Subject:
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Re: To HB or not to HB, that is the question.
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.robotics.handyboard
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Date:
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Wed, 23 Apr 1997 16:26:32 GMT
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Original-From:
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Chuck McManis <cmcmanis@netcomANTISPAM.com>
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Reply-To:
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cmcmanis@netcom^nomorespam^.com
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Viewed:
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1412 times
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Fred Cass wrote:
> ... A friend of mine and I are ... trying to decide if we should
> go with the HB, or make something else.
I believe the answer is 'yes'. Which may sound silly but may
turn out to be the answer you settle on. Tom's comments about
the power of 8 bit computers is spot on. They eventually lose
their ability to 'keep up' as it were, however they are so cheap
that they are easy to add additional ones!
> The one compelling reason he gives for using the 6mip 8051 thing is that
> he already has a nice C compiler that produces optimized code (besides
> having a pretty windoze interface, etc.). And of course he's familiar
> with it already.
The above factoid should probably make your choice for you. When you
are building a robot there are many new things to learn, so if you
are unfamiliar with the processor that is just another thing to pile
on to the learning curve. Development tools are also a big investment.
In my robotics practice I've got two standard 'architectures', one
is the 68HC11 and one is the Microchip PIC. I chose these architectures
based on the availability of reasonably priced tools, and the ability
to implement complete systems with a small component count. My
previously qualified architecture was the Z80.
I've been looking for a couple of years now for a decent 16 bit
architecture (the 68000 architecture looks good w/gcc) but haven't
made the commitment because often times robotics tasks that are
'running out of steam' for a processor can be easily parallized
by adding another relatively cheap processor.
> Is there any other 68hc11 C compilers out there for a reasonable
> price?
There are many 6811 C compilers, my favorite is icc11 which is full
ANSI C for $99. I've got most of a library to support the Handyboard
so its almost to the point where I can develop with either ic or icc11.
See the imagecraft web page (www.imagecraft.com) for details.
> Which do you think is easier,
The one you know.
> more expandable,
The one that you are building the I/O ports for.
> more powerful?
This becomes irrelevant.
Sounds to me like you should start out with the 8051, you're bud
has experience with it, development tools, and clearly an urge to
build a board up (there is no way a 'prebuilt' board can be as
efficient in terms of I/O as a home grown board).
--Chuck
--
cmcmanis@netcom.com http://www.professionals.com/~cmcmanis
All opinions in the non-included text above are the sole opinions of
the author.
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Message is in Reply To:
 | | To HB or not to HB, that is the question.
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| I've been looking into the HandyBoard, and it looks great. I'm wondering if I could get some opinions here. A friend of mine and I are going to build a robot, and we are trying to decide if we should go with the HB, or make something else. I know (...) (27 years ago, 23-Apr-97, to lugnet.robotics.handyboard)
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