Any SX-28 fans here?

[carbonzit]

I'm kind of surprised that in all the postings that involve microcontrollers, nobody ever mentions the SX-28 (formerly made by Ubicom, now owned by Parallax, I believe). This is the only µc I've ever worked with (well, apart from x86 programming).

It's a good little machine, with real-time clock, 12 I/O lines, comparator, 1 instruction/clock, other stuff. Of course, I'm sure there's a $1.50 PIC that does that and more.

Just wondering if anyone else out there ever used these, or still does. They're still available, along with programmers.

Here's the Parallax page about these chips.

 

[Mike - K8LH]

I've certainly heard of it but never used it.

May I suggest you modify your original post and include a link or two for those who might want to take a closer look?

Cheerful regards, Mike

 

[Sceadwian]

I've seen the SX's before as well, not a big fan or Parallax though, they tend to sell overpriced (though well documented and functional) kits primarily aimed at educators. The specs on the surface for the SX line gave me pause a ways back when I was looking at different micro controller lines, however the body of material available for PIC/AVR and even some other chip lines is far better, not to mention variety of devices and development systems.

Just a note... Parallax issued an 'end-of-life' on the SX line that was in 2009... that any chips are still available goes to show you how many people use them. No more will be made, it's effectively a dead chip line.

The single most impressive thing about them was the fact that they're clockable up to 75mhz, which is far beyond the typical 2-16mhz for an AVR/PIC

 

[Nigel Goodwin]

I'm kind of surprised that in all the postings that involve microcontrollers, nobody ever mentions the SX-28

Nothing surprising, it was an obscure device and very few people ever used it - so perhaps no one here does?.

 

[carbonzit]

I get that few people used them, but the company I used to work for used them for all their robotics functions, so they must have had something going for them.

There's no indication on their web site that the chips are obsolete, and Digi-Key still has all their stuff in their most recent catalog, so I don't know about this "end-of-life" stuff.

Parallax also makes the Basic Stamp line that I remember Steve Ciarcia being so fond of (remember his Circuit Cellar?).

 

[Ian Rogers]

Carbon!! Parallax also make the propeller....This is a brilliant chip, I have made a little graphical controller with it.

 

[upand_at_them]

I bought a couple of SX-28's early on, but never used them. I had a cheap programmer that worked for the PIC and there was a ton of PIC examples, so that's what I went with. Like Nigel said, it was obscure.