Comments are moderated before they will appear on the website, this is a manual process and may take some time. Please be patient.
Author Name is a required field.
Email Address is optional, but without one I won't be able to contact you back. It is never shown or linked on the website. You can always just email me if you'd rather not post a public comment. I generally reply in-line with a comment rather than email you back, unless I want to discuss something in private or off topic. Please check back to see when I reply.
Website URL is optional, if supplied the Author Name will be hyperlinked to this URL.
You may use wikitext in the body, preview may be handy here. Don't worry if you can't figure them out, just give me a hint what you want linked to what and I'll do it during moderation. Wikitext is not BBcode!
Spammers: Please don't bother wasting your time scripting up posts to this form. Everything is moderated, your post will never be seen on the web even transiently, there is no way to even view it by its internal ID, it will never be indexed. I will simply delete your post in the moderation interface. If I'm your target audience you're really on the wrong track; I'll never click on a URL in your garbage. The post content is not emailed to me (and I don't use a Win32 mail client anyway), I view the posts in plain text in the moderation interface so no clever tricks of any kind will make anything you type be interpreted by anything other than me, a human. Just give up and go elsewhere please!
22nd September 2009 01:01
Hello, the same question with more details:
I need to find a general purpose divide by 64(or higher) prescaler or frequency divider that is capable of 1Ghz min input frequency. Till now I have not successfully found a non-discontinued product, so I need your suggestion of where and what to buy.
Hope my request will not be a disturbance to you.
Thanks!
21st September 2009 11:38
Hello, don't forget my previous post!
All the best!
16th September 2009 17:19
Good afternoon.
Just to ask, how many ATtiny MCU do you have?
One out-of-topic question: where can I get a prescaler or frequency divider IC that can accept about 1Ghz of input fq? I find it that the prescalers are hard to find today, while I want to make a frequency meter.
Hope you can suggest me where and what to buy.
Thanks.
15th September 2009 22:47
Bert,
It isn't so different, programming is programming IMO. The hardware is much more restrictive, memory is tight and the kinds of problems you are solving are far more bit-oriented or otherwise low-level.
The "hello world" of microcontroller programming is blinking a LED, try that first. Blinking it with precision requires getting to know the timer features of the device you are using. Driving a simple display or having something respond to a debounced button press are the next things to try. Then serial IO, using the A/D and/or D/A features of the device, maybe some I2C interfacing like external memory chips or sensors, RTCs, etc.
Its fun. Frequently frustrating but somewhat addictive. Helps to have a particular project in mind. I find it hard to just start hacking with a MCU, I need to know what I am looking to achieve.
A simple line chasing or two-wheel collision detecting robot is a common project which can be done with the smallest 8 pin devices. Extra IO pins make driving the H-bridges for the motors easier and let you expand the sensors. You can build it all around a small "breadboard on wheels" for endless experimental possibilities. You can use hacked servos for the wheel driving motors or small gearbox and motor assemblies like Jaycar sell. Some use friction drive direct from the motor shafts to large rubber wheels.
Regards,
Alan
14th September 2009 23:41
In other words, I only have experiences in computer programming but not hardware programming!
14th September 2009 23:36
Yeah....thanks for the reply. But I think I need some help to start my first PIC programming....I had never used a MCU before...
So, for PIC 8bit devices, there are 35 instruction set right? The software architecture is very familiar to me but I can't understand the "machine codes",as my most advanced and serious programming work only reached file access, by using C++.
By the way, I need some kick-start for my "hardware programming",and do you have any recommendation for me to read for? Websites? Or even you as my teacher?
14th September 2009 23:16
Bert,
G'day again mate. Yeah still alive here, but busy doing other things and a little uninspired to work on the website. Have lots to write up though - should get around to it soon...
I prefer the Atmel devices. There is a lot of info and examples out there for both Atmel and Microchip devices. Either work nicely and there is a huge range of both. Picking one camp of the other isn't a huge deal, the principles of one work with the other, its just a MCU after all, the datasheets tell you all about their electronic properties and software features.
I have no particular reason for picking the Atmel range really. I found the toolchain easier to set up on Linux. I like writing for them in C and found the development studio for the PIC a bit of a pain as it requires Windows.
Some people prefer using raw assembler and others one of the various commercial BASIC dialects. I find BASIC too ugly for serious work - although the commercial ones are quite nice in hiding the complexity of many things, like serial IO. The avrlibc does much the same for C, but has a steeper learning curve. The raw assembly for either device is quite nice, but compilers are so good now days subjecting yourself to assembler programming should be reserved only for when you really need it IMO. I find the productivity of the "pretty assembler"-like C language much preferable to the "Meccano set chainsaw"-like assembler.
In general the hardware part of the project is pretty easy compared to the software... I think that's a general statement about the nature of Physics vrs Mathematics - but perhaps I am biased, I'm a programmer by trade. Still I seem to throw together the hardware in an hour and spend the next two days tinkering with the code.
Regards,
Alan
13th September 2009 18:34
Hello. There's been so long since the last email I sent to you. Hope you are still fine!
I am new to programmable microcontrollers, so I need a suggestion from you: Which is the best and the easiest to use ? PIC or ATMEL ?
Seems like you liked AtTiny very much, and I would like to know some info before I start building circuits with programmable microcontrollers.
Thanks
6th October 2011 21:36
sohail wrote...