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- čas přidán 26. 10. 2018
- Using the Padauk programmer to program the 8 pin SO PMS154C micro and flash a LED on a breadboard.
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I have told everybody I know about this 3 cent chip, these are some of the best EeVBlog videos yet. #KeepupthegreatworkDave
I fully concur that !
I think they are funny and potentially the most practically useful to me, I actually bought some of these.....just waiting for the programmer now.
Yeah, some funny and entertaining projects with the 3 cents microcontroller would be great.
Same here. But I do get weird looks, especially from my grandma.
This is the best EEVblog video i have seen. So much nicer than bagging other peoples work.
AVR GCC is actually pretty good at optimizing for really small microcontrollers. For the ATTiny 10 you can a lot of the stuff without even using its 32 BYTES(!) of SRAM, all with C.
I did my electronics (comms) apprenticeship starting in '80. In '79 calculators were still banned at my school!
I didn't use a computer (started on PDP7 and 9 at work in '90!) until Win 3.0 in about '95..
To see the functionality in such tiny chip packages at such negligible cost just staggers me.
So cheap in fact that these controllers are designed to be disposed of. PWM greeting card and trashcan.
I am impressed. A tiny little package that contains so much and can do a lot.
@Dave - cheers for doing all the ground work!!! This is really interesting and I really appreciate your stab at this! :)
sounds about as powerful as the Zilog Z8 from 1998. We used the comparitor with a slope generator to do a ADC. We used it in the Turtle AMR meter reader. Which interestingly has the longest distance record for sending signals over the power line since there was one in the Australian outback. It was a 2K program written in assembly to save space. You can save code space in assembly by making subroutines with multiple entry points.
Nice
@@EEVblog I could send you one of the meter boards, but they are not much to look at. it's a cap based power supply with a switching circkut to send the signal and a Z8 Rom processor. It has an IR led and a photo detector to sense the disk rotating.
You can do those more cleanly in C with goto.
I work in C for programs down to about 400b.
Love your 5 cent approach! Nice stuff!
Love this segment
Ditto. I can't get enough. This series really deserves the coveted DaveCAD award.
This is fantastic. Keep going on this.
Thank you so much Dave! I’m so excited about these!
Suggestion: Use it to run Ws2812b’s!
Can’t wait for more!
Your library works nice, now I can power up 16 led rings with under 3 USD cost!
Extremely interesting !
Thank you.
Wow dave... You really have unleashed a monster here... People seem to be so engaged...
Brilliant ..!!! The video and everything.
Thanks Dave!
Great video! With that retro ass UI I was half expecting the programmer to use a parallel port!
Awesome. Should be possible to program these chips with other programming hardware. Voltages isn't a problem. It's limited how much code is pushed into that little bugger anyway. Dave, care to do a poor-mans decap on one of those? Just torch it with a gas flame, clean the resulting die in acetone and let's see it under the microscope.
Very informative ,Thank you 👍👍👍👍
Great video
I'm imagining this reading I2C and outputting servo PWM control so you could reduce wiring in more complex RC devices by just running busses.
SDCC (Small Device C Compiler) would be a good compiler for the chip.
Use SDCC all the time, myself :D
cool stuff...i hope ya find a good use for them chips in something.. nice to see that LCD still kickin strong!...i think they can handle the bias these days..older ones would be a different story..
Super interesting series...
Nice, thanks for sharing👍😀
Thanks for exploring these low cost chips, they ended up providing me just the solution I needed!
Had a problem generating the right reset timing for the ESP32 IO0, crystal oscillator and LAN8720A phy on my wESP32 project, and the custom programability of these chips was just what I needed to fix it (see www.crowdsupply.com/silicognition/wesp32/updates/the-phy-reset-saga). Prototyped it with the P-003 programmer, went through the process to get Sino-Mos to program and reel a bunch of these (MOQ was 9000, but still cheap), and now I have my own low cost "custom chip" that does exactly what I need it to do for my next build!
Looking forward for the waveforms.
Dave, I really like this, thanks for doing it. At that kind of price, it could be brilliant for some odd little projects if you can get the programmer going. After spending $120 on the programmer and ICE it would take a long time to get it back but if it's only the ICE it would be worth doing. Looking forward to seeing more updates.
Program a bunch of them as blinkers and they can make the perfect giveaway!
Is there a way to use JEDEC to access everything on the chip and unset the chip fuse?, Have you not tried Code::Blocks or Monodevelop together with the appropriate gcc compiler?
Excellent 👍
sdcc (small device c compiler, instead of gcc) is the open-source solution for several types of microcontroller architectures (8051, z80, pic, stm8, et al)
i give this a gigantic finger up! i am so excited over this im -32,768
Would SDCC be a better compiler for it?
Definitely, has no problem with 512B RAM 2K flash 8051 stuff I worked on. I doubt it has support for this chip though.
Nice vid😁
In your future video can you please find out what unpopulated CN21 (near JP3) is for?
Excellent all the way ...
Great for your power supply project, do you catch my drift?
OTP not for the hobbyist market... these things are for disposable electronics like greeting cards. Amazing the job they've done with the IDE etc... thanks for the demo!
I know, its fascinating. Would like to know more about the language and the compiler. Funny how most want to port the lang to some other compiler (that they are familiar with). Hey lets study and use what they provide shall we?
@@orbitalair2103 I agree, its going to be far more effort to try port a compiler than to use the one provided. Has no one played Shenzhen/IO? Learning a new language if you know one already isn't difficult.
Hello, Could you send me where can I get this programer. Thank you. Regards
Any details on that breadboard @ 17:01 and where to buy one?
Thanks.
What type of things can be done with one of those? Other than a blinky LED of course 😀
led chaser, rgb led controller, led dice, and alot more
Was there a comparison to other micro p on the market?
I reckon it is fair that a company that took time to design and produce a ICE and programmer doesn't want to open source it.
$100 isn't all that much. The pickit isn't much cheaper.
You can get the PICkit 3 for like EUR 10 from China, free shipping. This programmer looks like 80s technology with all these jumpers.
@@frankbuss because PIC's are popular worldwide, so yes, it is financially viable to produce and sell knock off programmers. I bet you if that padauk micro becomes a worldwide phenomenon, cheap programmers are going to pop up on eBay.
This one might look like 80's tech but it does the job, don't need more.
I still think $100 is a very fair price, especially considering the IDE is free, and apparently all is pretty well documented.
And I bet you if you were a Chinese factory, buying a couple of millions of chips, they'd give you an ICE for free.
Agreed, it's fair enough. And you don't want support queries from diy programmer users
$100 is nothing in comparison with 1000 sold products. Design and development is always more expensive, but 3c micro is great cost cut in big volume production.
@@EEVblog I disagree. For antitrust purposes, you should either sell hardware with full disclosure of the spec, OR software that conforms to someone else's spec. Letting a company put a product into commerce without disclosing a spec is corruption. I'm sure the mob puts a lot of effort into their crimes, should they be rewarded eh?
would love to see a reverse engineered programmer for these chips
Yea the westerners making cheaper counterfeit Chinese stuff would be great lol.
it well be a dream to come true
No..... no...... just no.
You don't seem to understand that internal Padauk engineering data is necessary to ensure the best possible write to memory cells. The quality of that write is what determines how long your part lasts before failing.
@@Peter_S_ A correct reverse engineering would program those chips at least as the well as the original, it would cut cost on the case and supply a DIY kit for the amateur builder.The manufacturer want to make profits on the chip not on the development tools they are already giving away the compiler for free, they expect to sell a few 100-1000 programmers and a few 100 millions chips, cheaper the tools will be, higher the chip sale will be and the profit to the chip maker. I wouldn't be surprised that they would supply the programmer schematic if requested.
@@Peter_S_ You have to keep things in perspective. Lets say you're developing an ink jet cartridge, putting an anti refill chip costing $0.03 instead of $0.30 is going to generate $ millions to your company and to this chip maker.
What comes with the programmer? Looking at the LCSC website, I don't see the chip adapters. Do you have to get them somewhere else?
eBay. That's where I got mine :)
Unboxing on second channel. Buy or make your own
I dunno about the gcc thing, I’ve done a lot of work with the attiny13a, and avr-gcc is quite good at managing the resources, I’ve had trouble optimizing my code any further in assembly, and the portability gained is well worth a byte or two.
Then again EEPROM and PROGMEM being available help a ton, so maybe not with these micros.
Ok Dave was the solder worth more than a chip? Y I know the adapter was lol where was this when I started. EPROMS were a pain lol
15:30 if you use TagConnect, the connector on the board won't cost more than the microcontroller (because it's free).
I have a generic question, but I have to ask. Overall reliability. Will the device last or perform the same as main brands?
Don't see why not.
Its nice to see a manufacturer that is interested in helping developers. I recently purchased a programmer which cost over £2000.00 and it could not program some devices without and (expensive) adaptor simply because the pin out was different even thought the programming algorithm was the same. I asked them why they did not allow users to create custom package files to define pins and they said it could not be done. I think they meant that they could not charge users £500.00 for adaptors if they could do it.
Name and shame!
Its a well known supplier (D.....an) I restore a lot of old equipment and wanted a programmer to program old EPROMS and PROMS. To add new devices all that is often needed is a rearrangement of a few pins so I asked if this could be added to the software rather than needing an adaptor as they state in the tech info that all 48 pins on the programmer are 'universal' pins so I assume they can be set in software as power, gnd, in or out so I see no reason why this cannot be an easy user function in the software to allow users to choose a programming algorithm and assign pins. I assume this is what the programmer does normally from the selected device. I would add that they provide a service to add new devices on request but they have never added any I have asked for. I have had to purchase adaptors for some of the more un-usual devices that need multiple rails and that is fair enough.
i am facing i2c slave task in padauk . the bulit code not working
Cost of the programmer and ICE is reasonable. Glad you've done the reviews.
Padauuuken!
Brilliant
I will be waiting for the ability to order my next EEVblog multimeter for under a dollar!!! :-D
I bet it would be fairly straight forward to make a programing feeder (might have to be double width) for pick-and-place machines. If it takes less time to program/verify the chip than populating one full board, you wouldn't wast any machine time and would have no need for a separate programing machine. If programing takes longer, you could have multiple programing feeders loaded and switch off between them.
ElectricGears A more standard solution for assembly house programming is to include the programming algorithm into the script for the automated board testing robot. Many programmable chips do come with the needed code as downloads from the vendor sites or even as an output option in their IDEs. Combining this with your other electrical tests in an efficient test procedure that also assigns serial numbers to QA-passed boards is the job of the design and production engineer.
I wonder what the failure rate is though. Would you want to scrap or rework a board if programming fails?
@@chaos.corner I believe some of the more advanced machines can dump a part if it looks wrong when it's scanned for alignment offset. Those ones could dump the micro in the defective parts bin and wait for the programing of a 2nd one. On others, I assume the feeders send a 'part ready' signal to the machine when a fresh part is in position. The programmer/feeder would just advance the reel one more place and let the defective chip wind up on the take-up reel. Depending on the cycle times you might have to wait a bit for the next chip. If it's a complex board, there should be time enough for several defective chips and machine time would be less then scrap/rework. On a tiny board (so it's only scrapped) where the extra programing holds up the machine, you're out that machine cycle anyways.
@@ElectricGears I was more thinking about if the programming fails. But that's likely a rare event in any case. Unless there was a bad batch. Oh, never mind. I see you are talking about programming in-line before it goes on the board. That's fair enough.
I noticed your Development breadboard looks like a good one.
Call that a breadboard? *This* is a breadboard.
Chaos Corner show me your breadboard or make and model #
@@lafpml1 It's a reference.
"Reverse-engineer"... Now Padauk regrets sending you the programmer.
Can we program it using ardriuno
Just curious, is it possible to decap and UV erase them? :)
Poor man's FLASH.
The resources needed to decap it would likely cost more then the whole micro itself.
Not to mention that the cheapest method for OTP memory is to have an array of fuses. Yes, writing data to it is literally by blowing the fuse. Simple crude, and not 100% guaranteed to work either, but it sure is cheap. So in this case, UV would not restore those fuses.
But this 3 cent micro might use another method for OTP memory.
this programmer also calibrates internal rc oscillator when uploading the code.
This looks killer! Is there a community for this? Like the 3-cent club? Doesn't need to be practical could be a challenge in hackaday. 3 Cent-ers or something.
Start one.
Not yet but there will soon be one. In five years, Arduino will be a forgotten thing of the past and all hobbyists will use PADAUK microcontrollers.
So! When do we get it to boot Linux?
While Padauk may sounds esoteric to DIYers, it is very well known among mcu hardware professionals in China and SEA. Billions of chips made by Padauk are used in toys and small consumer electronics, where power consumption and cost are primary concerns. Some devices may contain more than one such MCUs.
What breadboard is that?
Who is going to make the first RGB LED Blinkey Throwie
Sorry I didn't comment earlier. Anyhow, as a professional Flash memory programming specialist I might guess that this device lacks the internal high-voltage charge pumps that a typical micro would have for self-programming and timing. No doubt they did that to save costs but it would raise the cost of the external programmer circuit.
hi,
you mean there will be no diy programmer any where soon !?
I have fashioned a crucifix from a tube of ATTinys and a USBasp.
X-Mega
Anyone have a link to what that LCD thing is about?
czcams.com/video/ZtOXfFkV2jw/video.html
@@Graham_Wideman Thank you
Interesting. I wonder though. If capacitance allows it to kind-of work without the ground attached, maybe it also allows it to avoid some of the effects of the DC bias since the data lines are still being driven at frequency.
great thumbnail
glorious thumbnail
Chosen by the magic CZcams algorithm
Gotta get your tongue at the right angle for it to work
Thumbs up on the scoping the programmer. do it with a NOP and JUMP ( once you know the instructions for those).
Great video again Dave!! This is really badass for those looking to play around with something like this to learn. I am hoping there will be some more videos coming out and maybe even some projects. I'm lovin this series and I am pretty sure everyone else is as well. Who'd a known!!
The programmer is $60, thats damn cheap if you asked me for something like that. Why must people be so cheap at times. C'mon guys n gals. Pony up the cash or use another solution.
Agreed. But high novelty value in making an Arduino programmer for it
@@EEVblog I will not disagree with you there. And also, because why not, right? ;-)
60$ makes sense for someone that would use 1000+ IC. So most people, that will be below 100 IC in whole lifetime. 100 IC cost FAR LESS than programmer.
So if we can have very cheap add-on for arduinos, then you add option, to use such IC (even if less than 100 for each), to many 1000 if not millions of people.
100x 1M++ is still better than 0 for PADAUK
Streufer MIght be cheap for you,
like a days work for someone earning minimum wage in the USA or Australia.
But for someone working minimum wage here it's 2 weeks wages. Not something id buy to play around with even at that cost.
Im down for reversing eng. that thing.
they probably make more money from selling the programmers than from the chips at those prices
It's been a LOT of years, but maybe I'll have to dust off the proverbial soldering pencil.
Sorry for the simple/stupid question... but what kind of things would you use this chip for?
Jeff Grant Anything cheap that doesn't have a custom chip available. Like half of the gadgets sold in dollar stores.
I'm planning on using them for costume lighting/effects. These PM154Cs also look powerful enough to use for some laser tag accessories I have in mind too. Way cheaper/simpler/smaller than throwing Arduinos at these types of projects.
Anything that needs a bit of programmable logic. It's just like any other microcontroller - it'll do whatever you program it to do with the tiny amount of memory and hardware it has built in.
Offloading simple tasks off a main processor. Like a point load pwm controller, io or serial control, tons of uses
@@tmilker But you can get super cheap micros with flash and such for like a buck a pop?
Can someone answer a question for me from a newbie? These 3 cent jobs are OTP. Could you get an equally cheap Paduk flash memory chip, then have a kind of boot loader you’d program into the otp, whose only jobs would be to flash in the user program into the external memory chip and execute the user program? Say the processor is 3 cents and the flash chip is 3 cents or so, well you’re only out of pocket 6 cents or so...
Unlikely, you would have to write an emulator in the chip, there isn't enough ROM for that. If the task you're thinking is to avoid OTP, then use a 15 cent chip instead that is erasable.
Joshua Lloyd hi Joshua, which 15 cent micro controller would you recommend? Is there one from paduk or maybe STM? Didn’t realise you could get flashable micro controllers that cheap.
@@cthoadmin7458 I've heard PIC and AVR have some that cheap. I don't have a product in mind right now, and can't find one at the moment. But check out Digikey, or Octopart, use the filters, let me know if you find something in that range. I've heard they are available but I've never used one.
I think that chip and an LED is actually cheaper than a blinking LED.
I have no idea, but yes the prices are probably about the same. But I think the Chinese will still stick with putting a small chip inside the LED, because these chips are probably way more tolerant to voltage conditions. For example, a self color-changing RGB led can be hooked to a 3V coin cell without any resistor or capacitor and will work until the battery will be so low that you won't be able to see the LED anymore. Such a battery does have a huge internal resistance. With the PWM dimming there will be a hell lot of ripple. The blinking/color-changing chips are very resilient to power supply ripple because they just contain a super-simple power-on reset circuitry, a low-tolerance RC oscillator and one or two hundreds of logic gates to control the LEDs. By the time the chip does crap because the battery voltage went too low, like I said the LEDs won't light anymore.
However if they use a microcontroller, even if it costs 3 cents, a blinking or color changing LED could crash or do weird stuff if the supply voltage gets unstable.
@@atmel9077 Yep, the spec makes it very clear that this is for stable voltage applications, and a LV POR at 3.0v is unfortunately really high. That's not much life from a coin cell
@@jnevercast 3V POR is for the highest frequency 8MHz, which is really fast for a 3-cent micro! The LV POR can be as low as 2V for the lowest frequencies
@@atmel9077 Good knowledge, thanks. I've not viewed the datasheet in full.
Pick a cheap hobbyist MCU for the next series ?
yes would be nice if theres a cheaper way to program them
Do you want a pony too? Programming isn't trivial unless the IC has self-programming capability. $100 for an OTP programmer is completely trivial.
Did you know that Digikey charges $0.25 per chip for programming parts when you're getting multiple reels of 3000 programmed?
@@Peter_S_ Do you work for Padauk? ;)
@@Peter_S_ For people using them professionally sure, it's practically nothing. But I think many here were excited about using them in hobby projects and for that a $100 programmer is quite expensive.
(...) is quite cheap ftfy.
I wanted to program some old EEPROMs as part of hobby projects and £30 was too much for my cheap ass.
Where is Ben heck ?
5 cents! I'm going to go broke!
Some cans and bottles have a larger redemption value if brought to a recycler, at least here in California. Heck, I think there are a few different containers that are worth at least 3 uC's each at this point, 2 if you go full baller like Dave did here.
#HomelessEEforHire
This chip is not programmable with Arduino, so what is actually the cheapest chip that is?
I have a case where all I need is a chip that turns off another chip when the AA battery is below 1v. The key is it is very low power, i'm using a attiny85 which will work, buts its $1.50, adding it to a $5 setup is a bit much, but I don't know of any other solution..I'm sure someone EE could do some analog solution, but it would be more than a single component to hand solder, so one of these that just reads voltage, turns on a pin if below, and go back to sleep, this would be great for that.
They now have a MTP chip (multiple time programmer, 1000 times only) which would be great for hobby, if an arduino could program it.
That 3 cents is with or without tariffs?
Does Taiwan fall under the Chinese tariffs?
@@drivejapan6293 Who knows these days ...
You have tariffs for a 3 cent part?
@@jnevercast if there is a tariff on microcontrollers then this would fall under that. It's price is irrelevant. But I don't think these Taiwanese parts fall under the tariffs on Chinese goods.
I'm looking forward to the reverse engineering video!
i read there is a free compiller for this right now, but i dont understand how to use it :/
This micros can be program only one time?
Yes, it's one time programmable. But at 3 cents each, you can probably afford to just throw away the test units until you have something working.
@@jmonsted That's not how you're supposed to use it though...
You develop using ICE, then you test it on a prototype with real chip using a ZIP socket. If it works, you ask 100.000 of them ready programmed on a reel for mass production of your what ever gadget-
If it doesn't work, you go back to your code using ICE to find out why... you don't use a chip every time you want to test your program...
Obviously...
@@Mtaalas If you need to test your program fewer than 4,000 times, it's cheaper to buy the 3 cent chip and throw away, than to buy the ICE. (Also, not counting the time required to learn how to hook up the ICE, even if it's 15 minutes, that's something.)
@@linagee You're not counting in the TIME it takes to swap out 4000 chips on an off the ZIF-socket...
Time is money as well. Let's say I as a developer earn 25$/hour (an average pay where I live for that sort of work) every time I press "program" I need to use additional 30 seconds of time swapping the chips around -> 500x30 seconds is already 4.1 hours of extra time needed, that's over 100$ in pay...
Not economically viable or very sane
Any chance of someone hacking an In-Circuit-Serial-Programming port and an FT232 or similar programmer?
I suppose it is beating the snot out of the ATTINY13A-SU @ USD$0.24 in Benjamins/unit. But for the lowly hobbyist like me, the Tiny13 is infinitely easier to use ... With avr-gcc, erasable flash, programmer availability, and community support. You went a long way to make a blinky!
Did you know ET actually says, "ET home phone"? One of the classic quotes that is generally done wrong!
aww i wish you got the actual 3 cent chips instead of the 5 cent ones, or at least a few of the 3 cent ones just to prove they work, otherwise its just like getting any old chip. the whole point was the 3 cent price tag
The comment in the FPPA0 routine - 125,000 / 125 = 1,000, rather than 125
Paying for the emulator and programmer might make sense for a makerspace
Its probably cheaper to order a 1000 ICs pre programmed than it is to buy a programmer ;)
@@jnevercast But if you're gonna get a bunch of random DIYers each with their own small scale project, each with varying level of programming and debugging skills, it would be less wasteful to have the emulator and programmer devices.
how does every single person on earth have a different way of saying padauk? i've heard puh-dook, pah-dook, pah-dawk, pad-oak, padock, puhduck... list goes on!
0.05c micros are great. What's all this fluff about that large LCD?!
LCD should normally be driven with AC voltage, because otherwise this could cause damage to the liquid crystals. 9 months ago he started to drive a LCD with DC voltage to see what would happen, and yet it still works perfectly.
It's a bit silly that they don't want to release how to program the chips. These chips could easily become insanely popular like the Arduinos (atmegas) if they just opened it up a tiny bit more. I feel like keeping the programmer proprietary is going to hurt them a lot.
They probably do not want lots of people who only bought a few parts to bother them with support questions.
Keep in mind that the entire world's hobbyist market might not even equal a single order from one of their regular customers.
@amihart....it's a great value if you are going to bring something to market, 60 bux is nothing vs the money you will save. If you are a hobbyist just stay with Arduino etc. or ig going to market start with Arduino for prototyping/ proof of concept, then design around a 3 cent chip like this. Keeping in mind supply issues/ plan B's.
Just to clarify for everyone who doubts the importance of the "low volume" hobby market and why it is more important than it looks:
All the hobby toys are just inexpensive educational tools, these small arm/avr/pic controllers that are used everywhere, they are well known and very accessible to hobbyists. The hobbyists have learned how to use them, how to solve problems with them.
But hobbyists aren't completely separated from the rest of the world. The hobbyist that has build a small toy robot has to work somewhere and his co-workers might also have build toy projects. And now they have to decide what to use to do some project for the company.
And that is why you will find pic/avr/arm everywhere.
maybe it has to do with the overseas market (I.e. people ripping each other off?)... but even 60 bucks is a bargain ... the chips are almost free...a genuine arduino board is like 20 bucks, the chips are something like 2$ each. .........but it might make sense market wise to bring out cheaper low volume hobby options, so people get used to your chips and will want to use them later, or if they come up with more serious products the might use the 3 cent chips they know well. --- I could see in particular for little IoT things these chips being very popular and as much as I hate IoT madness its a growing market :3
Probably won't release the programming spec. as it's probably so close to a PIC that they don't want to be sued. Maybe they even copied ideas from a PIC/AT micro by viewing the die, who knows? As for the voltages, that is to guarantee programming margins and is needed in programmers used for professional production. Not so for hobby use (as anyone that ever made a serial port pic programmer will know). The only other analogue voltage needed is the 'programming' high voltage.
If it IS a clone and could be sued, I hope he doesn't make a video showing it's a clone, because that would be bad for EVERYONE.
@@FusionDeveloper I doubt it's a direct clone, probably based on ideas from a PIC/AVR though. If it's been designed from scratch, using similar ideas, I don't think there would be anything illegal going on, a bit like implementing features of well known software independently without actually copying any code. Same goes for reverse engineering the programming protocol - it's probably already been done by a tech hobbiest in China, it's just hard to find when you can't speak or write Chinese.
@@littleal350
When looking for Chinese hobby stuff use Bing as they have a large market share in China. I'm not saying it's perfect, but I've tried it a time or two.
Why would they copy something like an AVR or PIC these days with RISC-V open and the patients for an 8051 expired? I'm no expert, and am honestly just curious why someone would copy something like this when (I think) there are other options that can be used legitimately?
-Jake
@@UpcycleElectronics Well, to get ahead it's easier to start with something that has already been done and then tweak it to your requirements. The Chinese are very good at copying anything (you can even buy fake banknotes for your own country- not that I'd try that, of course) and then producing for a real low cost. It might not be needed nowadays, but I'm talking maybe 15 or so years ago, I think I programmed my first PIC in 1998, who knows if anyone decided to use the basic architecture for their own products between the 90's and now. Also the datasheet bears an uncanny resemblance to that of an 8-bit PIC micro (maybe just by accident as it's an 8 bit micro). I can't see Dave reverse engineering the programmer and upsetting the people that kindly supplied him with the equipment for free - if it were me, however...
China is close to be the first economy of the world soon to be #1 in tech. So something as low tech than a µC programmer is a child's play for its million of engineers !
Isn't there a legal implication to reverse engineering a product to make it open source?
e.g. For software, I've heard before you need one person to look at the results of the code, write a description of the output, and then someone else to write code from scratch to do the same thing without ever having seen the original for it to be legal.
USA law doesn't apply everywhere.
I would presume, without actually having looked at them yet, that the programming procedure is already described in the datasheets, aren't they? In that case there wouldn't really be a need to reverse-engineer that programmer at all; just cook up something to provide the required voltage levels and have an Arduino or something enable or disable them according to the spec. I guess that's about the most naive approach to solving that challenge cheaply, anyway...
@@benhetland576 Dave said that Padauk did not release the programming specs. That's the point of analyzing the programmer, which he (/Dave2) proposes to do.
Imagine if they'd take this pragmatic, easy to use approach further with small pin count, easy to use chips with an equally pragmatic TWI peripheral.
The Attiny44 is the smallest, cheapest chip I know like that.
But I must say I hate the monstrous IDEs of PIC and Atmel and even more so the voodoo jungle of cobbled-together open source stuff.
Gonna program the PMS xD staaahp
Well it is almost the end of the month. I mean, if you're going with that theme.
I wish I had things I needed them for, I would buy them instantly, their almost free.