanced PIC's.Lastly,what is the best program to compile my code?The book metions WINASM as a program to use,but was wondering what is the easiest to start off with.Thank you for all the help, and sorry for the dumb questions but this site is my only way to ask questions as I am self-teaching all this to myself and not taking a college class as I have done with other electronics subjects in the past.PLEASE HELP.......

 

[Nigel Goodwin]

Hello everybody.I am just starting to learn about the PIC microcontroller in my spare time.I bought the book "PIC:your personal introductory course" and have found it very interesting.I have not completed reading it yet,but have tried my hands at compiling some code written in notepad. My first question is what is the best way to write code? I see some people using an old BASIC format among others and was wondering what is easier and possibly the pros and cons of each.Next, is there a website that has schematics to build your own programmers,or do I have to buy one.I will be starting out programing the 16c54 -55 and then move on to more advanced PIC's.Lastly,what is the best program to compile my code?The book metions WINASM as a program to use,but was wondering what is the easiest to start off with.Thank you for all the help, and sorry for the dumb questions but this site is my only way to ask questions as I am self-teaching all this to myself and not taking a college class as I have done with other electronics subjects in the past.PLEASE HELP.......

First off, dump the 16C54/55 - they are extremely old PIC's, one time programmable (or you can buy very expensive UV eraseable ones) - but worst of all they are parallel programmed, this can only be done by a very few far more expensive programmers.

I presume your book is a very old one, the C5X series chips are rarely mentioned these days - if you did want some, I've got about 200 16C57XT's in tubes! - and no way to program them!.

Your best bit for learning PIC is the 16F628, it's a later pin for pin replacement for the 16C84 and 16F84 - and it's an EEPROM chip, this means you can simply reprogram it over and over with a simple cheap programmer.

The standard PIC assembler is MPASM, which comes as part of MPLAB, you can download it free from MicroChip. Regardless of what language you use to program your PIC's, a good knowledge of assembler is essential!.

Have a look at my PIC tutorials, you may find them helpful.

 

[pike]

Have a look at my PIC tutorials, you may find them helpful.

Veried by me and many others in this community as very helpful (and it's free education).

 

[Zacman]

Nigel, I think you need a link to your tutorials right at the top of this forum, almost everyone asks for help, including me, and you have to keep telling people where to go.

Great resource

 

[Nigel Goodwin]

Nigel, I think you need a link to your tutorials right at the top of this forum, almost everyone asks for help, including me, and you have to keep telling people where to go.

That was why I added it as a signature 8)

 

[Oznog]

I'm hooked on the PIC18 series myself, which can be clocked 2x as fast, and has a more C compiler-friendly instruction set.

I downloaded HiTech PICC18, I've always written in C. It's just so easy to build complicated projects with. I write for graphics LCDs and I don't know if I'd ever be able to keep track of such a volume of code in assembly. It's probably less efficient assembly than hand-written, but that's an accepted cost.

The Warp13 programmer is a great one. They keep improving it too.

 

[patricktran]

Hi Nigel Goodwin, your site is really really halpful. Did you write winpicprog? It is the most popular program that students use in my uni.
Thanks Nigel

 

[Nigel Goodwin]

Hi Nigel Goodwin, your site is really really halpful. Did you write winpicprog? It is the most popular program that students use in my uni.
Thanks Nigel

Yes I did, thank you very much :lol:

What uni are you at?.

 

[patricktran]

University of Technology, Sydney. Nigel, my instructor recommended every student doing Digital System must have a copy of winpicprog in their labtop or desktop

 

[Nigel Goodwin]

University of Technology, Sydney. Nigel, my instructor recommended every student doing Digital System must have a copy of winpicprog in their labtop or desktop

Nice :lol:

Interesting you are in Australia, the first version of PicProg (the original DOS version) had a lot of input from Don McKenzie in Australia. The current versions of WinPicProg still includes a 'DonMac' option - which simply alters the display format of hexadecimal numbers (to the way Don preferred).