hi stef,

here is a code fragment from one of my rs-232 devices ...

	banksel TRISB
	movlw b'10100000'	; bit 7 - set for TX
				; bit 5 - set for RX
	movwf TRISB
	banksel SPBRG
	movlw d'11'		; 9600 baud (0% error) @ 7.3728 mhz
	movwf SPBRG
	banksel TXSTA
	movlw b'00100000'	; bit 5 - tx enable
				; bit 2 - BRGH
	movwf TXSTA
	banksel RCSTA
	movlw b'10010000'	; bit 7 - serial enable
				; bit 4 - rx enable
	movwf RCSTA
	banksel BAUDCTL
	movlw b'00000000'	; bit 4 - invert
				; bit 3 - BRG16
	movwf BAUDCTL

you can see in there that i did set the TRISB bits.  did i need to ?
don't know.  all i can say for sure is that this code does indeed work,
it's a working 9600 baud 8n1 serial connection between a laptop and the
pic.  that's implemented on a 16F690 running at 7.3728 mhz.

hope that helps ...


Stef Mientki wrote:
> I'm a little bit confused about the TX and RX pins in UART mode.
> I checked several PIC types:
> If you read the text carefully, you will read several times:
>    "bit SPEN () and the TRIS register have to be set in order to
> configure the TX and RX pins as the USART"
>
> Now look at the schematics of the ports, and see that it doesn't matter
> to set the TRIS register,
> because the "peripheral OE" will override these settings.
>
> Which of these 2 is true ???
>
> Why is this contradiction in all manuals (also very old) that I've
> looked in ???
> 
> 
> thanks,
> Stef Mientki

On Sat, 20 May 2006 19:22:00 +0200, Stef Mientki <S.Mientki-nospam@mailbox.kun.nl> wrote:

>I'm a little bit confused about the TX and RX pins in UART mode.
>I checked several PIC types:
>If you read the text carefully, you will read several times:
>   "bit SPEN () and the TRIS register have to be set in order to
>configure the TX and RX pins as the USART"
>
>Now look at the schematics of the ports, and see that it doesn't matter
>to set the TRIS register,
>because the "peripheral OE" will override these settings.
>
>Which of these 2 is true ???
>
>Why is this contradiction in all manuals (also very old) that I've
>looked in ???
>
>
>thanks,
>Stef Mientki

Peripheral function does override the TRIS state (unlike some other peripherals). 
This can be a PITA sometimes as you can't tri-state TXD without also disabling the receiver.

I'm a little bit confused about the TX and RX pins in UART mode.
I checked several PIC types:
If you read the text carefully, you will read several times:
   "bit SPEN () and the TRIS register have to be set in order to
configure the TX and RX pins as the USART"

Now look at the schematics of the ports, and see that it doesn't matter
to set the TRIS register,
because the "peripheral OE" will override these settings.

Which of these 2 is true ???

Why is this contradiction in all manuals (also very old) that I've
looked in ???


thanks,
Stef Mientki