Motorola or Microchip?

[FJB203 at aol.com]

>  I just bought a 6805 EVB (programmer) for $25 from a co-worker. I think 
>  Future (or someone like that) lists the Motorola stuff but be prepared, 
>  the 6811 EVM listed for $7-800 last I checked; EVB is cheaper. Get a 
>  catalog from 'em. Again though, check carefully into the Moto stuff, I 
>  think they are about to revamp some of their strategies and improve the 
>  chip availability. Also contact a local sales office or distributor; they 
>  oughta be able to fix you up with some windowed samples or something, 
>  especially if you mention that Microchip word :-)

Todd, I noticed an "intel.com" in your sign off... why not use a Pentium Pro
200? <smile>.  All kidding aside, I had gone the route of selecting the
Motorola 68HC11E9 for the processor when I had the illusion I was going to
build an EFI setup easily (yeah, right).  I also purchased from one of my
staff members, who finished school for electronics, the student version of
the Motorola evaluation kit, and found it to be a great resource, having
serial ports already installed to dump code and program the chip with a
bootstrap loader to read the EEprom.  I haven't done anything with it other
than attach it to my PC as I have other sections of my mid-engine project
that requires immediate attention, but its a cheap way of getting into it, it
really is.

I chose the chip for several reasons... the E9 version has eight A/D lines
coming in, and with minimal buffering circuitry, can monitor a lot of engine
sensors with that.  Also, one of my good friends who lives in Pittsburgh has
been using that chip for many years in a custom gas sniffing monitoring
equipment and knows the entire line of chips like the back of his hand.  To
me machine code is machine code and the minor differences between chips
instruction sets is a matter of reading a book and learning a little bit...
the I liked the Motorola series because they have a flexible line of chips
that you can choose from cheaply and get the job done.

A neat feature is the "SCI" bus on the Motorola chips, allowing you to link
several together.  my original intent was to have one 68HC11E9 control the
engine, and a 68HC11A9 (I think) which has only 4 A/D control the digital
dash, climate control, etc, and they'd talk to one another via the SCI bus.

Just some thoughts...


Frederic Breitwieser
Bridgeport, Connecticut
Homebrew Automotive Mailing List

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