PIC18F97J60 vs. MCF5223x for embeddet networking applications

Does anybody have any experience with PIC18F97J60 vs. MCF5223x for
embedded networking applications? The MCF5223x appears to be a little
more capable as well as supporting 100mbps operation. The PIC18F97J60
is probably cheaper (I assume). 

Any information would be appreciated.

Petter
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Petter Gustad wrote:
> Does anybody have any experience with PIC18F97J60 vs. MCF5223x for
> embedded networking applications? The MCF5223x appears to be a little
> more capable as well as supporting 100mbps operation. The PIC18F97J60
> is probably cheaper (I assume). 
> 
> Any information would be appreciated.
> 
> Petter

For one thing the PIC18F97J60 is not capable of 100Base-T operation, it 
is 10base-T only. The MCF5223x is 10/100 capable. I have experience with 
the MCF52235, but not the PIC18F97J60. However, I have used the ENC28J60 
ethernet controller which is similar to the ethernet used by the 
PIC18F97J60. I would expect the MCF5223x to be at least an order of 
magnitude faster than the PIC18F97J60.

You can get a free, but limited, version of the CMX-MicroNet TCP/IP 
stack for the MCF52235 on the CMX Systems web site. See the demos and 
manuals section at http://www.cmx.com. (The demo software is intended to 
be for evaluation purposes only.)

An evaluation version of CMX-MicroNet for the PIC24/dsPIC33 and ENC28J60 
ethernet is also available on the CMX web site.

Paul Bosselaers
CMX Systems, Inc.

Petter Gustad wrote:
> Does anybody have any experience with PIC18F97J60 vs. MCF5223x for
> embedded networking applications? The MCF5223x appears to be a little
> more capable as well as supporting 100mbps operation. The PIC18F97J60
> is probably cheaper (I assume). 
> 
> Any information would be appreciated.
> 
> Petter

The MCF5223x has a ColdFire core (32-bit, lovely architecture, a wide 
range of good tools, plenty of speed, power-efficient for its speed) and 
plenty of flash and ram.  It can also be seen as a stepping point to a 
bigger system (such as using a different ColdFire with external memory, 
which could then run something like ucLinux).  The PIC has a PIC core 
(8-bit, hideous architecture, a few usable tools, slow, but low power) 
and limited flash and ram.  There are plenty of small PICs with nice 
peripherals, but it's a dead end if you ever want to move upwards.

So the MCF5223x is a great deal more capable, although probably slightly 
more expensive (though not a lot, when you look at the whole board).

As always, however, a lot depends on things like experience, vendor 
support, future plans, tools, etc.

David Brown <david@westcontrol.removethisbit.com> writes:

Thank you David and Paul.

> low power) and limited flash and ram.  There are plenty of small PICs
> with nice peripherals, but it's a dead end if you ever want to move
> upwards.

This is an important point.

> As always, however, a lot depends on things like experience, vendor
> support, future plans, tools, etc.

I've got some expereince with both PIC's and 68k programming (in the
early days of the Macintosh). I also did a couple small apps for my
Palm (Dragonball). In that case I used a gcc as a cross compiler under
Linux/X86. I'm hoping to find a similar environment for MCF5223x as
well. I'm more comfortable with emacs, make, and gcc than CodeWarrior.


Petter

-- 
A: Because it messes up the order in which people normally read text.
Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing?
A: Top-posting.
Q: What is the most annoying thing on usenet and in e-mail?

On Tue, 17 Oct 2006 21:23:45 +0200, Petter Gustad wrote:

> I've got some expereince with both PIC's and 68k programming (in the
> early days of the Macintosh). I also did a couple small apps for my
> Palm (Dragonball). In that case I used a gcc as a cross compiler under
> Linux/X86. I'm hoping to find a similar environment for MCF5223x as
> well. I'm more comfortable with emacs, make, and gcc than CodeWarrior.

Try www.netburner.com.  They do cheap Coldfire modules and also sell
development kits.  Look into Eclipse+gcc+debugger of choice for your
development environment.  I haven't tried to plug Emacs into Eclipse. 
Eclipse is Java, though, so you might want to have a fast system.


    ~Dave~