Part 4 : Overview of Internal Peripherals:

The following internal modules are the most common peripherals that you will find in many microcontrollers

USART, CCP, Analogue Comparator. MSSP (I2C and SPI)

The CCP module implements three different modules Capture - to capture the arrival time of a signal change. Compare to generate signals at specific times and PWM: a pulse width modulation output.

USART

The Universal Synchronous Asynchronous Receiver Transmitter.

This allows your PC to communicate with your microcontroller. It is such a universal protocol (serial transmit and receive data protocol) that it is used everywhere. Serial ports used to be included as standard on a PC but now only a USB bus is included. However you can buy a USB to seral module for the same result (the USB part becomes invisible) and you use A terminal program such as Tera Term to view and send data to and from the microcontroller.

It allows you to debug programs and can be used to control the operation of the microcontroller.

You can make a software USART and even operate one on a 16F84  (it does not have a built in USART) but it saves code space if you use an internal module e.g. on a 16F88 or 16F877(A).

As well as this the module can be started and left to get on with transmitting the data on its own so the microcontroller CPU can get on with doing some other useful task.

As with the timers you can operate the USART in polled or interrupt mode and again the polled mode is easier but the interrupt mode saves processing power.

Asynchronous mode

This is the mode that you need to use for communication with standard RS232 interfaces on PC - it is the normal mode of use for RS232.

All you need to make it work is a transceiver that translates the high voltages required by the RS232 interface from/to digital voltage levels e.g. a MAX232 chip.

Synchronous mode

This is a mode of the USART that uses an extra signal - a clock to clock in all data.  It allows very fast operation as the USART does not have to figure out an estimated clock signal position to find the data.

CCP

Capture Compare PWM

This module - CCP - operates in one of three modes:

*Capture.
*Compare.
*Pulse Width Modulation.

You will probably find that the PWM mode is the most useful out of the three but that depends on the task you want to solve.

PWM

PWM has many uses from controlling the speed of a DC motor to generating an analogue signal or controlling the brightness of a bulb.

The basic principle is that the output is fully on or off but by varying the percentage of time that the output is on then the average current delivered to the load can be controlled.

Capture

You can use Capture mode to capture the time that an event occurs.

When an external event occurs e.g. a signal transition from low to high the value of both Timer1 registers is stored in the CCP registers.  

You can then go and look at these stored values to find out when the event occurred.

Compare

This mode compares the Timer1 value to the CCP value and generates an output signal when a match occurs so you can generate an output at a specific time.

One internal use of this mode is to send a 'special event trigger signal' to start an ADC conversion - this would be useful in a datalogger.

Comparator

The analogue comparator is an underused peripheral but it is just as capable as the standalone comparator the LM311 (and just as fast).

The advantage of this module is that it generates an interrupt and you can also feed in a separate comparison voltage generated internally in the PIC.  This comparison voltage is generated by a DAC and is programmable.

Some PICs have two comparators in them and the other advantage is that they operate much faster than using a software solution so using them saves processing power.

For example you could build a line follower robot with two sensors using two comparators.  

If you replace those comparators with the internal PIC comparators you could then add software functionality to make the robot more intelligent.

MSSP,SSP

Another module that deserves a mention is the Master Slave Synchronous Serial port.  

Its implements two high speed serial interfaces I2C or SPI.

SPI

Serial Peripheral Interface.

You can buy SPI chips which have many different functions from ADCs to increasing I/O space.  SPI is a simpler interface than I2C and runs at very high speed 10MHz.

I2C

I2C is more complicated but more flexible and you can use it as a multidrop interface using only two wires - you can attach up to 128 chips on the two wires.  So it's very useful for for adding functions to a design when you have run out of microcontroller pins!

Again you can buy many different chips with many different functions.

Note: the MSSP implements a full I2C interface while the SSP does not.

Control your projects using C.

Next time...

...Programming the microcontroller.

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