Maplin beginners PIC book.

[ian field]

...........anyone know if its any good?

 

[Anthony Fremont]

..........anyone know if its any good?

This book?
http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=32791&criteria=pic&doy=5m8

If so, it seems a bit dated. The 16f84 is all but dead. The 16F88 (and
even the 16F628) are newer/better chips. At this point, someone starting
from scratch should probably consider the 18F line. This is an excellent
book for that:
www.picbook.com
Digikey sells a parts kit for the circuit board that's included with the
book. I have the parts kit, book and pc board, but I never got around to
putting it together.

I learned by using an earlier book of his. Admittedly, I've stuck with the
16F line since it's what I know. But I do think the 18F is the way for you
to go. Banking becomes much less of an issue for a newbie to PICs. Plus if
you plan to do any C programming, the 18F is much more friendly to
compilers. Microchip has a free, time-limited "trial" compiler available,
but it can be renewed by uninstall/reinstall.

 

[ian field]

This book?
http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=32791&criteria=pic&doy=5m8

If so, it seems a bit dated. The 16f84 is all but dead. The 16F88 (and
even the 16F628) are newer/better chips. At this point, someone starting
from scratch should probably consider the 18F line. This is an excellent
book for that:
www.picbook.com
Digikey sells a parts kit for the circuit board that's included with the
book. I have the parts kit, book and pc board, but I never got around to
putting it together.

I learned by using an earlier book of his. Admittedly, I've stuck with
the 16F line since it's what I know. But I do think the 18F is the way
for you to go. Banking becomes much less of an issue for a newbie to
PICs. Plus if you plan to do any C programming, the 18F is much more
friendly to compilers. Microchip has a free, time-limited "trial"
compiler available, but it can be renewed by uninstall/reinstall.

Thanks for reply.

Yes - that's the book, the Velleman K8048 programmer I've bought includes a
PIC16F627. At the moment I'm starting from completely no idea, so really I'm
asking if the book can teach me basics that apply to PICs in general?

 

[Anthony Fremont]

Yes - that's the book, the Velleman K8048 programmer I've bought
includes a PIC16F627. At the moment I'm starting from completely no
idea, so really I'm asking if the book can teach me basics that apply
to PICs in general?

You should be able to learn plenty that will still apply to the 18F line
should you decide to look at those later. The whole 16F line is fairly
similar in that once you know how to use a peripheral in one chip, you will
have little trouble getting it to work in another. You should have lots of
fun, and you'll certainly learn plenty if you don't give up easily. ;-)

 

[ian field]

You should be able to learn plenty that will still apply to the 18F line
should you decide to look at those later. The whole 16F line is fairly
similar in that once you know how to use a peripheral in one chip, you
will have little trouble getting it to work in another. You should have
lots of fun, and you'll certainly learn plenty if you don't give up
easily. ;-)

Its a long time since I did any programming and I wasn't especially good at
it, so I'm expecting a bit of an uphill struggle!

 

[Anthony Fremont]

Its a long time since I did any programming and I wasn't especially
good at it, so I'm expecting a bit of an uphill struggle!

Only 35 instructions, how hard could it be? ;-) Seriously though, don't
be shy about posting questions here when you get started. Sometimes it can
be tricky getting a PIC to run at first. Like allot of things though, it's
easy as pie once you get the hang of it.

 

[ian field]

Only 35 instructions, how hard could it be? ;-) Seriously though, don't
be shy about posting questions here when you get started. Sometimes it
can be tricky getting a PIC to run at first. Like allot of things though,
it's easy as pie once you get the hang of it.

Having built the Velleman kit (about a week ago!) I still haven't even tried
powering it yet, the only RS232 on my PC is in use so I went to Maplin today
to order an add on card - as usual out of stock, so I have some time to
stick my nose in the book I picked up while there. There's currently a
series of articles on using MPLAB in EPE magazine, but before I gather all
those together for another read through I need to study the basics like
architecture diagrams and familiarise myself with what all the instruction
codes do.