November
1998, Issue 100
Smart
Rocket
EASY
RIDER
It’s
no problem finding parking for the SX, which is offered
in a variety of small packages from 18 to 28 pins, including
DIP, SOIC, and SSOP. It isn’t finicky about fuel either,
running on anything between 3.3 and 6.25 V. It gets
good mileage, consuming about 1 mA/MHz at full throttle
and mere microamps when idling.
Take
a close look at the motor (see Figure 1). Those of you
familiar with Microchip PICs will notice a striking
similarity. Indeed, the SX goes out of its way to offer
PIC16C5x socket compatibility.
|
(Click
here to enlarge)
|
Figure
1—Like
a motorcycle, the Scenix SX may be small, but at
close to 50 MIPS, it’s really fast. |
The
novel in-system programming scheme (using the OSC pins)
for the onboard 2K ´ 12 program flash is supplemented
with a parallel programming mode similar to the PIC’s,
with a slightly different algorithm.
It’s
possible to configure an SX as a PIC clone, but it probably
doesn’t make much sense. Alhough it’s not expensive,
there’s no way an SX is going to compete price-wise
with the much higher volume PIC.
In
fact, after considering the plethora of good 8-bit micros
(including flash-based) on the market, two features
stand out as compelling advantages for the SX—performance
and innovative, low-cost, easy-to-use development tools.
