16-bit Microcontroller Packs 64 Kbytes of Flash in a 28-pin Packages

April 4, 2007

Microchip’s dsPIC and PIC24 line of 16-bit microcontrollers has become every popular even as some concentrate on 8- and 32-bit product lines. Well, there are plenty of applications where 16-bit microcontrollers are the best solution and the latest from Mi

William G. Wong

The 16MIPS PIC24FJ64GA002 is available with 16K to 64Kbytes for flash and 8Kbytes of RAM. Best of all it fits into a small 6mm by 6mm QFN, 28-pin package.

The big problem with small packages is finding the right set of peripherals. Most systems provide general purpose IO on top of a fixed set of peripherals. Unfortunately often the peripherals are a subset of what is available on a higher pin count package and designers have to select from multiple chips and hope they contain the right combination of peripherals. Microchip’s Peripheral Select Pin allows designers to assign pins they way they want at runtime. This cuts the number of chips that Microchip needs to deliver while providing designers with the flexibility a large selection of chips would off.

The chip includes a range of peripherals include I2C, UART and SPI communications. A new version of the Explorer 16 development board is available with a 44-pin version of the family, the PIC24FJ64GA004. The board is priced at $129.99. Pricing for the lone chip starts at $1.69.

For more information, visit www.microchip.com.

About the Author

William G. Wong | Senior Content Director - Electronic Design and Microwaves & RF

I am Editor of Electronic Design focusing on embedded, software, and systems. As Senior Content Director, I also manage Microwaves & RF and I work with a great team of editors to provide engineers, programmers, developers and technical managers with interesting and useful articles and videos on a regular basis. Check out our free newsletters to see the latest content.

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I earned a Bachelor of Electrical Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology and a Masters in Computer Science from Rutgers University. I still do a bit of programming using everything from C and C++ to Rust and Ada/SPARK. I do a bit of PHP programming for Drupal websites. I have posted a few Drupal modules.

I still get a hand on software and electronic hardware. Some of this can be found on our Kit Close-Up video series. You can also see me on many of our TechXchange Talk videos. I am interested in a range of projects from robotics to artificial intelligence.