cachehiker
New Member
I worked out a way to get an Arduino to handle a task here at work involving a variable frequency (0.1Hz to 100.0Hz), variable duty cycle (1% to 99%) pulse train, a 2 line by 16 character LCD display, and RS485 communications by using an old Intel 82C54 Programmable Interval Timer to generate the pulse train so the Arduino can keep up with everything else. The pulse train needs to be accurate to within a few µs.
I can get the Arduino to keep up with two out of three tasks by itself but the third disrupts the pulse train to an extent where we can't trust its accuracy.
I'd rather not use a chip quite as dated as a 82C54 and in a wide body DIP package but the searches I've done haven't turned up any other simple to wire and understand options. Aside from using a more powerful processor, or maybe a Cypress PSoC 3, are there any other more recent devices with three programmable 16-bit counters? how about one with a serial interface?
We have a lot of noobs here and little time to lay out custom PCB's. That's why I prefer to use Arduinos for a lot of these basic testing chores. We also got a good deal and have scads of these parallel interface LCD displays.
I can get the Arduino to keep up with two out of three tasks by itself but the third disrupts the pulse train to an extent where we can't trust its accuracy.
I'd rather not use a chip quite as dated as a 82C54 and in a wide body DIP package but the searches I've done haven't turned up any other simple to wire and understand options. Aside from using a more powerful processor, or maybe a Cypress PSoC 3, are there any other more recent devices with three programmable 16-bit counters? how about one with a serial interface?
We have a lot of noobs here and little time to lay out custom PCB's. That's why I prefer to use Arduinos for a lot of these basic testing chores. We also got a good deal and have scads of these parallel interface LCD displays.