One possible advantage to PICs is the availability of (most? all?) parts with OTP PROM instead of flash (the "C" parts versus the "F" series). For something that may need to just work, for decades, in high ambient conditions such as the controller on an outside plant HVAC unit, that could be desirable insurance.
-- Rich Webb Norfolk, VA
el
It is not JUST the compiler that designers look at, it is the whole development and debug flow as well.
The fastest way to get a (new) device onto a designers desk, is to offer a USB-Stick (or slightly larger) type very low cost, ie a 'Slicon datasheet' with USB debug. If that toolkit also has a nice set of hackable examples, then that helps as well.
Microcontroller silicon is getting cheaper so quickly, that details like compiler differences will be lost in the timelines.
Most of our recent device-selections were driven by peripherals, not by tools, (and not by core).
example: in one selection, Microchip PIC32 actually made the shortlist, (surprised me ;) until the fine print revealed that TxCK was only available on the bigger package. Bummer... Pity, as their EVK was affordable, _and_ had a proper debug pathway.
Some more expensive systems are only partial, and beware lines like this in the Guides : ["Optionally, if you have a SAM-ICE=99, instructions are also given about how to debug the code."] - and that Sam-ice is twice the price of the whole PIC32 evk !? (and the SAM3U EVK is way more complex than we need too, which bumps the price to $200+$100 vs $55...) NXP parts DO have the right peripherals in the right package mix, so now we trawl this :
One reason people will not go Atmel is the relatively low probability of being able to buy the same chip in two years time (especially with them looking financially weak at the moment).
Microchip still sell chips for designs I did 15 years ago.
Atmel's 'Not recommended for new designs' means go redesign your product because we are not making them anymore.
Are you grazy? It takes me a day to get into a new platform and start working with it. Period. Last time I had to do a PIC design. The days work included writing a wrapper so PICC could be invoked like it is GCC from Eclipse.
--
Failure does not prove something is impossible, failure simply
indicates you are not using the right tools...
"If it doesn\'t fit, use a bigger hammer!"
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The problem with commercial tools is that each MCU has a different crappy IDE and a different toolchain. That is why the combination Eclipse, GCC en GDB is so powerful. You learn the tools once and can apply that knowledge to any target. Besides, Eclipse beats most IDEs hands down.
--
Failure does not prove something is impossible, failure simply
indicates you are not using the right tools...
"If it doesn\'t fit, use a bigger hammer!"
--------------------------------------------------------------
Not all $$ are created equal.
Cost and price being completely different things, of course.
Ten years back, I justified a laptop based on the node-locked tools I had to run. I needed to work in the lab as well as my office and a laptop was a lot cheaper than another $80K for another seat (high end FPGA stuff). Now I wouldn't consider buying any node-locked software. Indeed I won't buy any FPGA development software, because I don't need to.
Having bad tools is a silly strategy.
Because they refuse to adequately fund something that doesn't generate profit/revenue. The counters of beans refuse to see that you have to give bait away to catch fish.
Yet it's SOP.
Classic attitude of a company just about to go bust.
IAR has a decent commercial tool chain where many processors use the same IDE. I've only used it for the ARM, but the IDE and debugging facilities seem OK to me. YMMV.
Mark Borgerson
Eh... You do know that in the very recent past it looked as if Microchip was going to buy Atmel, right?
Microchips own branded compiled is based on GCC and is free for most series, e.g 18, 24, 32 Some speed/size optimisation limits may apply on the free student version, but no code size limits etc, so close enough to free for many uses.
Dave.
-- ================================================ Check out my Electronics Engineering Video Blog & Podcast: http://www.alternatezone.com/eevblog/
There's a difference between "start working with" and "up to speed". A big difference.
And this is relevent how?
Only the 16-bit (PIC24/30/33) and 32-bit (PIC32) compilers are gcc-based. It wouldn't be practical to port gcc to the 8-bit families (10/12/16/18), they're just too far from the kind of architecture for which gcc was designed.
But small jobs lead to big jobs. Hobbies lead to small jobs. If you really want to sell chips, win the hearts and minds of the hobbyists and students.
Well said!
The same goes for operating systems. Remember OS/2? If I had been IBM management, I would have paid Borland to port Delphi to it. There would then have been a flurry of reasonably good GUI software for OS/2. As it was, hardly any application software was ever developed for OS/2, and it died out as soon as its half-brother Windows 95 came along.
Yes... If it took $5k worth of time to get into a new platform, I would never have gotten into any platforms at all!
uChip was/is financially much better off than its technically superior competition.
es,
It is free for the minority of series - 10/12/14/16 are [right now] not free. I suspect that they'll start offering a free suboptimal Hitech now though.
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