Opinions on EasyPIC 4

[Yantob]

I'am contemplating buying an easypic4 will i be dissapointed ?

 

[hugo]

schematic picflash2 clone

Hi,

It might not be the cheapest one, but it's possible to be the best PIC development system on the market...

So if you can afford it and you want to play with pics...go ahead and buy it....


P.S. I own an easypic2

 

[xorcise]

jdm programmer for 30f series

I am the US distributor of mE products. I don't believe that anybody has been disappointed with this board. We use it almost exclusively for our own commercial PIC development work and it's also great for the beginner. The board is pretty self-contained and there are dozens of peripheral boards for interfacing and testing various functions and circuits.

You can see some of the fun using this board with my demos on YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/profile_videos?user=circuited

Take a look at our site:

**broken link removed**

 

[Yantob]

easypic4 adc

thankyou for your replies ,I have been useing a tech-tools PICwriter for quite a few years and it is time to move on .incircuit programing will save lots of time i have lost count of the amount of times ive removed the pic from the programmer to the target pcb and back again to re program it and makeing up stripboards to test it .it appears i dont have the best brain for programming but i find it very addictive .ive just move from a 16f84 to a 16f628 i would like to experment with the adc inputs so i guess a easypic4 will be this years christmas toy.

 

[blueroomelectronics]

largest hex number 16f887

The easypic4 is an experimenter board, the programmer circuit is very basic and similar to a JDM programmer.

Get a PICkit 2 instead as it's cheap and fully supported by Microchip & MPLAB. It's a real debugger too.

If you want to learn the 18F series basics can't go to wrong with my Junebug kit.
**broken link removed**

 

[xorcise]

easypic4 rs232

The easypic4 is an experimenter board, the programmer circuit is very basic and similar to a JDM programmer.

Get a PICkit 2 instead as it's cheap and fully supported by Microchip & MPLAB. It's a real debugger too.

If you want to learn the 18F series basics can't go to wrong with my Junebug kit.

I like PICKit2, it was my first PIC board some years ago. The Junebug looks like fun too. But there is no comparison to the capability and functions of the EasyPIC4 board. I also find no similarity to JDM. The EasyPIC4 board has a USB PICFlash In-circuit Programmer/ICD and programs possibly the largest number of DIP PIC's compared to other commercial programmers.

We were able to use the EasyPIC3 and EasyPIC4 for our development with USB PIC's, changing programming on the fly as necessary without removing the PIC and remaining connected simultaneously with the PC.

By the way, you might want a longer cable on your car-bot...

 

[Yantob]

picwriter programmer schemat

er looks like paltronix will soon be getting some of my cash for the easypic4 almost there anymore diswaders or perswaders ,Thankyou for all your replies this really is the best forum ive come accross

 

[blueroomelectronics]

mikrobasic microwire

The easypic4 is an experimenter board, the programmer circuit is very basic and similar to a JDM programmer.

Get a PICkit 2 instead as it's cheap and fully supported by Microchip & MPLAB. It's a real debugger too.

If you want to learn the 18F series basics can't go to wrong with my Junebug kit.

I like PICKit2, it was my first PIC board some years ago. The Junebug looks like fun too. But there is no comparison to the capability and functions of the EasyPIC4 board. I also find no similarity to JDM. The EasyPIC4 board has a USB PICFlash In-circuit Programmer/ICD and programs possibly the largest number of DIP PIC's compared to other commercial programmers.

We were able to use the EasyPIC3 and EasyPIC4 for our development with USB PIC's, changing programming on the fly as necessary without removing the PIC and remaining connected simultaneously with the PC.

By the way, you might want a longer cable on your car-bot...

The EasyPIC4 programmer uses both proprietary software and hardware neither of which are MPLAB compatible. The PICkit 2 supports programming hundreds of PICs from the 10Fxxx thru dsPIC33F and debugs most 16F & 18F PICs from within MPLAB.

Any proprietary programmer will always be behind in updates compared to a Microchip supported device or clone.

You can't use a cable more than 8" to 12" with an typical ICD, I didn't even notice an external ICD connector on the EasyPIC system.

 

[Yantob]

swordfish compiler limitation

the problem i find is programming my main expertise is electronics i needs a microcontroller in most designs to reduce size and cost if i could i would farm out the programming bit but like most prototype work i need to do many changes ..so as you can guess i need as lots of help and i fine basic just the better option .

 

[xorcise]

swordfish compile ram

er looks like paltronix will soon be getting some of my cash for the easypic4 almost there anymore diswaders or perswaders ,Thankyou for all your replies this really is the best forum ive come accross

Please say hello to Gavin when you make your order.

The EasyPIC4 programmer uses both proprietary software and hardware neither of which are MPLAB compatible. The PICkit 2 supports programming hundreds of PICs from the 10Fxxx thru dsPIC33F and debugs most 16F & 18F PICs from within MPLAB.

I didn't realize that proprietary software/hardware was a particular problem. Microchip kept their ICD methods under wraps for a very long time. I also think that MPLAB compatibility is rather meaningless. PIC's have increased in ROM/RAM size virtually requiring a high-level structured compiler with source-code debugging capability for larger programs. Such features are available through many vendors, including the free mikroElektronika compilers.

Might I add that any PIC Hex file created with MPLAB, or any compiler, will upload using the EasyPIC's on-board programmer. The board is quite well endowed and self-sustaining with plenty of prototyping expandability. When comparing features and quality, you will find that mikroElektronika builds the best development boards found anywhere.

Any proprietary programmer will always be behind in updates compared to a Microchip supported device or clone.

Maybe.. but not necessarily. Generally, the datasheets are out for weeks and months before you can even get the new PIC samples. As soon as the datasheets are available Definition files are easily created by the programmer, if not done already by the vendor.

Added after 14 minutes:

the problem i find is programming my main expertise is electronics i needs a microcontroller in most designs to reduce size and cost if i could i would farm out the programming bit but like most prototype work i need to do many changes ..so as you can guess i need as lots of help and i fine basic just the better option .

I have a couple of world-class PIC programmers in the UK if you're serious and interested. One of them also does engineering.

If you want to use BASIC then I can recommend the best Basic compiler for PIC's around, Swordfish. It's for PIC18 only, and there is a free download of the full compiler with only a RAM usage limitation. It's sold by Mecanique, which is in the UK.

https://www.sfcompiler.co.uk/swordfish/

 

[Yantob]

mikroelektronika picflash clone

farming out the programming does always make me think what do you tell the programmer to do .

1.give the programmer the desigen and say make it work
2.give the programmer a flow chart.
3.say what pic to use
4. or say what you would like the pic pins to do.

 

[blueroomelectronics]

mplab glib c18

Proprietary programmers are at the mercy of the original developer to support new chips as they are introduced. At under $40US it's hard to argue the PICkit 2 isn't an affordable tool for any level of PIC user.

EasyPIC4 schematics are not available online, a strange omission IMHO. Makes it difficult to do a cursory review of the board. But by the looks of it, it's a straight forward demo board, I'll post a more detailed critique of it from what I can tell from the photo & description.
I'm not saying it's a bad design, It's just not how I'd do it. But most demo boards are somewhat limited in flexibility but that's expected. You can only do so much with jumpers and dip switches. That's why I broke up my design(s) into several smaller designs.

As for compilers the 16F series was designed for assembly and the 18F, 24F, 30F & 33F series were designed with C in mind. A fully functional C is available free from Microchip for the 18F thru 33F PICs from Microchip (It will revert to the "student edition" after 60day but that merely turns off the optimizer)
Swordfish is an excellent compiler and it's slowly integrating with MPLAB so it will hopefully support the debugger in the future, does it integrate at all with the EasyPIC4 development software?
These forums are probably not the best for PIC information but the Microchip forums would probably serve this line of questions better.
http://forum.microchip.com/

 

[xorcise]

mplab glib

I agree that PICKit2 is a bargain and should not be overlooked as a good USB programmer/ICD. We also carry a portable USB PICFlash2 programmer which is similar in nature, but more expensive.
**broken link removed**

My comments are not intended to be contentious to other quality products. I am pointing out that the EasyPIC4 board is great for the beginner and can easily be used for serious development work. It provides a good testing platform before moving to the actual protoboard and PCB.

The schematics for the board are available on the CD that comes with the board.

There a couple other inexpensive products by mE that work nicely for programming and prototyping work in conjunction with the PICFlash2 USB programmer above:
**broken link removed**

**broken link removed**

 

[blueroomelectronics]

mikroe picflash clone

I do like the 2x5 connector used on the clones, the inline connector the PICkit 2 uses isn't that secure, and the Microchip ICD2 uses a RJ12 that's no good for breadboarding.

Using a ZIF socket is far more reliable than standard DIP dual wipe sockets for repeated use.

I'm looking for US distributors for my kits, interested?

The PICkit 2 is extremely portable, supports a handful of EEPROM SPI, I2C, Microwire and now has a UART tester.

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[xorcise]

mplab easypic4

I usually just plug in a 3M ZIF into the same socket. 3M is more expensive but seems to have longer pins and it holds relatively well if not banged around too much.

Your boards look quite nice. Contact me through the website email: info(at)circuit-ed.com and we can discuss distribution.

 

[ful babu]

picflash clone

well no offense, MPLAB is a really clumsy tool as well as its c compiler comparing to ccs, iar and mikroe compilers, even I wud prefer ht c compiler over microchip’s one. Any way I hav easypic4 , and mikroec compiler they are easy to use and u can work fast, this tool suit is really smooth

regards

 

[blueroomelectronics]

swordfish versus mplab

well no offense, MPLAB is a really clumsy tool as well as its c compiler comparing to ccs, iar and mikroe compilers, even I wud prefer ht c compiler over microchip’s one. Any way I hav easypic4 , and mikroec compiler they are easy to use and u can work fast, this tool suit is really smooth

regards

To each their own, in my opinion MPLAB is an terrific tool, not clumsy at all.

 

[Yantob]

picflash2 clone

its been ordered a easypic 4 from paltronix uk thankyou to all who have posted answers to my original question i will try this time with mikro basic to see how i get on with the help of this forum if i have no joy then i think i will farm out the programming seems odd i bought one of the 1st home computers in the uk in 1976 called mk14 from sience of cambridge programming in machine code 31 years later iam still not much better o well i will get there one day

 

[blueroomelectronics]

jumpers for pickit 2

Did you have a project in mind or just want to learn PICs?

 

[Yantob]

firmware easypic4 for programer

thankyou for asking i have several possible patentable projects would you like to here about them iam only able to discuss one of them though. it concerns solar panels