HI speed programmer

[Tobias]

I need to program 400 18F4431 chips ISCP.

I have found Xeltec, looks like they have a high speed programmer. Any opinions on this product or can you offer alternatives?

Yes I know I could have ordered the PIC chips preprogrammed but I wasn't thinking.

Merry Christmas

[longpole001]

it the time of the year for few beers , watch a fav show on the computer - " while you hit a few keys to program 400 chips " should get through at least 20 beers for 400 chips


happy xmas

[Demon]

Tobias, use the WWII Allied approach; quantity over quality. The Tigers and other German tanks were superior in every way except one, maintenance/parts fabrication, ok, that's two.

Look for a simple DIY programmer schematic, and now make 10-20 circuit boards for them. Gang-programming can be your friend.

Robert

[Demon]

Or the relational database approach; a one-to-many design. One programmer, many output connectors. Have the programmer cycle through the connectors, you can start replacing with fresh boards as it's moving along (have a status light at each connector).

"Don't think of high-speed programming, think volume, it opens up cheaper avenues." - Henry Ford

Yup, he said that.

Robert

[Tobias]

longpole001 has the most appealing idea.

Demon,
I have found another programmer that will do eight at a time, lead time is 6 weeks. I think alot of suppliers must be taking the Walmart approach to keeping inventory anymore. Even Deutsche has a hard time keeping inventory of connectors and terminals at times.

Anyrate, do you have any links for programmer schematics? I know I can search, I just don't know what I am really looking when determining if its a good schematic and parts.

[Jumper]

Any PicKit II or PicKit III clone and then all you need to do is use the stand-alone programming button. Since they are cheap you can buy i.e 5 and then click the buttons on all 5 ... sip some beer and connect the next board of the batch.

I bet with some serious soldering you can even connect the 5 units to the same button :-)

[Demon]

Or one PK2 with a 8-pins-or-whatever-you-need multi-position rotary switch (like old display selectors).

As you manually plug a fresh board, turn the dial to that position and click PGM. Unplug the PGMed board and replace with a fresh one.

You can only do so much manually anyways, so you'd only need 1 or 2 extra outlets. This could be wired on those dev PCB breadboards.

Not at my PC, can't google right now. Wife hollering something about "pick up all your darned PC crap from the kitchen".

[longpole001]

is there no way microchip offer a bulk programming service after the pics have been purchased ?

[Tobias]

Yes and its cheap. The problem was the timing. Microchip doesn't have reels of 4431 chips on-hand very often. I had to buy the reel before i was complete with the code. Its pretty cheap to have Microchip do it. I had them do 300 chips before and it was a couple dollars a unit if I remember correctly.