Hi,

I'm a newbie, and I'd like to try to build a pic programmer. I have read the sticky posts, and I might use the Ver 5 programmer.

I would like your opinion of the following programmer:

http://home.comcast.net/~botronics/pickey.html


The first schematic appears to include a debugger. Can he achieve an ICD so easily? Would I need a special software for it?

Does the third schematic which suppose to be the newpickey, comes without this debug feature?

which of the two would you recommend?

Thanks

 

This is not ICD. In the "Schematic of PIC-KEY on Proto-board:" figure the PIC is a traget, not part of the tool.

The toggle switch is either in the PROGRAM position or in a COMM mode. In the COMM mode it uses the MAX level shifter to connect the target PIC RX and TX lines to the same serial port used to program the PIC.

To debug with this setup you include code in your program to send informative info over the serial line (PC TERMINAL EMULATOR) to help you understand what your program is doing;

It is not as useful as ICD (In Circuit Debugging). On the other hand it is often good enough. Many people used similar methods for years.

I like the use of the MAX level shifter to generate 12V. This is not often seen on a simple serial programmer. Should work on most any serial port. When you can find one.