gnupic: DIY USB programmer ?
Subject:
Re: DIY USB programmer ?
From:
David Willmore ####@####.####
Date:
11 Jan 2005 17:27:12 +0000
Message-Id: <200501111726.j0BHQoFW031350@localhost.localdomain>
> >For my part, I'm willing to make my code for a USB/RS-232 based semi-
> >intelligent programmer available. The 18F2550 should be available
> >for a few years and we'll see about porting it to whatever successor
> >it has when/if it goes away.
> >
> >I'd like to see a design that will last a few years--maybe until the
> >time that USB phases out. :)
> That sounds like a great idea.
>
> How about a real open source USB pic programmer (USB2 would be even
> better?). If done well it could even be made MPLAB compatable (I
> currently use the Warp13, serial version which is great, but serial)
> because soon enough Microchip will release a Linux port (or someone will
> get it running properly with WINE). The problem is, if it's worth
> doing, it's worth doing well, so it should support pretty much all
> devices and maybe even eeprom. Schematics, software and firmware for
> the onboard microcontroller/s should be available for free, with kits
> and prebuilt units available in the US, EU and Australia for a
> reasonable price.
USB2.0 High speed adds very little to this. The Microchip PICs which
do Full Speed USB are USB2.0 compliant. This means that they comply
with the changes in the standard, but that they don't use the High Speed
mode. For a programmer, 12Mb/s is plenty fast. :)
The design I'm working on, with different firmware, could be made to
be MPLAB (by which I take you to mean ICD2) compatible. If you meant
that it was integrated into MPLAB as a programmer, I think you can do
that with just telling the MPLAB GUI to launch an external tool, right?
Please excuse my ignorance, I don't really use MPLAB.
The reason I like this 'half intelligent' programmer is that it is *not*
tied to any specific micro family. Yes, it's tuned and only supports
PICs, so far, but there is no limitation in it that requires that. If
I put in some bootloader support to it, downloading a new software rev
that supports other chips will be easy. So, supporting EEPROMS, etc.,
would just be a matter of making the host program support them.
And, I do expect this complete design to be made available as Free
software/hardware. If we can get some kitting companies interested,
that'd be great.
Cheers,
David
