[time-nuts] favorite microcontroller module?

Robert Vassar rvassar at rob-vassar.com
Wed Feb 20 14:38:00 EST 2008


On Feb 20, 2008, at 10:41 AM, Chuck Harris wrote:

> Robert Vassar wrote:
>
>> I regard PIC chips as something to be avoided.  Horrible little
>> architecture that should have died back in the 70's.  It gained a
>> foothold with hobbyists due to the ease with which they can be
>> programmed.
>
> Wow!  I guess I should stop using them.


Not at all.  Embedded products generally have higher quality needs  
than general purpose computing as we've come to know it today.  Let's  
face it, when a traffic light controller or a military device wanders  
off the end of a null pointer people die.  You're a pro, you  
understand these problems.  Engineering is compromise.  Use the tools  
you feel comfortable with that allow you to do your job.


As a software professional that plays with uC's for fun, not work,  
I'm going to choose something that doesn't use oddball word lengths,  
and has a nice orthogonal instruction set with a rich set of  
addressing modes.  I learned the '51 back in high school 20+ years  
ago.  If someone else was going to pick up a uC arch from scratch for  
hobby purposes, I would probably recommend the AVR.


>
> And I assume they have them in 6 or 8 pin surface mount with 4 or 5  
> ADC
> channels, and a built in clock oscillator that has a better than
> 1% accuracy over the full military/industrial temperature range?

SiLabs makes some very remarkable derivatives, which I've not had the  
pleasure to play with.  I'm not sure they get down to the 6 or 8 pin  
point.

>
> Oh, and I forgot, a uart on every pin?

Why on earth?  No... I don't want to know.  :-)

>
> PIC's are the greatest little problem solvers in existence.
>

s/PIC\'s/uC\'s/ and we agree....


>
>>
>>  and have an arch better suited to C.
>
> Who cares?

Anyone trying to make a C compiler for the chip?  Anyone concerned  
about the quality of the compiler, mixed language use ala C with  
assembly, or code portability?

>
> -Chuck Harris, Not a hobbyist!
>
>


I have to confess, I'm rather surprised at your passion for the PIC.   
But hey... I spend all day working on Solaris and Linux, and use a  
Mac everywhere else just to be 100% Microsoft free.  So while I'm  
surprised, I can understand it.
:-)


Cheers,


Rob , "software engineer", but uC hobbyist...


  



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