>Sorry if this is a dumb question, but would it be at all possible to connect
>a pic or sx microcontroller to an ISA or PCMIA modem? I'm trying to find a
>way to send data from a robot to a computer, and I thought the cheapest way
>would be to get an old modem and hook it up to a cordless phone, but I don't
>know if the PIC has enough processing power to run a modem. Can anyone tell
>me what this would involve, and if anyone's tried it before?
>Eben Olson

Yes it's possible with ISA, I did it years ago with a Z80 (like a PIC in
a bigger package and 1/4 the speed :)   You can wire the ISA bus
connector up to look like most of the address for COM1 or 2 is
already selected.  Then you run a few of the port bits out to
there so you can select the remaining bits (which lets you select
the particular register).  I also ran one more bit that let
you select COM1 versus COM2 (3F8 vs. 2F8).  This gave me a
really neat option:  I could remove the modem and plug in
a 2-serial port card and I could talk to each port separately
under software control--attach an external modem on one port
and a serial terminal on the other and you have debug heaven.

To read and write to it takes data 8 bits and a strobe, just like
any parallel transfer.  Some PICs actually have a byte-wide
bus transfer mode on one of the ports you could use for this,
though I doubt it's all that necessary.

The rest is just a Small Matter Of Programming.

Er, I should have read your message more carefully, because it
looks like you want to put the cordless part of the phone
in the robot with the PIC and the modem.  I'm afraid the modem
is expecting to be connected to a phone line and getting a
wireless handset connected to it in place of that may turn
out to be the real challenge.

Barry

--
http://www.piclist.com hint: The list server can filter out subtopics
(like ads or off topics) for you. See http://www.piclist.com/#topics