Can anyone recommend a pic programmer?

Hi Chris,

The cheapeast commercial PIC programmer and the one I use is the PIC kit 2. It's a programmer and a debugger all in one, I love the little sucker. Microchip recently release the PIC kit 3 which cost $50 so I'm sure you can find the PICkit 2 for maybe $30 or $40 maybe even less.

There are a lot of do it yourself programmers online, I've never used them so I can't vouch for their usability. In my opinion if you can afford it (I'm so broke even $50 is a lot) this is the way to go.

In my experience, I wouldn't trade it for anything. You can find some cheap development boards on sparkfun.com ($15.00) that will help you get up and running with PICs.

hth,

Jorge Garcia

Jorge,

Cheers for that, I'll take a look now.

I don't know if they are any good but I ordered an Arduino starter kit off ebay so I will find some use for it anyway.

http://cgi.ebay.ie/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=160464436921&ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT#ht_3480wt_1137

Cheers,

Chris.

Hi Chris,

Definitely the Arduino is good, in fact it is a phenomenon in the hobbyist world. It's greatest appeal is the open-source hardware and software it's development environment is easy to use and the large number of libraries will allow you to take advantage of some very sofisticated features without getting bogged down with the details.

As you work with it I'm sure you'll find it very useful. I stick to PICs because they're what I know and I like knowing how things work, because that knowledge can allow you to wring every last drop of performance out of a microcontroller no matter what brand you use (Microchip, Atmel, Freescale, Parallax, etc.). The Arduino designers chose the tradeoff of hiding the complex details from the users in order to simplify programming and implementation. In most cases this is a good tradeoff and you'll be able produce a lot of projects quickly but I just feel like I'm cheating if I don't understand what going on under the hood.

So I enjoy writing functions in C and I'm trying to learn some assembler because I like being able to make the most of a chip.

The Arduino does not dissapoint and if you're not into the heavy duty programming it's definitely an excellent choice. Have fun.

" What I cannot create, I do not understand" Richard Feynman

hth,

Jorge Garcia

Cheers Jorge,

I am sorry to bother you again but I was just curious as to what you can do with a Microcontroller or a PIC (if there is a difference).

I know you can program them for LEDs and thats just about all I know lol.

Cheers,

Chris.

P.S. I am off to the pub so I wont be able to reply until tomorrow.

Hi Chris,

A PIC is a brand of microcontroller. You can think of microcontrollers as stripped down PCs. They have memory, the have I/O, peripherals, and an instruction set just like a normal computer would. The big difference strides in that when you program a computer you don't worry about memory usage(most of the time), or how fast the program runs because todays computers have so much power code that runs 1ms slower or faster isn't going to make much of a difference to the typical user.

A microcontroller's resources are extremely limited compared to the average PC. Where as a PC might run at 2.2GHz, a high-speed microcontroller might be running at 120 MHz. Todays PCs have 500+ GB of memory the average microcontroller has 16-128kB of memory. The orders of magnitude difference in resources shows why it's critical to write compact, efficient code for a microcontroller; in order to obtain max performance you simply cannot afford to be wasteful.

Microcontrollers are designed to interface with real-world devices and you'll find them in your appliances, your car most electronic devices these days contain at least one microcontroller if not more. Now that I've given you more of an idea as to what a microcontroller is, I tell you some things you can use it for.

WHAT YOU CAN DO WITH A MICROCONTROLLER (PIC, ATMEGA, PROPELLER, list goes on and on)

- Establish Wireless and Wired communication networks (802.11, Zigbee, X-10, RS-232RS-232, RS-485, I2C, LonWorks, etc.)

- Control Industrial Systems ( Digital PID loops, hysteretic controllers, Interface all sorts of sensors, etc.)

- Develop Robots[My personal Fav] ( Program navigations systems, motor drives, 3D-mapping, etc.)

- Home Automation

- Instrumentation

- And of course light LEDs

As you can see microcontrollers are useful in many applications and they form the backbone of embedded design.

Have fun learning, and sorry about the long winded response got a little carried away.

Best Regards,

Jorge Garcia

Jorge,

Can code be removed or re-written on a microcontroller? The C code looks really difficult but that's something to learn another day. I'm confused about all the pins, for example I have a component list for a 4x4x4 led cube and the list says:

6. PIC18F4620 microcontroller (40 pins)

7. SN74AHC574 octal D-type flip-flop x4 (20 pins) 

8. ULN2803A NPN Darlington transistor array (18 pins)

9. LM2574 5V switching regulator (8 pins)

10. 22ohm resistor array (16 pins)

11. 47ohm resistor array (16 pins)

12. 68ohm resistor array (16 pins)    etc.

But with 40 pins on the microcontroller, 80 betweens all the flip flops, 8 on the switching regulator, 18 on the transistor and 48 between all th resistor arrays. How do i figure out what connects to what (pin wise). I know where all the parts go on the board but just not what pins connect to what.

Chris.

Hi Chris,

Code can be removed and/or written on a microcontroller. It's all done through your computer and whatever development environment your using.

It's good that you have the Bill of materials, what your going to need now is a schematic which tells you how those components are interconnected, or even better would be a pre-fabricated board since all you would have to do is place the components all the connections would already be produced on the board.

Without a schematic at the very least it's going to be difficult(if not impossible) to figure out what connected to what, especially if you are new to electronics.

Best Regards,

Jorge Garcia

Hi Chris,

If you want to learn the skills to program a Microchip microcontroller in C , I have just the right book for you:

Titel of Book:        "Embedded C Programming and the Microchip PIC"

I found this book very useful to read and together with a self build testboard (LED's, switches, etc) a tried several pieces of code explained in the book. The book is rather expensive, but every USD is well spent. Even better, let someone else spent it. :-)

Best regards, Enrico Migchels

Hi Chris,

I can recommend you programmers & debuggers ICD 2 or ICD 3 (newest one). Personally I use ICD 2 (product # DV164005) and it's good tool for hobbyists and PICs with small program memory (due to programming time).

Cheers,

Jiri

the pickit 2 is well worth the money, if you want to program high end pics like the pic32 you will need the pickit 3, we use pic32 here for development and use the ICD3 its faultless, but costs a fortune....

all the pic deivces use ICSP even the pic32, altough the pic32 does multiplex the ICSP onto the JTAG port and microchip at this stage do not support JTAG???, you can build a simple programmer with minimal fuss, microchip give full spec datasheets for ICSP on the website

if you are looking to program other micrs, there is an intersting project at http://www.embedded-projects.net/index.php?page_id=165 i have one of these pre assembled, it can be a bit tricky to get going but it works well after the inital setup is complete

cheers