Development board for Crossworks ARM beginner

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Norm Carlberg

I am moving from PIC in Basic to CrossWorks ARM in "C" but haven't found a development board yet.

Is their a simple beginner USB board with debugger?

I have been slowly looking through the Crossworks supported list with no luck so far.

A 2nd choice would be a board with a replaceable ARM chip.

Future plans for ARM may include the SparksFun GLCD at:

http://www.sparkfun.com/products/8335

 

Norm

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    David Comer

    Norm, PIC BASIC to CrossWorks is a huge move, but a great choice IMHO. I don't know what your experience level is, but I think you will find ARM challenging to come up to speed but well worth it when you do.

    With regard to a USB board with debugger, many start with the TI/Stellaris series of Cortex M3 devaluation kits. The easiest IMHO is the EK-LM3S811 found at ti.com/stellaris. I am pretty much a beginner (advanced beginner if you will) that migrated from the PIC series to ARM, and have evaluated the TI/Stellaris series (Cortex M0/M3), the Atmel at91sam3u and at91sam7s series, and a few of the NXP devices (1300/1700) Cortex M3 series. I am currently working with the Atmel at912am7s-ek (at91sam7s256k device) with CrossWorks and LOVE CrossWorks. I have tried the CodeSourcery IDE and have found CrossWorks very intuitive in comparison. The CrossWorks debugging and board support is superior and frustration level much much less.

    USB support is nice, but if you find you like CrossWorks, consider upgrading to the personal edition and spending the extra $$$ for the CrossConnect. The Seggar JLINK is supported, but CrossConnect and Seggar are, I have found, pretty much equivalent. I've tested the Seggar and CrossConnect, by the way, with CrossWorks with no issues.

    I would encourage you to continue to post and ask questions in this form as well as any vendor form (TI/Atmel/NXP/etc.) as there are many more than willing to help.

    Finally, there is another board, the BlueBoard on SparkFun that is popular, but is a JLINK board, not USB. There you do need a JLINK device. There are many cheap, and middle of the road cost for beginners. You can look at SparkFun development tools to get an idea. My choice was to bit the bullet and buy a "professional" quality tool and CrossConnect/Seggar JLINK were my choices (I link to have backups).

    I hope this helps. 

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    David Comer

    Norm,

    Just another thought. There is a book sold on the Elektor Electronics site titled, "C Programming for Embedded Microcontrollers" by Warwick A. Smith that is a great introduction to the ARM IMHO. Note that Warwick uses open source tools (Eclipse with YAGARTO) and the Atmel AT91SAM7S-EK. I think the AT91SAM7S-EK, CrossWorks, and a JLINK device works as a better combinarion. This is mentioned as one possible configuration in the book, but, clearly, to appeal to a large audience, the author writes to individuals that are budget constrained as well as those that are moving in to the more professional environment.

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    Norm Carlberg

    I purchased a BlueBoard-LPC1768-H at:

    http://microcontrollershop.com/product_info.php?products_id=3856

    Thanks

    Norm

     

     

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    Ghanta Engineer

    Norm,

    So what tools did you use for programming and debugging?

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