Shulie TornelGarrett Scott I'm Garrett Scott, technical marketing engineer at Microchip Technolog, specifically in the 8-bit division
technical marketing engineer : is that technical, marketing, or engineering ?....
@Yann Guidon / YGDES They are indeed complicated beasties. I wound up with a couple of Spartan 3 boards. Just worked out that way. I also picked VHDL over Verilog as a starting point based on what I read about it.
lol
I am an engineer, working in the marketing department
oh that's not XOR Garrett ?
One question from me: The recent datasheets (since the last 3-4 years :P) for the 8 bit PICS do not describe well the pin circuitry, such as if there are protection diodes (to vdd/gnd) on the pin. Where can I get information on this matter?
I'm Mark Hofmann, a Field Applications Engineer for Microchip.
@Al Williams thanks
Kevin : we might continue in private to keep this channel on topic :-)
@edwin romero is here too
sn't engineering battling all the time with marketing? :-)
welcome @edwin romero and @MarkAtMicrochip !
@Yann Guidon / YGDES I wasn't going to say any more on the topic during the chat.
@Frank Buss Synergy!
That made my day
like marketing promises something that engineering says it's impossible, but I guess good to have an engineer in marketing then
Boian Mitov Hello @Garrett Scott
here's the sheet for discussion: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1JwQ-RzYceeUrCMs9BcZ2--k5O8IBmSL6vZ-er-u5O58/edit#gid=0
@Frank Buss One of the nice things about being an engineer at Microchip is that most of the Marketing people either were engineers or have their engineering degree.
sounds like a good idea
So do we pull the questions on the discussion sheet and add them here?
yes please
Shulie: So here's a question that a couple of people are interested in. Asked by ido: The modern 8-bit PICs are awesome, but are there plans to update the xc8 compiler to newer C standards, maybe even C++?
makes sense... and this retains the real engineers as customers
+1
and while implementing C++ for XC8, would be nice to release the pro version for free :-)
We can't tell you what's in the works, but we are always looking at the best upgrades we can provide
That would be nice, but I'm willing to pay for C++ support on PIC.
here's a question from @Frank Buss : What's the point of slow and difficult to program 8 bit microcontrollers (e.g. for PICs, the optimizing C compiler costs a lot of money and has some quirks), if you can get a 32 bit ARM microcontroller like the ATSAMD09C13A for 0.62 EUR, with full optimizing GCC support?
We are not working on a C++ for 8bit PICs, but there is one from a company called Boost which has one. Our recommendation is to select the best-fit architecture for a project, based on needs and requirements that can be identified at the design’s outset. 8bits are very robust with 5V support. Our newer parts are loaded with core independent peripherals, which provide reduced CPU load, thereby dropping power consumption. To get similar performance to our PRO XC8 compiler, you would need to purchase an IAR compiler. To further reduce the barrier of entry to the XC8 PRO compiler. We have released a subscription service at $30/month
is 5V used that much anymore? and for low power, the STM32L0 family is really nice
@Kevin CIPs definitely help reduce the memory burden as well
Hi, so is it going to stay MPLAB for PICs and Atmel Studio for AVRs?
in a low power benchmark they were one of the winners
@Frank Buss Yes, 5V is used a lot in industrial applications. Lots of people like the additional resolution of 5V on ADCs
@Garre
@igendel For the foreseeable future, we plan on supporting both MPLAB and Atmel Studio
Garrett Scott so whatever development you are used to, there's no change needed
Thanks @Garrett Scott
oops... @Garrett Scott CIPs?
@Kevin Core Independent Peripherals, www.microchip.com/cip
@Garrett Scott you mentioned some new developments in the peripherals...?
I'll pass this one over to @edwin romero
@Garrett Scott ty. I'll check it out. I haven't looked at the Microchip website very much as my interest has always been more on the AVR side until Microchip bought up ATMEL.
@Kevin the difficulty is because 8 bit microcontrollers are much slower for some tasks, than an 32 bit ARM core, even worse for PIC with the 4 clocks per instruction cycle and multiple instructions which is one in ARM for some tasks, but I agree, there are some simple tasks for which PICs and AVRs might be useful
@Kevin another fun thing to look at will be www.microchip.com/mcc
@Frank Buss 8bit AVR does one instr per clock?
@Garrett Scott Thanks again. I've opened both pages in my browser.
For everyone else who doesn't want to open that browser right now, MCC is a GUI based configuration tool which helps speed up development time
@Morning.Star right, AVRs are a bit better :-)
Hi, @Garrett Scott. I recently got into a project where I needed an MCU w/ 4 I2C ports. For the prototype I ended up using Teensy 3.6. Is there AVR/PIC alternative w/o BGA package ?
The defunct Ubicom SX had a PIC-like ISA and pipelined for 1 instruction per cycle. I've always wondered why you guys don't do that too. Granted the SX was a power hog, but that wasn't really the fault of the pipeline
@Sophi Kravitz We have introduced several different core independent peripherals in the last couple of years to give customers flexibility and address their needs.
@Frank Buss They have also generally a little bit more expensive than PICs which may be one of the reasons PICs are more popular than AVR amongst some product manufacturers
We have added vectored interrupts, DMA, peripheral disable module...
@Orkhan AmirAslan There are no MCU8 parts that have 4 I2C ports. However, there are 232 32-bit parts that do. There's a tool that we have on the web called MAPS at http://www.microchip.com/maps
I am excited about the vectored interrupts, that's a huge step forward, although the Errata for the K42's scared me a bit :-)
Going back to the MCC tool I had mentioned, you can easily configure these new peripherals and their interconnections
Shulie: Question from Synthimuse: When is there going to be support for processor load profiling? I'd like to know how many spare cycles I have in an intensely loaded interrupt-driven application.
Which PICs have vectored interrupts?
The latest family with VI is the K42. www.microchip.com/k42
why would anyone need processor load profile, if someone has at least a free GPIO and a scope?
@edwin romero Thanks
@Frank Buss That is a technique I'm using with a current AVR based project. The downside is that it takes extra cycles to do the bit flipping of a GPIO pin.
What has really annoyed me and pushed me further in the FPGA camp : MCUs have TOO MANY options and types, and references, and yet you always end up with a limitation or another. OTOH : for FPGA you just stock and pay according to two parameters : packaging and density... the rest is p to you
or AVR
@Yann Guidon / YGDES No analog though.
Fusion has analog... expensive but it's a fantastic beast...
ok cool! I'll take a peek
found the low power benchmark: http://www.eembc.org/ulpbench/ the PICs are not good too good, but granted, the STM32L series is a bit expensive and not needed for many tasks
Jonathan : link in private :-)
ty
Shulie: Yann asks "The new PIC32 with integrated SDRAM looks very cool, are more parts of this kind planned ?"
We can't tell you what's coming up in the future, but stay tuned
Is the PIC32 with SDRAM out? I don't remember seeing an update on this?
thanks for not replying :-D
@Jonathan Bruneau asks 'Any intention to replace the PIC16 core with a AVR8, while keeping the same peripherals? ATTiny817 is a good start, but isn't as feature packed as, say, a PIC16F1769.'
@Jonathan Bruneau we announced this last week, PIC32MZ DA family www.microchip.com/PIC32MZDA
We do not plan to replace either core, but we will cross-pollinate the best features from both architectures
features = peripherals+
horray! I'm looking forward to it.
peripherals+software ?
Yes, so are we.
would be nice to have some FPGA logic in there, because as Yann says, e.g. the time you need to figure out how to configure it for generating e.g. a PWM signal needs longer than just writing a few lines of VHDL, and then with the fixed timer registers you can't even do everything you might need
Shulie: Ooh, this one is an interesting question: The strategy to choose MIPS over ARM was bold, did that pay off over the years ? Asked by Yannnn
@Yann Guidon / YGDES peripherals, software, tools, etc
I'm just the 8bit guy....but I'm glad that we have both in our family
didn't Atmel have a microcontroller with FPGA blocks in it?
Frank : Atmel has (had) a line of CPLDs (I know, I tried to get started with them last year) and... well... it's a disappointment, a dead end for this family of chips... But they could reuse the IP and integrate it in other products, please....
@Frank Buss One peripheral we have is the CLC, configurable logic cell, www.microchip.com/clc
CLutCh ? (sorry, I'm ohmless, I couldn't resist)
@Frank Buss also, the AVRs have the CCL
I've played with the CCL, more like a classic FPGA MUX logic configuration. Both the CLC and CCL are nice.
Here at MCHP we love our TLAs
Frank Buss how many logic cells do I have with CLC? if it were me, you could just remove all the timers, UARTs etc., just give me a microcontroller core and a few thousand LUTs to implement whatever peripheral I need
@Frank Buss That would be awesome.
Frank : hmmmm good :-) or just use a FPGA and implement your own PIC or AVR core in VHDL or Verilog, I've seen a few...
One part which has the CLC is the PIC16F15386 product family, if anyone is interested and I can send out a board to first 50 PMs
@Kevin that's not efficient, a hard core is useful, as known from the Xilinx Zynq
!!!
Garrett : there's "386" in the number, can't be bad ;-) I'm in !
@Garrett Scott people should PM you right now to get a free board?
Yeah!
done :-)
#freePICs
@Frank Buss I also saw a reference to a discussion on the Microchip site about using an AVR with an external FPGA.
done :)
even better, bare PICs ? :-P
I thought it was a dev board
FPGA folks, have your fun by all means but please leave us others some peripherals :-)
LOL
ok, back to the question sheet: Next 2 Qs from @orkan : Q1. Any future plan to make Atmel Studio available for MAC and/or Linux? Q2. Any intention to merge MPLAB and Atmel Studio?
Many years ago I used to sell a board that was a PIC with a CPLD (baby FPGA, more or less). Never very popular, but did sell a fair number of them
oh, yes please. I run Linux only these days.
hi @Al Williams !
I will second that. Hi @Sophi Kravitz
there are tiny FPGA, I have some stock of Antti's #ProAsic3-Stamp which was provided with an AVR core clone :-)
isn't there a license problem when using an AVR core in a FPGA?
AVR8 is so old, ask Antti ?
or maybe someone from Mirochip :-)
@Sophi Kravitz my hands are tied, I can't tell you anything that's coming out in the future
but I'm happy to answer questions about the current products, tools, or whatever else
but writing AVR core in HDL is a school exercise, it's pretty neat. Another friend made his own PIC16F clone too, it's less straight-forward....
By the way bare PIC @ www.microchip.com/samples
I remember there were some ISAs which had patented algorithms
If Atmel Studio was to become available for MacOS, please also make it for Linux. I've seen some companies release something for Mac but not make it for Linux. There shouldn't be that much difference to the code required to make something also available to run on Linux.
;)
Shulie: "The recent datasheets (since the last 3-4 years :P) for the 8 bit PICS do not describe well the pin circuitry, such as if there are protection diodes (to vdd/gnd) on the pin. Where can I get information on this matter?" question by @sparky-summer
Thanks Edwin, free samples helped me considerably when I started as a broke independent engineer :-) I owe samples so much !
@Yann Guidon / YGDES Always happy to help!
I could make some prototypes then get the customer to pay for the real order
@sparky-summer the datasheet will be your best bet. Another option is to reach out to your local Microchip representative, www.microchip.com/sales
unfortunately, the samples programs have been used and heavily abused by others :-( do you have remarks about this ?
@Yann Guidon / YGDES Make sure to contact Scott to get your hands on the free eval board
I did Edwin, thanks !
@Yann Guidon / YGDES there's always a few bad apples in a bunch...
@Garrett Scott The datasheet says less than I need to know :P
We've got just a couple more questions, and we're running out of time
next q?
Q :: Is there any decent free development toolchain for PIC on Mac/Linux? Last time I tried to get into PIC as a hobbyist I haven't found any.
https://hackaday.com/2010/11/03/how-to-program-pics-using-linux/
How-to: Program PICs using Linux
Arguably, Microchip's PIC microcontrollers do not get enough posts here. One of the drawbacks for some of us is that Linux support for PICs is not very well known. The information is out there, but no one has laid out the process of going from writing C code to programming a chip.
hm... that topic came up on the ##microcontroller channel a while back.
MPLAB X is free, and XC8 has a free mode, as well as the assembler
MPLAB X works fine on Linux, I'm using this
Also, MPLAB Xpress is a free, cloud-based IDE which works on all browsers and OSs
MPLAB Xpress | Microchip Technology Inc.
http://hackaday.com/2010/11/03/how-to-program-pics-using-linux/ suggests sdcc
that's an article from 2010...
I have used MPLabX also... and for device programming, PCIP as mentioned
but also
https://github.com/vdudouyt/minipro
minipro - An open source program for controlling the MiniPRO TL866xx series of chip programmers
Kevin @Frank Buss The compiler is still around at http://sdcc.sourceforge.net/
has anyone tried http://platformio.org/ ? I've got it installed into my Atom editor (I'm a web dev foremost) but haven't tried it yet. Oh, it says it only supports PIC32.
We have to start wrapping up, just one more question from anyone?
Shulie: How about this one: What is the biggest market segment for 8bit MCUs?
I saw there are some Arduino-related tracks in the upcoming MASTERs conference, is that an official collaboration?
Honestly, we see our 8bit devices being used across so many segments, it would be hard to pick out one frontrunner
literally, you name it and we're probably in it
Have some example segments
or 7 segments ?
@Jonathan Bruneau Industrial, automotive, health care, smoke detectors, lighting, power, solar, IoT, home automation...
Solar! Fancy that!
do you have radiation hardened 8 bit microcontrollers? might be useful to use them in CubeSats
I was a little more surprised to see smoke detectors listed.
@igendel I'm not familiar with the particular track at Master's, but we do collaborate with Arduino
Thanks @Garrett Scott
Bonus question : I'm curious of the design tools, CAD and other things used to design the chips at Microchip, any hint about how they are developed ?
Thank you @Garrett Scott
@Frank Buss for info on that, www.microchip.com/promo/aerospace-defense
thanks
thanks for joining us @Garrett Scott !
we'll be posting a transcript shortly :)
That was kind of you to come and chat :-)
Thanks everybody!
@Frank Buss IIRC, I recently discovered that the 8-bit 1802 microprocessor is still being sold. They have a radiation hardened version, IIRC.
@Frank Buss The Atmel guys told me they had a Rad Hard ATMega coming before the merger
thank you @edwin romero and @MarkAtMicrochip as well!
I'll be getting those boards out to everyone soon!
@Frank Buss Atmel has some rad hardened chips that are pretty similar to other AVRs. I fly atmels on the ISS, with no special considerations for radiation.
Hey @Brad... do I know you? lol
Shulie: For anyone who needs it: Transcript here: https://hackaday.io/event/25196-8-bit-microcontroller-hack-chat/log/61124-8-bit-microcontroller-hack-chat-transcript
Thanks everyone!
Thanks Microchip! Also, your representative in Israel is awesome :-)
Thank you for the chat, everyone.
@Brad cool, but I guess on the ISS is less radiation?
This was fun. Thanks for your time.
It was tempting to go for one of the boards but I have enough devices on my workbench already. :)
Thank you to all of you at Microchip.
Kevin : me too but "you never know" and having the right chip to do the work is worth some... shelf space :-D
@Frank Buss Eh, LEO in general is pretty low radiation. /Most/ Cubesats don't fly much/any higher than the ISS. You do get a little bit of shielding since the ISS is full of crap, though
@Yann Guidon / YGDES true
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