[sdiy] dsPIC fun board

[Csaba Zvekan]

There is something interesting in this PICKIT2 vs ICD2 business. When  
I have Eric's Firmware loaded in MPLAB 8.10 and make a "build all" .  
Everything compiles fine, creates a hex file. When I download this via  
the ICD2 programmer it works . When I choose PICKIT 2 programmer it  
doesn't. :)
But when I choose the same hex file with the PICKIT 2 Programmer  
Software 2.55.02 and PICKIT 2 Firmware 2.32.00. it works like a charm :)
So I guess downloading out of MPLAB 8.10 via PICKIT2 is not possible  
at this time. Only ICD2 !
You would have to use the PICKIT2's programmer software to download  
the generated hex file. Kind of an inconvenience  .

Csaba


On Jan 19, 2009, at 11:45 AM, Csaba Zvekan wrote:

>
> On Jan 19, 2009, at 11:28 AM, Jason Tribbeck wrote:
>
>> Hi,
>>
>> Csaba Zvekan wrote:
>>
>>> Hi Jason,
>>>
>>>
>>>>> You still need some sort of download hardware though. Since I  
>>>>> use an
>>>>> MCHP ICD2 I don't know what the alternatives are.
>>>>
>>>> I use PICKit2 on my Mac natively - works very well (although I've
>>>> not ventured above 18F series yet; the dsPIC are listed as being
>>>> supported by the command line program [pk2cmd]).
>>>
>>>
>>> When I tried to download the first firmware I tried it with my  
>>> PICKIT
>>> 2 clone . Unfortunately it didn't work on this particular µCU maybe
>>> some later PICKIT2 firmware can handle it . I think it was due to  
>>> the
>>> voltages that it needed to create .
>>> But with the ICD2 it was working just fine.
>>
>> I don't know about how different the clones are; however, 2.10 of  
>> pkcmd was released reasonably recently (I checked yesterday), and  
>> there was a big mention of dsPIC33 support.
>
>
> I looked at Microchips PICKIT2 page and there is a new Firmware.  
> Maybe that one works . I also have to mention that I did have some  
> problems calibrating the "clone" and had to download the firmware  
> via ICSP a few times. Which was a bit of a pain.
> I think the real PICKIT2 is somewhat more reliable than my chinese  
> clone.
>
> Csaba