Looking for Microcontroller Recommendations
in [Design]
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From: Jan Panteltje on 19 Jan 2010 07:08 On a sunny day (Mon, 18 Jan 2010 20:52:10 GMT) it happened nico(a)puntnl.niks (Nico Coesel) wrote in <4b54c708.774112562(a)news.planet.nl>: >> >>No, this is true, why bother with ARM when you can get a good small mobo for <70 Euro? >> >> http://www.alternate.nl/html/product/Moederborden_Socket_441/ASRock/A330GC/-1079713/?tn=HARDWARE&l1=Moederborden&l2=Intel&l3=Socket+Atom >>8 Watt! > >Now you are trying to sell me a car without seats and tires. If you need an embedded solution, and have space, there is time to market, design cost, and cost of software tools. This is 90 % of all that of the shelf for 70 Euro. If you design from scratch (with any processor), and say need USB PCI Par port serial SATA then you are in for a lot more, a LOT more. And then you still need to design that I/O it was about in the first place. If you ever designed a PCI card, and know the interface, then all you have to concentrate on is that, for the rest there are many mobos, so good second source. For the par port, I run strings of i2c chips from it, perfect for multitasking as i2c is not delay sensitive. The first time I did it that way was in the eighties when i2c was born, and I still do it today. Then there is the serial ports etc.. How much memory you want or need is up to you, you just plug it in. As far as reliability is concerned, that only gets better the more is integrated in the CPU. Less chance for the mobo designer to f*ck up. And most mobos I have here, some very old ISA, just run fine today. The change of a defective memory chip is much bigger, and that would hit you too if you did your own. Anyways, no arguing, not giving away more secrets, I would have to charge you consultancy cost, but you can alway email geld_speelt_geen_rol at panteltje dot com. >Ofcourse >I want it to have memory, storage, connection to an LVDS LCD panel, >some real integrated parallel I/O and a PSU that runs from some DC >voltage source (lets say 5V or 12V) ofcourse. I know about these >boards; we use them as little as possible. If you want a complete >system you'll get close to 200 euro. Add some add-on boards for I/O >and a decent audio interface and you get close to 300 euro. I am not sure for how much you would sell a complete ARM system with same capabilities. Buy a netbook? >And there are many reliability issues. I know from experience that it >takes a lot of work to turn such a board into a reliable solution. And >these is always a fan running that needs to be replaced approx. every >3 years. Not so, these boards now also exists with passive cooling! http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/Atom-Mainboards-mit-HDMI-Ports-und-PCI-Express-Slots-898611.html >A beagleboard fits the bill much better and costs half your solution. >http://beagleboard.org/ Kids stuff, does not even have Ethernet, does not accept my PCI cards either, no par port, DOA. No win 7, no LTSpice in Wine.
From: Hal Murray on 19 Jan 2010 07:54 In article <hj2cmc$uah$1(a)news.albasani.net>, Jan Panteltje <pNaonStpealmtje(a)yahoo.com> writes: >No, this is true, why bother with ARM when you can get a > good small mobo for <70 Euro? Does your mobo fit in a cell phone? There is a lot of room between a PIC and an x86. There are a lot of nice ARM chips that include flash and RAM. I like the Atmel SAM7 series. There are many others. Yes, if you need PCI slots, then a mobo is probably the right approach. -- These are my opinions, not necessarily my employer's. I hate spam.
From: JosephKK on 19 Jan 2010 08:53 On Mon, 18 Jan 2010 10:51:31 GMT, Jan Panteltje <pNaonStpealmtje(a)yahoo.com> wrote: >On a sunny day (Sun, 17 Jan 2010 22:08:06 GMT) it happened nico(a)puntnl.niks >(Nico Coesel) wrote in <4b538770.692296890(a)news.planet.nl>: > >>>Why move? PICs last as long as the FLASH last, so does your ARM. >>>>without rewriting from scratch if you have to. >>> >>>Product lifetime... think about it. >> >>Changing product requirements? Products getting obsolete? A lot of >>people don't realize it but for companies that do software development >>the software is the most valuable asset the company owns in terms of >>investment. Having to rewrite and retest known-good-code is a huge >>waste of money. > >That is why PICs are so nice, they have been around for ages, >Microchip keeps making them, the old architectures are still around >after all this time, very easy to add a feature, I just did that yesterday. >Unlike some other manufacturers who obsolete architectures and chips on an almost weekly basis. >Or have great chips on paper that you cannot buy anywhere however (Xilinx comes to mind), >ridiculously expensive if you have to get low quantities,. >No foe me PIC anytime, they are the work horse of industry. >ARM is just an obscure idea that has been trying to make mainstream for years, and never succeeded. >They have good a PR team perhaps. >The next step up after a PIC is a x86 mobo for embedded systems. Then how come it is still not that common in embedded systems.
From: Nico Coesel on 19 Jan 2010 11:55 hal-usenet(a)ip-64-139-1-69.sjc.megapath.net (Hal Murray) wrote: >In article <hj2cmc$uah$1(a)news.albasani.net>, > Jan Panteltje <pNaonStpealmtje(a)yahoo.com> writes: > > >>No, this is true, why bother with ARM when you can get a >> good small mobo for <70 Euro? > >Does your mobo fit in a cell phone? > >There is a lot of room between a PIC and an x86. > >There are a lot of nice ARM chips that include flash and RAM. >I like the Atmel SAM7 series. There are many others. > > >Yes, if you need PCI slots, then a mobo is probably the right approach. The upcoming Cortex devices will have PCI express. I expect somewhere this summer. -- Failure does not prove something is impossible, failure simply indicates you are not using the right tools... nico(a)nctdevpuntnl (punt=.) --------------------------------------------------------------
From: Nico Coesel on 19 Jan 2010 11:57
Jan Panteltje <pNaonStpealmtje(a)yahoo.com> wrote: >On a sunny day (Mon, 18 Jan 2010 20:52:10 GMT) it happened nico(a)puntnl.niks >(Nico Coesel) wrote in <4b54c708.774112562(a)news.planet.nl>: > >>> >>>No, this is true, why bother with ARM when you can get a good small mobo for <70 Euro? >>> >>> http://www.alternate.nl/html/product/Moederborden_Socket_441/ASRock/A330GC/-1079713/?tn=HARDWARE&l1=Moederborden&l2=Intel&l3=Socket+Atom >>>8 Watt! >> >>Now you are trying to sell me a car without seats and tires. > >If you need an embedded solution, and have space, there is time to market, >design cost, and cost of software tools. >This is 90 % of all that of the shelf for 70 Euro. > >If you design from scratch (with any processor), and say need >USB >PCI >Par port >serial >SATA >then you are in for a lot more, a LOT more. I was comparing an off-the-shelf solution to your off-the-shelf solution. -- Failure does not prove something is impossible, failure simply indicates you are not using the right tools... nico(a)nctdevpuntnl (punt=.) -------------------------------------------------------------- |