Where to buy?

[Omar.M]

Hello,
I have fried all of my samples that I had gotten (just 2 of them, anyway) and now I am looking to buy some PIC microchips.

I am a fairly poor student, I cannot pay handling fees or extra charges... I am just looking for a mail order site that accepts paypal-- and hopefully has a range of PIC chips.

I was really interested in (**broken link removed**... Randy's site but I sent him my order 2 weeks ago :/ and still no reply. That was probably the only site I knew which was cheap.

Thanks a lot,
Omar

 

[kchriste]

I am a fairly poor student, I cannot pay handling fees or extra charges...

You can place another sample order in a month but you may have to sample different chips. Your problem will be that most other places will charge shipping on small $ orders.

 

[Omar.M]

...

Yeah. I don't really want to continue sampling-- it feels kind of wrong. I am ready to pay shipping, in that case I may have to buy a few chips at a time. But I don't want to pay like more than 5 dollars on it.

Am I making it too hard? The search query too exact-- if you catch my drift?
Thanks,
Omar

 

[kchriste]

You need to tell us where you are in the world. If you are in the USA, then digikey is fairly good if you order more than $25 of stuff. You can check their shipping costs at:
http://sales.digikey.com/ship_cost.asp

 

[philba]

mouser has no minimum and if you can get US Mail, it is a fairly cheap shipping option. plus mouser is cheaper than glitchbuster on PICs (cheaper than digikey as well).

 

[Omar.M]

...

I am very sorry for not including enough information:
I live in Ottawa, Canada.

I have looked at Digi-Key A lot... their prices are great but the problem is they slap on a handling fee plus the shipping free-- quite frankly I do not order that much stuff to be paying like 10 dollars extra on an order < $5

Mouser seems interesting, I will look into that-- thanks.
Any others you guys recommend? You must remember I have no credit card so I rely on paypal

Happy Holidays, by the way,
-Omar

 

[dknguyen]

Check out www.glitchbuster.com

It's run by a professor and sells PICs, resistors, diodes, caps, transistors, and a bunch of other basic components and ICs with dead cheap shipping.

$2 shipping good enough for you?

*Mouser has at the door shipping or brokerage fees or something like that (for shipping to Canada). Digikey does not, which is why I like Digikey better. Mouser does have prices on some items that are 30-45% less than Digikey though- but include shipping and it's only worth it when you have a big order.

 

[Omar.M]

Yeah

Yes, I know about Glitchbuster. Infact Randy's company was the first one I went to. I sent him an order 2 weeks ago. He has not replied yet. I have sent him 2 more e-mails, but it seems he is not responding.

That is why I am here, asking about other companies.

I like Digi-key, I would totally go with them or Mouser. Just, if I am buying like less than 5 dollars worth of equipment they are charging me like 5 dollars extra for Handling fees, or weird-o shippers.

Plus the big thing is I don't have a credit card. I have to use paypal...

 

[William At MyBlueRoom]

Try DIPmicro in Burlington. https://www.dipmicro.com

 

[dknguyen]

Yes, I know about Glitchbuster. Infact Randy's company was the first one I went to. I sent him an order 2 weeks ago. He has not replied yet. I have sent him 2 more e-mails, but it seems he is not responding.

That is why I am here, asking about other companies.

I like Digi-key, I would totally go with them or Mouser. Just, if I am buying like less than 5 dollars worth of equipment they are charging me like 5 dollars extra for Handling fees, or weird-o shippers.

Plus the big thing is I don't have a credit card. I have to use paypal...

He has a spam filter because he gets tons of spam. Try rewording your messages and titles differently (and indicate that there should only be one order in each one). YOu might want to use a different e-mail address (one that isn't hotmail or something that won't get blocked to tell him to put your regular email onto his whitelist).

William: Cool! A place where I can get Microchip's CAN transceiver by itself without paying $15 for shipping!

 

[Omar.M]

Woah

Thanks a lot for the DIP micro link.. they seem great but they don't have the 16F628A chip I need ... but their prices are so good for other things...

I see now. I was suspecting the same problem. Maybe I will try with my ISP mail?

Thanks,
Omar

 

[dknguyen]

Yeah, for me, one of my university email accounts worked while the other kept getting blocked. I had to email and say that my other one was my regular.

 

[Omar.M]

Well, I am glad it wasn't because he suddenly went out of business or something. Either way, thanks a lot.

I have sent him an e-mail from my e-mail account as well on he other mail too.
How long does it take for him to reply, usually?

Omar

 

[Rolf]

How to order from Randy........ (glitchbuster.com)

Well, I am glad it wasn't because he suddenly went out of business or something. Either way, thanks a lot.

I have sent him an e-mail from my e-mail account as well on he other mail too.
How long does it take for him to reply, usually?

Omar

I sent Randy an order just a short time ago, and got it in less than a week.
Here is how I did it. Since all prices and shipping is known, I just added up my order and sent him the money by PayPal and included my order at the same time by using the PayPal notification window. No email used................

 

[jimg]

I've found Newark to be very good. Lowest prices on pics. No service charges.

 

[Omar.M]

Darn

Drats. I finally got a reply fro, him but it turns out that he doesn't have the chips (16F628A) in stock. That sucks.

I like Newark, but they don't accept paypal. I have no credit card.

Does anyone recommend anything? Is there a chip that is like the 16F628A? Or does anyone know any places I can buy some then (mail in)

 

[philba]

Randy appears to have the 16F648A in stock. that is identical to the 628A except it has twice as much memory. $.30 more. It's kind of odd that he let his stock of 628As run down. That's got to be one of the top couple of PICs in terms of volume.

For a little more money, you could also get the 16F88. it is very similar to the 628A though init is a little different and serial I/O is on different pins. If you are using the chip for experimenting, the F88 is a good choice as it also has analog.

Glitchbuster is a side biz for randy. He has good intentions but gets busy on other things and doesn't always give the biz the time it needs. I'd sure like to see him succeed. He really needs to put together an order form instead of relying on email.

 

[Omar.M]

Hmm, seems the world hates me... his 16F648A is a SOIC-- it cannot be used on breadboards.

Are there any others similar ?

Thanks,
Omar

 

[kchriste]

What are you intending on using them for?
Something like the 16F819 might work also. If you sub any chip you will need to make some changes to the code/hardware. With some of them you may only have to change the list directive to redefine the processor.

 

[Omar.M]

Well

I have just recently gotten into this programming stuff.
Right now though, I am just playing around with LEDs and POV toys. I am writing the code myself, in GCBASIC

The code for the 16F628A looked like this:

#chip 16F628A, 4
#config XT_OSC, MCLRE_OFF

dir PORTB.0 OUT
dir PORTB.1 OUT
dir PORTB.2 OUT
dir PORTB.3 OUT
dir PORTB.4 OUT
dir PORTB.5 OUT
dir PORTB.6 OUT
dir PORTB.7 OUT

DIM A(4)

A(1) = b'11111100'
A(2) = b'00110011'
A(3) = b'00110011'
A(4) = b'11111100'

Start:

For var = 1 TO 4
Portb = A(var)
wait 7 ms
Next

goto Start

Just some basic stuff. With a code like this would I have to change lots?