On Sun, 2009-10-04 at 20:38 -0400, Nathan House wrote:

There is no "best method", there are many methods, what's best depends
on your needs.

> I need to have two way communication between a PIC microcontroller and a
> laptop computer. I only know of two ways to do this:
> 
> 1) Over a serial (RS-232) connection.
> 2) Over a USB connection.
> 
> I have successfully sent data back and forth between a dsPIC and my laptop
> using the UART module, but it's an annoyance to have to use a serial-to-USB
> adaptor and working with serial ports on windows is not fun. 

I'm not exactly sure why you say they "aren't fun", the hardest part is
figuring out which COM port is assigned to your adapter, which isn't too
bad.

> Also, if other
> people ever decide to duplicate my project, they would have to buy an
> expensive adaptor as I've had to do.

Expensive? They are $15 regular price here, often on sale for less.

> Everyone has USB ports on their computers, so this seems like a good option.
> But I really don't know *anything* about USB. Is using the USB module on a
> PIC difficult? Would it be hard to write a windows program to recieve and
> send data?

MChip has example designs, it's pretty easy to take one of their
frameworks and adapt it to your needs.

> In your opinion, is it worth taking the time to learn about how USB works
> and how to implement it in my project? It just seems like no one is using
> serial anymore, are serial communications becoming obsolete, and is it time
> to move on to USB?

Serial is used ALOT out there. Whether it's time to "move to USB" is
more up to you, if this is a mass market product then yes, USB is
probably your best choice. If this is a one-off or hobby project then
unless you WANT to learn USB I don't see what going the full USB route
will get you. If it's in between you'll have to weigh the pros and cons.

We need more info from you to give a useful recommendation.

TTYL

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