[sdiy] Microchip DSP kit $60 > AVR32

[Neil Johnson]

Hi,

Eric Brombaugh wrote:
> On Mar 23, 2008, at 8:28 PM, Tom Farrand wrote:
>
>>  I'd love to do ARM projects but the GPL tools
>> seem difficult to use and I don't think they optimize code at all.
>
> I'd be interested to find out where you learned this. I've been  
> using GCC on x86 an Sparc architectures for the last 15 years or so  
> and the optimization is excellent. I've used it on ARM for a few  
> years and it's always seemed adequate. As you pointed out though,  
> the biggest disadvantage is that it setting up a toolchain from  
> scratch can be a hugh PITA. On the other hand, there are a few free  
> pre-built GCC toolchains like YAGARTO (www.yagarto.de) that have  
> done most of the work for you.

I'll second that.  The GCC tools are industry-strength.
Pre-built packages for ARM-GCC for Win32/Linux can be gotten from  
CodeSourcery -

	http://www.codesourcery.com/gnu_toolchains/arm

(they also do prepackaged GCC for ColdFire and PowerPC).  The 'free'  
version is the plain, bare-metal command line tool set.  If you give  
them money you seem to get a lot more (GUI, etc).

Otherwise, if you feel the need for a GUI then check out Eclipse and  
the Zylin modifications to the CDT.  There are several resources out  
there on using Eclipse for developing and debugging microcontroller  
projects with GCC/GDB/Eclipse.

Neil
--
http://www.njohnson.co.uk