dsPIC33EP512MC502 - better suited for a development board

 

From Firewing perspective, this microcontroller comes with 512Kb Flash memory and a faster speed compared to the dsPIC33FJ128MC802 that has native support in Firewing Basic which means all the optimizations are available to the user.

And I almost said everything about advantages and disadvantages. Better in every way (e.g., has a very well thought redistribution of the 5 volts tolerant pins), but dependent on a commercial version of XC16 compiler to gain access to all the optimizations. And to add more to the disadvantages, it is not supported by the Pickit 2, a programmer that is still widely used in the Maker world, especially under the Linux operating system, mainly because it can be made at home.

Still, the increased speed (where the internal oscillator has a better calibration) and the amount of the memory can make up for the lack of code optimizations. There were always differences of opinion between the Industrial environment and Academic environment about how a development board should look and what microcontroller should equip that board and one big disagreement was about the memory capacity of that microcontroller. The Academic environment knows very well that the majority od the students have "small pockets" and they can't afford to spend (too much) money on a limited toolchain, only to discover that their application needs a much potent microcontroller than one offered by the Industrial environment (e.g., the micros provided by Microchip on their Microstick development boards). As such, the Academic environment will always use the microcontroller with the largest memory space available (e.g., ChipKit MAX development boards).

Now, to ease the migration to dsPIC33EP512MC502 microcontroller (and the 5V EV variant), Firewing16 boards should be redesigned (or any board that was based on Firewing16 design). Or designing the next generation, Firewing R3, directly based on that micro, with a new set of libraries.

If you look at the dsPIC33EP512MC502, the way the 5V tolerant pins and some of the features on the pins are distributed, you will conclude that a certain positioning of I2C and SPI peripherals is preferred/suggested to the user. A new positioning, which affects that of the R2 board. I should insert some images with side-by-side comparisons between micros, maybe I'll do that when time permits.

Well, dsPIC33EP512MC502 definitely trumps STM32F072 micro for the Maker world, in my opinion, and is worth advertising it as such by the Microchip, that can come also with Pickit2 support.

But I am carried away by my passion in designing development boards and providing a complete development environment with examples (or guides in using the existing ones), ignoring the fact that the only PIC programmer I have is a Pickit2 and nowadays there is less time (and money) for hobby activities so, I will put this on stop and go back to rising goats for survival. :P