Re: WHERE'S ALL THE SMALL FOOTPRINT STUFF?

Thanks Dave. I have looked at the Kinetis parts, but I don't have time 
to learn a new Micro, and I know the PICs pretty well. I write in 
assembler, and have never used the ARM assembler, nor do I have tools 
for it, while I do have tools for the PIC and MPLAB is free. In addition 
the 6 bit DAC on the KL02P20 isn't enough for me.

Al

On 4/11/2014 6:10 PM, David Brown [email protected] [msp430] wrote:
> This is off-topic (and nearly sacrilegious) in an msp430 group, but the
> smallest microcontrollers I know of at the moment are the Freescale
> Kinetis devices - they have 20 pin devices in less than 2x2 mm, with
> Cortex M0+ cores (far nicer than PIC's !).
>
> On 04/11/14 07:38, Onestone [email protected] [msp430] wrote:
>> I know I've moaned before, but potentially the best part that Ti built
>> was the MSP430F2131. It's problems were simple, no SBW interface, no
>> comms. It's plusses were a very small footprint, decent I/O count and
>> reasonable memory. As they've added to their portfolio they've
>> concentrated on the high end big memory high pin count stuff, or the
>> very low pin count, like 16 pin QFN packages, which usually just fall
>> short on pin count. Sadly the 2121 and 2131 were orphan parts, an odd
>> transition into the 2 series without the SBW. I looked at the
>> MSP430G2131 and thought here was the answer to my prayers, but it seems
>> to be nothing more than an MSP430F2002 with possibly a slightly better
>> Brownout detector, how about uniformity in numbering Ti??
>>
>> Most of the stuff I design has small physical requirements, like, in the
>> past a 0.45" (11.43mm) sq wireless multi-sensor device, a sub 0.25gm
>> (.008oz) motion and temp logger, and a 6x8mm (.235 x .315) motion temp
>> and light logger with optical comms. All of these used the 2131 or 2121
>> because nothing else had the pin count I needed, but in all cases my
>> data rates were limited by the need to bit bang comm ports. Once again I
>> find myself in that situation, I have a 10mm diameter limit on one
>> design and a 5x8mm limit on the other, and this time I need a faster
>> comm system. The closest I can get is the MSP430G2432, nothing remotely
>> close in FRAM, which would be my preference, and nothing else I can find
>> in a 4 x 4 mm  QFN24 package. The other problem I've often encountered
>> is the lack of a DAC. In these small designs I don't have space (or
>> budget) for an external DAC, and surprisingly need one quite often. For
>> this design I've been forced out of the MSP430. For the first time in 14
>> years I've been unable to find a part that does what I need
>> economically, and am jumping ship to the Microchip PIC16LF1709, a 20 pin
>> QFN part with DAC, UART, SPI and plenty of other resources. Yes it's 8
>> bit, yes it has that evil PIC architecture, but I was once a huge fan of
>> the small PIC's, and don't see this as an insurmountable problem.
>>
>> Whinge over
>>
>> Al
>>
>
> ------------------------------------
> Posted by: David Brown <[email protected]>
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Posted by: Onestone <[email protected]>
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