Sounds like a "universal Pic I/O" board would be useful, The Pic board would have a Pic and all the hardware necessary for the different sensors and motors as well as other common input and output devices. May even have a prototyping area for those special needs. The whole thing could be incased in a "Ninja Turtle Shell". This would allow easy replacement of controllers and addition of sensors. This would also be easier to program as you would gain knowledge of the single board and accumulate a good "tool box" of Pic routines. The Pic controllers could put the sensor readings into a convent form for the base computer before sending to the base computer. And receive single and repetitive commands for the outputs from the base computer. By having each Pic handle a small number of I/O this could be done in a timely manner. The base computer could be a PC that could be programmed by those that felt a need without as much concern about the real time aspects of the network. Maybe even have the base computer on the internet with wireless connection. Bill ----- Original Message ----- From: "Chen Xiao Fan" To: "Microcontroller discussion list - Public." Sent: Monday, February 13, 2006 10:07 PM Subject: RE: [PIC:] How much can a PIC do? > > >> -----Original Message----- >> From: piclist-bounces@mit.edu >> [mailto:piclist-bounces@mit.edu] On Behalf Of Denny Esterline >> Sent: Tuesday, February 14, 2006 10:38 AM >> To: Microcontroller discussion list - Public. >> Subject: Re: [PIC:] How much can a PIC do? >> >> Like I said before, the math is complex and unspecified. A >> large part of this project is developing a reasonable way >> for non-software folks to interract with that math. That >> particular aspect needs to be alot further >> along before I build any hardware. >> > > Looks a very typical university project. And perhaps the higher > level work is done in Matlab or similar tools. I guess DSP > (not dsPICs but those from AD or TI) might be better option > for this kind of project because of the higher level software. > Matlab supports quite some DSPs and higher end MCUs but not > anything from Microchip. And the system may need some MCUs, > so PIC still can be used for some tasks. > > Regards, > Xiaofan > > -- > http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive > View/change your membership options at > http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist -- http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist