gnupic: DIY USB programmer ?
Subject:
Re: DIY USB programmer ?
From:
Manuel Bessler ####@####.####
Date:
5 Jan 2005 01:27:43 +0000
Message-Id: <20050105021952.A19450@betazed3.varxec.de>
First of all, thanks for the quick replies.
I'll address a few points here that came up in several replys and
clarify some things...
... specific responses to suggestions I'll post in seperate mails.
Note: When I say "intelligent", I mean a programmer where not the PC
but whatever is in the programmer 'box' does all the hard work,
ie. timings, program algorithms and such.
* USB 2 Serial Converter: For the commercial "intelligent" programmers
this is usually no problem, but it probably won't work for
non-intelligent programmers (like JDM, Tait)
* The solution should be low-cost. Most of the users of my project
don't want to spend more on the PIC programmer than the main part of
the project.
* While I could design a *simple* "intelligent" programmer, and make it
part of my project, I don't have the time, and there are already
people out there who download the lastest programming specs and
implement it into their intelligent and non-intelligent
programmers/software (Pikdev, IC-prog,....), so I don't want to
duplicate this over and over.
* Availability: as with nearly every open source project, my open
source/hardware project has users that live in different parts of the
world. Some like pre-built hardware, some like kits, some build it all
by themselves. If I tell everyone that they should order programmer X
from company Y, this might be convenient for some, inconvenient for
others. Shipping times, customs, and taxes would add to the price.
Thats where the JDM programmer excels: the parts can be found just
about anywhere in the world.
It'd be nice if it were as nice as connecting a serial-to-usb
converter between PC and JDM programmer and be done with it, but I
don't think this will work.
* Supporting users with their programmer troubles would take up more of
my time that I'd rather spend on developping my project futher.
* bootloaders: The way to go, but the loader has to get into the PIC
first. I use a bootloader for the main pcb of my project.
All the PICs people order from me are preprogrammed with a bootloader
(with boot-block protection bit set, so they don't accidentally
overwrite it :)
I thought about pointing people to WISP628, since it can apparently deal
with usb-to-serial convertors... but then again, it might be
inconvenient for some to order from the Netherlands.
Also, its just an ICSP programmer, and not all of my boards feature ICSP
capability.
Manuel
--
Opensource/Free Software: No Gates, No Windows
