 Hi, on MPI. On MPI, brought to you by Digikey. This week it is Microchip Lady Aida. What is exciting and new from new product introductions this week? I'm glad you asked. This week, our pick of the beginning of the year is going to be the pick kit from Microchip. They have a new pick kit 5. So it's the fifth generation. This is your pick? This is my pick. And you know, I've had a pick kit. So this is like, I'm familiar with this device. You know, I bought one a very long time ago to program pick 16 F84 microcontrollers. And they've improved it greatly since then. So this is the fifth generation available at Digikey and it's in stock. So as you might expect, you know, it works with MP lab MP lab X, which is against the 10th version. The fifth generation adds more and more support for chips. I don't know what generation they added support for ABRs, but one of the nice things is this is one of the few programmers that supports you know, SWD, JTAG, pick, ABRs, various styles and techniques and different, you know, MIPS chips, etc. It's a very wide range tool. So let's take a look. So inside is a at SEM E 70. So it's like a 300 megahertz Cortex M7 processor. So it's a pretty beefy device. It's got Bluetooth built in, which I'll talk about a little bit. Probably a moving networks module and it can communicate. It can it can power the target can be powered by the target. It's got an SD card and various buffers and analog scalars. And the thing that's cool about it is like I mentioned, it isn't just like an old school pick, you know, 16 F or 24 or whatever. My controller, it's a programmer or DSPIC. It's also for the AVR series, the SAM series and the CEC series. So, you know, ever since microchip purchased at now, like almost 10 years ago, eight years ago, they've been slowly integrating AVR and at mal chip support into everything and they have it here. So on the board, there's an eight pin connector. And you see on the left hand side, like it says eight pin SIL, that's like a single inline connection. And you kind of pick and choose which pins you're going to use for your debug interface. So you can see, like if you're using UPDI, you're going to use, you know, reset V target. That's the power of the target ground and data. Whereas if you're using, you know, AVR JTAG, you're going to use almost all the pins because you have to have TDO, T-CLOG, TDI and TMS, but also supports TPI, ISP, PDI, UPDI and debug wire, which not a lot of programmers support. If you have like an old style, you know, Arduino compatible with it at mega. I think the 328 and 324 had debug wire support, which I honestly never got using because I never had debug wire debugger. So this is a programmer and debugger. I think this image was drawn in like the mid 90s and they've been using it since I've seen this drawing multiple times. So as expected, it supports all the pick chips. It can generate high voltages. Some of them require like the Mclard pin to go up to 12 volts for high voltage programming. It can do it. And it also, like I said, supports debug wire, which is a one wire debugging system. Again, I have not used it, although I wanted to. I believe it's supported at mega 328, whatever series. There's also TPI. TPI is used for small AT tiny chips. I've definitely used this. It only uses like two or three pins, data clock and reset. So like, you know, there's a six pin AT tiny 10s or whatever. There are enough pins for SPI so you can get away with the TPI interface. There's also high voltage, AV, HV, SP and HPP. Honestly, you don't really need this as much unless you're like really messed up your micro controller or you have something like you're using a new PDI programable chips, which is like the latest AT tinies. You can use the UPD I pan as a reset pan, but then you have to use high voltage programming mode in order to enable it. You need 12 volts. So yeah, and in this case, it'll generate that 12 volts for you. Which is very nice because it's a total pain in the ass to generate and create that pulse if you don't have a program that supports it. I would recommend, I did not purchase the adapter and I'm purchasing the adapter now because I, you know, if you want to connect all these wires up to your dev board, especially if you have JTAG or SWD, there's standard cables and connectors and this is a little dongle that like plugs into the side of the picket five and then gives you all like all the cables and adapters. You can also craft your own honestly, but it's handy. Okay, but then the best part about this, I think that I think is the thing that makes it the pick of the year because we just started. So this is the best NPI of the year is the programmer to go ability, which I think is new and is really neat because a common thing that I've bumped into in my life is I need to, I want to give somebody a programmer. I'm like, okay, program all these boards and I don't want them to run MP lab on their computer. Maybe like, you know, I don't want to install it or there's like driver issues. I just want to be like, look, plug this thing in and in the field, you press the button and it programs in the flash and the fuses, whatever that you need. And once in a while, you can get like, I think Seger has one for SWD, but it's really, really expensive. So this is like 100 bucks. And it has this little micro SD slot on the back you can see with an MP lab, you have to generate the program file. You have to like in MP lab, like create the thing that tells it the chip and the code and the fuses. But once you have that program file, you put that on the SD card and then you slot it in and then if it doesn't connect to USB, you just press the button. And there's like an LED strip that tells you what's going on and it will just program it in the field without a computer as many times as you want, super fast and repeatedly. So there is an LED strip and there's like there is a little bit of like feedback of like, oh, like blinking purple means it's programming. You know, it does work in the field without a display. However, I will say I would recommend they have an iOS and Android app that you can use and it will like give you more information like if it couldn't connect or there was a failure in verification and you can also select which file you want to upload to your device. You have like multiple programs and multiple different chips. You're like, oh, this is for the AVR. This is for the UPI, whatever you select it and then you press program and go. So basically you have like, you know, you can't compile on the on through the app, but you can select which program file you want to upload via Bluetooth. And this is iOS, but there's also Android as well available in stock. You can actually buy it. I can't even imagine how much they had to delay this because the Sammy 70 being Cortex M7 I'm sure was like very limited during the chip shortage. But we're seeing all sorts of hardware we appear. So this just popped up in the digit key slash new. Yeah, I'm pretty, I was pretty sore about microchip because it was really difficult. I'm dealing with them. The humans who were just being a little shifty during the park shortage. So, but it's all, but you know, all is forgiven. It was a crazy night. I know. What do you do? Happy to have them on here. It was Tequila. It was not nothing. You know, it was desperate times and we all did something. We did get the chips eventually. It was, it was, it was desperate. It was, it was, it was now that you can get chips. It was grim. It's a perfect time to pick. So everything's fine now. Love me some microchip. Let's. This is cheaper than the AVR ice or at no ice. So it's like cheaper than most programmers. You get the Bluetooth on the go programming and it supports the entire family of chips. What I'm saying is it's all fine. And if you live through the chip shortage, we got hit so bad and even us were like, you know what? It's totally fine microchip. Send you a Christmas card or back on the nice list. Okay. Let's see a video about it. Let's see a video and then that'll be on. The pick kit five can also program targets without the need for a host computer using the tools programmer to go feature. This allows one of several pre-programmed program images to be selected and read from a fat 32 formatted micro SDHC card inserted into the tool. The memory card can be programmed from the MPLAB X IDE. In the project properties dialogue, go to the pick it five category. Then the programmer to go option category to set up the programming details. Next, select the programmer to go menu item from the make and program button. Alternatively, use the IP application. Enter advanced mode. Then choose the required hex file. Select the settings tab. Adjust the programming settings as required. Then click the programmer to go button to commence programming the card. When using programmer to go in the field, power for the pick it five can often be obtained from the target hardware. So typically only a connection from the tool to the target is required. Remote programming is initiated by pressing the button under the pick it logo. Press and hold this same button to reset the pick it five in case of error or after inserting a new memory card.