PIC programmers

[Mark R]

Has anyone got any particular favourites or experience with a variety of different programmers?

I'm thinking of building a few projects using the PIC16 series of controllers, but have seen a variety of very cheap devices which compete with the official 'picstart plus' kit at a fraction of the price.

In particular I'm interested in the kit from www.dontronics.com - which is an absolute bargain compared to the official programmer, and has full support for the 16 series (which is all I'm interested in at this moment).

I appreciate that I'm not going to get great support with the dontronics kit (and that I have to assemble it myself), but am I really missing anything, if I have no plans ever to program the 17 and 18 series. The additional features of the kit such as programming atmel controllers is interesting (but I can't yet find a source of these devices in the UK).

I'd be interested in hearing your experiences/views.

 

[ScottMac]

Try www.maxking.com. They're located in the UK and have a variety of programmers: PIC, Wafer, etc.

I bought one long ago, and it was a quality product. Their software is pretty decent as well.

Good Luck

Scott

 

[blahblah99]

www.electronics123.com sells a PIC16 series programmer for under $20. I have used that in the past and it worked EXTREMELY well. Very cost effective and gets the job done. Don't bother with the C/Basic compilers for PIC chips that you see for sale. They take up too much overhead space and you don't really get the gist of what's happening inside the PIC chip. You will be better off picking up MPLAB from Microchip (its free) and use that to develop your applications.

 

[Mark R]

Scott - I don't suppose you remember if the maxking programmer came in one piece, of whether you had to put it together.

They don't seem to be terribly clear - I don't want to have to assemble it if I don't have to. It looks like a good programmer, but (like all of the P16Pro based programmers) it needs a minor modification to program the 16F628s, I plan to use, properly (despite claiming fully to support them).

 

[ScottMac]

Mine came fully assembled and operational. The only additional step I had to do was to register it at the website to get an "unlock" code, then download the latest software. I bought a Mk14 (now replaced with the VxMini).

I've never heard of Mr. King having an unsatisfied customer; his reputation (from everytihing I've heard) is as good as any online retailer could hope for. The software has been solid, bug-free, and is pretty intuitive ...assuming you have a reasonable idea of what it is you're trying to do.

The project(s) that I purchased the programmer for have been dropped, I haven't played with it for a while now, but unless their way of doing business has changed, I can absoutely recommend the products based on the quality of the hardware, software, and support.

Good Luck

Scott