Hi,

I apologise if this topic has been done to death here (like 'PIC programmers') but I searched and came up with two results, so I would like a little advice.

Right, I've got an amtega88 laying around here that I bought on a whim, so its about time I got started working with it (and possibly other AVR's). I'm happy with PIC's, so I'm not going near any sort of debate.

My question is, is there a simple serial programmer (no micro's in it, just passives and possibly a logic chip) that will work with official atmel software? I've googled my heart out, and the number of options for programmers is frankly overwhelming, serial, parallel, really simple ones for pony prog, serial ones with micro's in them, USB, ICE etc..

Rather than spending £30+ for something that I may not persue there appear to be plenty of DIY programmers on the web, like AVRISP (with a micro in it), and the ones from Olimex http://www.olimex.com/dev/avr-pg1.html - for serial. I don't like using seperate PC programs for writing/compiling and then loading the software onto chip, but I'm unsure of what programmers AVRstudio supports. I'll avoid JTAG, and debuggers for now, just a simple programmer that works with AVRstudio, serial (want to use a USB->serial convertor) not parallel, and that covers the atmega series.

Any advice would be appreciated guys, cheers,

Blueteeth

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Inconsistency is the key to flexibility!

 

If you're not sure weather or not you're going to pursue AVR's use one of the basic parallel port programmers out there, they can be made with a few passives and transistors, anything else is going to cost you 20-30 dollars unless you find someone that wants to send you a pre-programmed AVR for a pony prog style programmer for really cheap (postage plus a couple dollars)

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Hey Sceadwian,

Thanks for the reply. I guess you're right...I also completely forgot about any bootloader option...so I could just use the parallel port to load in a bootloader, because my parallel port is usually used for lattice CPLD's. I think just found one on ebay, about 20 seconds ago that says it works with avrstudio 4.

Cheers man,

Blueteeth

__________________
Inconsistency is the key to flexibility!

 

You may want to try posting this question on the website www.avrfreaks.net. AVRfreaks.net website is full of information on the tools that are available for use with AVR devices.

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