Suitable for a College project?

[monkeyhead]

Hi there,
I'm looking inro microcontrollers for my college project. How ever I'm pretty stuck on what sort of microcontroller to begin with! I've only a small budget of £25 and thats to include other components aswell as the microcontroller.

I've experience in some Assembly,C++ and some BASIC. So basically I'm looking into a microcontroller that can be programmed easily by BASIC or assembly?
A few beginners tutorials would be handy too.

Would PicBasic be suitable for my needs? I intend to gradually make a small,simple functioned robot that perhaps follows a line, senses obstacles etc etc

Any general push in the right direction will be greatly appreicated
Many thanks
Matt

[Archangel]

Hi Matt,
You have the problem that plagues college students world wide, limited funds. So a couple of questions are at hand, #1. do you have a programmer, or access to one, and #2. how good are your assembly language skills? If answer to #1 is no then, can you build one for near nothing? It is do able but lots of hassel, $8 to $10 US on ebay for a JDM, which is all I use right now, using ICPROG software. Otherwise you will want to use an MCU with a built in bootloader so as to avoid that initial cost, Catch 22, They (MCU) cost more than standard PICs or AVRs, so you might fit only 1 or 2 into your budget.<p>
Other concerns are the cost of the basic compiler, I understand there is a demo version of ME Labs which is limited to " X " lines of code. That is an option. There are some free versions of C compilers out there as well, or you can write it all in assembly for free and use MPASM to assemble programand their other software tools for PICs or their competetors likely also have software tools free for the download. Some of the "aftermarket" chips are available with preinstalled bootloaders and free software tools, (which is why they cost so much more than a PIC chip). Most of the aftermarket chips are a PIC with something already installed. <p>
HTH
JS.

[monkeyhead]

Thanks for the reply!
The parents are willing to buy a pic programmer for me and the software required, so there for the £25 leaves me for the components for my circuits.

The question is what programmer and software? I would really prefer BASIC software
So any further recommendations?

Many thanks
Matt

[Archangel]

Hi Matt,
here is Bruce's website, he is an authorized distributor of PIC Basic PBC, and PIC Basic PRO PBP, which are the 2 compilers supported on this forum.

http://www.rentron.com/

[monkeyhead]

Are the programmers any cheaper?
Or is the other only other operation to build or buy a jdm?

[mackrackit]

PICKIT2 from MICROCHIP is around $40 or $50. That and PBP--all set.

[mackrackit]

Forgot to mention that MICROCHIP will give out samples (three at a time I think ) and National Semiconductor also has samples, (voltage regulators, LM34, etc) You can get resistors, capacitors, and resonators cheap from surplus stores like allelectronics.com.

You may want to try to start with a mix of 16F676, 16F684 both have internal oscillators and for something a bit bigger a 16F877A (needs external OSC). The 18s are a bit "cranky" to start with but you will soon work you way up.

[Bruce]

MeLabs released a new demo version with support for several more PIC series.

Demo version PIC MCU support:

12F683, 16F627(A), 16F628(A), 16F688, 16F690, 16F84(A), 16F870, 16F871,
16F872, 16F873(A), 16F874(A), 16F876(A), 16F877(A): Supported.

http://www.microengineeringlabs.com/downloads/PBPDEMO3.EXE

You might be surprised at what you can do with even the demo.

We have a few simple robotics projects in our Micro-Bot projects section that
were done with the demo version http://www.rentron.com/Micro-Bot/index.htm

Build or buy yourself a decent programmer that can handle controllers supported
by the demo version, and you're off to the races. A good solid device programmer
is worth its weight in gold. You'll see what I mean once you get started.

Nothing beats getting the full paid version at some point, but you can get a small
robot up & kicking around the house with the free PBP demo.

Last week we sold 2 complete development packages to a college student that made
the cash in his spare time, selling gadgets he made with the demo, to pay for
everything.

[RussMartin]

Forgot to mention that MICROCHIP will give out samples (three at a time I think ) and National Semiconductor also has samples, (voltage regulators, LM34, etc) You can get resistors, capacitors, and resonators cheap from surplus stores like allelectronics.com.

Fairchild also has a generous sample program.

[Archangel]

Last week we sold 2 complete development packages to a college student that made
the cash in his spare time, selling gadgets he made with the demo, to pay for
everything.

Very cool, Bruce !