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JustInTime Project Pages

You'll find some descriptions of AVR SX and PIC projects on these pages. And other stuf.

Projects

Here are some finished, or work in progress activities:

• Roland FD-8 Issues: Hall Sensor Modification
• As a 'hello world' #2 exercise, we've done some Knight Rider walking led experiments. These experiments demonstrate: pwm, either through SX Virtual Peripherals or inline and How to drive many leds with a few io-pins.
• 3D Miller controlled through rs-232
• Wireless LCD display
• Driving a shift register led display driver.
• Driving 4 seven segment led displays
• 'Very Limited Space' Midi Sustain Pedal.
• Fake Cricket.
• Reading Rotary Encoders
• Software projects:
  • An eclipse plugin for SX assembly language.
  • Sxgo, a fast, portable SX28 emulator.
• Oven temperature controller
• RGB Light Show (Wired/Wireless)
• Digital Analogue Clock with Traffic Light alarm

Notes

Some links to notes, images from the manual, etc:

• SX28 data sheet with pin-outs, instruction set summary, memory model, etc.

Programming

For newer PICs, the picprog programmer needs to be Modified. SX chips should best be programmed with the SX-Key or the SX-Blitz.

Although almost each project could be done with an SX as well as a specific PIC chip, the approach and philosophy between both is quite different. Look at the differences between the SX and the PIC we found (on the internet) and discovered (ourselves) between the two competitors.

A very useful utility for programming timing loops is PicLoops. It works for SX as well as PIC.

And how can you program a SOT23 package (i.e. the 10Fxxx series)? With a SOT23-to-DIL adapter.

Atmel has released a 4K version of the well-known Attiny2313, called the Attiny4313. It is fully (pin) compatible, with the only difference that it has double memory. The Attiny4313 is not yet recognized by Avrdude, so we have modified the Avrdude config file to be able to program it. This link contains the Attiny4313 section that should be added to your config.

Tutorials

As there are many, many tutorials about PICs on the internet, and the SX is very well documented by Parallax, we won't be serving another one here.

You might want to know how to run avrdude from eclipse under linux.

Nowadays, we prefer to do our stuff in SMT. Why? Because it avoids the bore of drilling holes. And you can make use of cheap SMT resistor and capacitor assortments, so you'll always have the right values available. Working in SMT requires making PCB. We use the laserprinter/iron method. One tip: the ironing sticks much better if the paper is wet. And one other tip: etching in CupricChloride works very well and you never run out of etchant!

ToDo List

Here are some projects that need to be finished:

• 100Mhz SX based Frequency Counter (done)
• AVR Bootloader System (done)
• CC2500 Wireless System, on hold while we're working on the
• Nordic NRF24 wireless system
• AVR DAC Audio playback
• Midi Chord generator
• Solarpower Chicken Lighting System
• PIC-based MidiFilePlayer
• Drumcomputer
• DCC Train control system
• simple GPS logger based on rs232 receiver
• sunrise alarm clock