I have an STK200, and have used it with an 8515 and 8535.
The STK200 is a very nice development board, very easy
and flexible to work with. If your chip supports external
memory (e.g. the 8515) all you have to do is add a latch
and some SRAM to the appropriate sockets. The AVR processor
architecture is much more advanced than either the PIC
or the 8051; it is designed for high-level languages and
has a proper hardware stack and other such nice stuff.
It has a huge pool of fully functional registers, unlike
the PIC where everythign has to go throw W.  There are
several RTOSs available for it if those interest you;
if you can afford a copy of the IAR C compiler, Jean
Labrosse's uC/OS-II will run there. Some of the memory
constraints of the PIC just don't exist for the AVR.
Don't let the relatively low MHz of the chip fool you,
it doesn't have the same kind of clock divide as you see
in the PIC and the 8051.

There is a port of gcc for the AVR (follow the links on
Atmel's web site under Third Party Tools on the AVR page)
and a very nice assembler called AVA. The gcc and ava have
been ported to Win32 and now will generate object files
that can be run in the AVR Studio simulator and programmed
by Atmel's ISP software, so you can use those even if you
don't want to use Linux.

I also was interested in the ICE200, but had trouble
finding one for sale. At the Embedded Systems Conference,
I asked at the Atmel booth, and they said that they ran
out of bondouts, so it will be another two to three months
before the ICE200 is available again. The main limitation
of the ICE200 is that it doesn't have trace buffer support;
they have a higher-end ICE that does, but it costs around
$2500.

--Bob

On Fri, Oct 01, 1999 at 10:01:29AM -0700, Nick Taylor wrote:
> I've recently ordered (but not yet received) the STK200 and a small
> assortment of AVRs and am interested in hearing PIC users' perspective
> on the Atmel chips.  Also would like more info about their ICE200.
>
> Sorry about the [OT] post, but who better to comment on the AVRs
> than PICsters?  If I ask on the AVR list I expect too many responses
> from people who have an almost religious attachment to that line.
>
> Thanks,
>  - Nick -

--
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Bob Drzyzgula                             It's not a problem
bob@drzyzgula.org                until something bad happens
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        http://www.drzyzgula.org/bob/electronics/
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