--- In m..., "Jaromir Subcik" wrote:
>
> I have similar experience with PIC’s. These micros are a little bit different from the others, but for simple tasks they are ideal. Small count of pins, low power consumption, wide voltage range, very robust and with useful peripherals. Specially PIC16(12)F18xx and PIC16F17xx are still competitive to small ARM’s.
> From my point of view the big advantage is in voltage range it can work from single Li-Ion battery without any voltage regulator even when it is charged.
I also like the peripherals and the wide voltage range.

Microchip has a nice policy with tools such as the ICD 3 - one gets an immediate free replacement if they ever fail, even if the user has done something silly to it.

Leon

Beginning Microcontrollers with the MSP430

I have similar experience with PIC’s. These micros are a little bit different from the others, but for simple tasks they are ideal. Small count of pins, low power consumption, wide voltage range, very robust and with useful peripherals. Specially PIC16(12)F18xx and PIC16F17xx are still competitive to small ARM’s.
From my point of view the big advantage is in voltage range – it can work from single Li-Ion battery without any voltage regulator even when it is charged.

Jarda

From: Onestone
Sent: Tuesday, March 12, 2013 6:41 PM
To: m...
Subject: Re: [msp430] Re: RANT

I used to love PICs, first met them in the late 80's when I used hoards
of them in a wafer transfer robotic controller for CVD furnaces. Then
used them for a long time in wierd apps. I built a nurse call system
with voice using just PICs, built an ECU with an 8 pin PIC, but the best
thing I built probably was a motor controller for whitegoods. At the
time I believe most manufacturers used a Philips ASIC, with a few
different versions for different mains frequencies and spin speeds. It
seems that for various reasons this became unavailable to third party
manufacturers. i was tasked with duplicating its function for less. the
ASIC circuit packaged cost around $4.50 to build. I used a PIC508,
integrated all the different functions into a single part, ran it
directly off the mains, and it worked like a charm. there aren't many
micros around you can get away with doing that with. I moved away
because their 16 bit systems which were originally supposed to be
available in late 1995 didn't becoeme available other than as samples
until many years later. I tried again in around 2005, because one of
their micros was a perfect fit, but again it turned out to be pure
unobtainium, despite promises, and cost me a large contract.

Al

On 13/03/2013 3:06 AM, William Sell wrote:
> Microchip have some sleep modes in the 9na range. The only downside is
> using anything from Microchip...
>
> -Bill

--- In m..., Onestone wrote:
>
> ... I moved away because their 16 bit systems which were
> originally supposed to be available in late yyyy didn't
> becoeme available other than as samples until many years
> later. I tried again in around yyyy, because one of their
> micros was a perfect fit, but again it turned out to be
> pure unobtainium, despite promises, ...
>
deja vu, sounds like you are talking about TI)

I used to love PICs, first met them in the late 80's when I used hoards
of them in a wafer transfer robotic controller for CVD furnaces. Then
used them for a long time in wierd apps. I built a nurse call system
with voice using just PICs, built an ECU with an 8 pin PIC, but the best
thing I built probably was a motor controller for whitegoods. At the
time I believe most manufacturers used a Philips ASIC, with a few
different versions for different mains frequencies and spin speeds. It
seems that for various reasons this became unavailable to third party
manufacturers. i was tasked with duplicating its function for less. the
ASIC circuit packaged cost around $4.50 to build. I used a PIC508,
integrated all the different functions into a single part, ran it
directly off the mains, and it worked like a charm. there aren't many
micros around you can get away with doing that with. I moved away
because their 16 bit systems which were originally supposed to be
available in late 1995 didn't becoeme available other than as samples
until many years later. I tried again in around 2005, because one of
their micros was a perfect fit, but again it turned out to be pure
unobtainium, despite promises, and cost me a large contract.

Al

On 13/03/2013 3:06 AM, William Sell wrote:
> Microchip have some sleep modes in the 9na range. The only downside is
> using anything from Microchip...
>
> -Bill
>
>
>

Not to go off-topic, but I'm just curious what is the downside of using
Microchip vs. MSP430?
On Tue, Mar 12, 2013 at 12:36 PM, William Sell wrote:

> **
> Microchip have some sleep modes in the 9na range. The only downside is
> using anything from Microchip...
>
> -Bill
>
>
>
>
>

Microchip have some sleep modes in the 9na range. The only downside is
using anything from Microchip...

-Bill

There are a few now, but there are also a lot of other low power micro
suppliers out there offering similar or better performance than the
MSP430 at lower cost.

Al

On 12/03/2013 6:43 AM, Matthias Weingart wrote:
> "Paul Curtis" :
>
>> I'm not sure a 512K MSP430 makes any sense whatsoever given the ARM devices
>> that are available now -- it's just for customers that have grown up with
>> MSP430, and know its peripherals and architecture well.
>>
> Are there any ARM devices that are able to operate at 10uA (or less) with
> fast wake-up? I ony know www.energymicro.com
> Standard ARM's need several milliseconds to start up from RTC....
>
> M.
>
>

"Paul Curtis" :

> I'm not sure a 512K MSP430 makes any sense whatsoever given the ARM devices
> that are available now -- it's just for customers that have grown up with
> MSP430, and know its peripherals and architecture well.
>

Are there any ARM devices that are able to operate at 10uA (or less) with
fast wake-up? I ony know www.energymicro.com
Standard ARM's need several milliseconds to start up from RTC....

M.

I ordered samples a couple of weeks ago, but have heard nothing yet.
Wolverine is really 2 products, the 57 and the 59. For me the 57 is
useless, too many major flaws and higher low power consumption than
existing products. You'd only benefit from the lower active current in a
high duty cycle design, so not truly low power. The 59 series is
somewhat better, and has a lot of nice features too, but not really
enough yet to convince me that they are goign to head this way
generally, since they have brought out far more big memory high current
devices than useful FRAM parts over the last 2 years. The 59 series FRAM
is quoted at 100uA/MHz, but the data sheet doesn't specify at what
voltage, whereas the original 1121 was quoted as 160uA/MHz at 2.2V with
LPM3 of 0.8uA and LPM4 of 0.1uA. The most commonly used low power mode
for me is LPM3, and this is what really sets your mean current in a low
power system, there is little difference between 0.7 and 0.8uA, but the
wake up times are significantly longer than the 1121, and most of the 2
series that I use. For example a 250us wake up from their LPM3.5 RTC
only mode is slower than I could process a software RTC, and send a
couple of hundred bytes across an SPI link. All in all, for a sensor
simple sensor system, for example, using low power mode between samples,
and, say sampling at 50Hz you' could be better off with a standard MSP430.

Al

On 11/03/2013 2:42 AM, Peter Johansson wrote:
> On Sun, Mar 10, 2013 at 9:54 AM, Onestone wrote:
>
>> I must admit I haven't been unable to buy anything yet, but then I don't
>> use anything bigger than a 2274 in most designs, and usually much
>> smaller than that, but this shows me that Ti have abandoned their low
>> power push, other than perhaps the FRAM stuff, so it's time to haul out
>> another low power device if I can find one physically small enough.
> TI have been touting Wolverine as their future of low power, so I am
> not sure it is fair to say that TI have abandoned their low power
> push. I just hit up TI's website to check the current status of
> samples availability, and found this:
>
> http://www.ti.com/product/msp430fr5969
>
> Surprisingly enough, I was able to add one to my samples cart.
>
> -p.
>

On Sun, Mar 10, 2013 at 9:54 AM, Onestone wrote:

> I must admit I haven't been unable to buy anything yet, but then I don't
> use anything bigger than a 2274 in most designs, and usually much
> smaller than that, but this shows me that Ti have abandoned their low
> power push, other than perhaps the FRAM stuff, so it's time to haul out
> another low power device if I can find one physically small enough.

TI have been touting Wolverine as their future of low power, so I am
not sure it is fair to say that TI have abandoned their low power
push. I just hit up TI's website to check the current status of
samples availability, and found this:

http://www.ti.com/product/msp430fr5969

Surprisingly enough, I was able to add one to my samples cart.

-p.