Re: Microcontroller options

In article <46573C94.6F26@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
Gordon McComb <NOSPAMgort@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Onesupermanone wrote:
My preference it to use C language.

There are a lot of choices but I'd say the Atmel line is a good choice
for you. They offer some traditional 8-bit RISC controllers, and some
newer 32-bit ARM-based controllers. Funnily enough, one of my selection
criteria is whether the chip is available in a DIP package, so I don't
have to solder surface mount, or invest in an expensive breakout board.
If this matters to you be sure to note the package availability when
you're looking.

For what it's worth, I'm a newbie too, as anyone here will readily
attest from the way I constantly pester them with questions. :) I
recently went on just such a controller search myself, looking at
various boards under $50.

But, based in part on the advice of Gordon and others here, I've decided
to take the plunge and give a raw Atmel (AVR) chip a try. These are
electronically quite easy to use; the challenge may be setting up the
development environment, but if you use Windows then you'll probably
find that pretty easy too. If you don't, get back to me and we'll
suffer through setting up the GNU toolchain together. :)

Here's what I just ordered from Digikey:

Part#: ATAVRISP2-ND
Description: PROGRAMMER AVR IN SYSTEM
Price: $35.91

Part#: ATMEGA48-20PU-ND
Description: IC AVR MCU 4K 20MHZ 5V 28DIP
Price: $2.69

The programmer is a bit on the pricey side, but you get it once and use
it over and over. The controller itself, as you can see, is quite
cheap. So if you screw it up and turn it into a brick, you don't suffer
too much financially. :)

I chose this particular chip because the ATMega48 seems like a pretty
common AVR chip (it's used in one version of the Pololu Baby Orangutan
for example -- which BTW looks like a great board if you want something
with motor controllers built in). And it's a DIP package, as Gordon
points out (important for me since I use a prototyping breadboard a
lot). I don't know what the "20PU" or "ND" parts mean, so hopefully
they're not important!

Good luck,
- Joe
.

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