Really enjoy this website and forum. It's incredibly helpful and all honest inquiries seem to be treated with respect and helpful assistance. My question relates to PIC Developemental Boards for someone such as myself who is presently entering the field of PIC programming at the ground level. I have my eye on the Easy Pic 4 by Mikro Elektronika. Has anyone dealt with this company/Product? Pro's and Con's? Thankyou very much in advance.

 

What programming language are you planning on using? What is your budget?

 

Mikro Elektronika offers Basic, Pascal, and C. I'm veering toward C and if I want to get the hardware and software together, I'm looking at around $350-400. Ive been using these figures as my point of reference.

 

I mentioned budget because for about $100 you can be up and running with Atmel AVR. It has a common architecture from device to device so it is very easy to write code for one part and then use the same code on another larger device (with very little to no mods). PIC does not have this feature-- the PIC 12/16 are different than the PIC18s.

That kit looks pretty cool -- has everything but the kitchen sink! I have heard the MikroC has decent libraries so coding with it should be fairly easy. I use the Hi-Tech compiler for PIC 12/16 and Microchip's C18 compiler for PIC18. Make sure your compiler handles both PIC12/16 and PIC18.

I'd go the C route because it'll be useful if you decide to try other types of micros.

 

Really enjoy this website and forum. It's incredibly helpful and all honest inquiries seem to be treated with respect and helpful assistance. My question relates to PIC Developemental Boards for someone such as myself who is presently entering the field of PIC programming at the ground level. I have my eye on the Easy Pic 4 by Mikro Elektronika. Has anyone dealt with this company/Product? Pro's and Con's? Thankyou very much in advance.

Although I have never personally used the Easy Pic 4 dev board, I can say that it is certainly a good starting point for someone wanting to get into m/c development. One thing I will say about Mikro Electronika's products is that they are only interfacable using USB2, so make sure your workstation is USB2 compatible (USB1.1 will not work).

Other than that, enjoy getting involved with m/cs and feel free to use the AAC e-book and ask questions here.

Dave

 

Thank you all very much for your help. I've used the AAC e-book quite a bit and it was very helpful.

 

Thank you all very much for your help. I've used the AAC e-book quite a bit and it was very helpful.

No problems, glad that the e-book is helping

It might be an idea that, once you have had a play around with the Easy Pic 4 dev board, that you post back here with your comments so that others that may be considering using this kit can benefit from your first hand experience.

Dave

 

No problems, glad that the e-book is helping

It might be an idea that, once you have had a play around with the Easy Pic 4 dev board, that you post back here with your comments so that others that may be considering using this kit can benefit from your first hand experience.

Dave

Absolutely. Will do.