This lab aims to familiarize students with serial communication in embedded systems using a PIC18F4550 microcontroller. Students will construct a circuit to transmit ASCII characters through the Tx pin and observe the signal using an oscilloscope. Next, students will receive characters from a PC using RealTerm and transmit them back while displaying on an LCD. Key objectives are to understand asynchronous serial communication signals and perform interrupt-driven transmission and reception.
This lab aims to familiarize students with serial communication in embedded systems using a PIC18F4550 microcontroller. Students will construct a circuit to transmit ASCII characters through the Tx pin and observe the signal using an oscilloscope. Next, students will receive characters from a PC using RealTerm and transmit them back while displaying on an LCD. Key objectives are to understand asynchronous serial communication signals and perform interrupt-driven transmission and reception.
This lab aims to familiarize students with serial communication in embedded systems using a PIC18F4550 microcontroller. Students will construct a circuit to transmit ASCII characters through the Tx pin and observe the signal using an oscilloscope. Next, students will receive characters from a PC using RealTerm and transmit them back while displaying on an LCD. Key objectives are to understand asynchronous serial communication signals and perform interrupt-driven transmission and reception.
This lab aims to familiarize students with serial communication in embedded systems using a PIC18F4550 microcontroller. Students will construct a circuit to transmit ASCII characters through the Tx pin and observe the signal using an oscilloscope. Next, students will receive characters from a PC using RealTerm and transmit them back while displaying on an LCD. Key objectives are to understand asynchronous serial communication signals and perform interrupt-driven transmission and reception.
Mohd Saad Bin Hamid Revision Number Revision Date 1.0 September 2014 JTKEK/BETC 4473
1.0 OBJECTIVES Familiarize the students with MPLAB X IDE and XC8 compiler for PIC based embedded systems design. Construct basic embedded hardware interfacing by using PROTEUS ISIS Perform program debugging through PIC memory access features in ISIS. To understand basic serial communication in embedded system and perform Interrupt service routine for serial communication. Analyze serial communication signal for different speed.
2.0 EQUIPMENT/COMPONENTS
Personal Computer MPLAB X Integrated Development Environment Microchip XC8 Compiler PROTEUS ISIS Software Eltima Virtual Serial Port Driver RealTerm Serial Communication Software
3.0 SYNOPSIS & THEORY
Synchronous and Asynchronous Communication
Figure 3.1: Synchronous and Asynchronous Communication
Serial communication is very important features in embedded system. It helps the system to communicate with external devices due insufficient human machine interface in embedded system. Because of that developer need to interface their embedded system with a PC during development and/or during testing in the field. The advantages of using serial communication is because the number of pins required is lower that parallel communication. Serial communication in embedded system capable to communicate to other peripherals just one I/O pin, compared to eight or more for parallel communications. Many common embedded system peripherals, such as ADC and DAC converters, LCDs, and temperature sensors also support serial interfaces. Universal Synchronous Asynchronous Receiver Transmitter (USART) is a common serial communication module embedded in microcontroller. It help microcontroller to communicate with
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external devices such as PC, GSM modems, Bluetooth modules and other peripherals with additional interfacing circuit.
Figure 3.2: Typical USART Data Frame ASCII Character (59h) at 9600 Baud Per Second
Baud Rate Calculation
The following table illustrate the formula for baud rate calculation:
Table 3.1 : Baud Rate Generator Formula
Calculation for high speed asynchronous 8 bit communication at 9600 speed for 8 MHz Oscillator:
High speed, BRGH = 1, so we choose formula for baud rate calculation as:
Baud Rate = Fosc/(16(n+1))
To find suitable value of SPBRGH:SPBRG we need to find the value of n.
9600 = 8MHz/ (16 (n+1))
(n+1) = 8M/(9600*16)
n = 51
So, SPBRG = 51 and BRGH = 1 need to be set for high speed serial communication at 9600.
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4.0 PROCEDURE
Part1: SERIAL TRANSMIT
1. Create a new project using MPLAB X IDEA for PIC18F4550 based system. Refer instructions in previous lab session. 2. Download main file (main.c) and configuration file (config18F.h) from ULearn and import to the existing project. 3. Construct the circuit as illustrated in APPENDIX 1 in Proteus ISIS. 4. Build the project and run the simulation by using Proteus ISIS. 5. Observe and record the output data sent through pin RC6/Tx of PIC18F4550 by using virtual oscilloscope in ISIS.
Figure 4.1 : Virtual Oscilloscope Output Window
6. You may need to adjust the time/div and voltage/div setting to properly view the whole character sent serially through Tx pin. 7. What is the value of the signal sent at Tx pin in Hexadecimal? 8. Modify the main.c file to transmit 3 different ASCII character and repeat step 5 and 6 for each character. 9. Record your observation and identify the bits represented by the signal recorded in the virtual oscilloscope.
Part 2: RECEIVE AND TRANSMIT
1. Modify the content of while loop in main.c file to receive data and transmit back the data sent through pin Tx of PIC18F4550 as in the following code:
2. Use RealTerm software to send the data from computer to the simulation in Proteus ISIS. Please refer the setting of virtual serial port pair driver installed in the Device Manager.
Figure 4.2 : Virtual Serial Port Pair in Device Manager
Figure 4.3: COMPIM Component Setting
3. Please ensure the right setting in the COMPIM component and the RealTerm serial port configuration. Then Click on button Change.
Figure 4.4 : RealTerm Serial Port Configuration
4. Click on Send tab of the RealTerm software to send a character or strings.
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Figure 4.5 : Sending ASCII character as Numbers
5. Send 4 characters as illustrated in Figure 4.5 and click Send Numbers. Capture the signal sent to the PIC using virtual oscilloscope. You may use the One-Shot trigger function by pressing the button One-Shot at the Trigger Menu of the virtual oscilloscope. The One-Shot trigger will freeze the oscilloscope display when any changes on voltage level on the input signal. 6. Based on step 5, analyze the signal, which character sent first and compare with the display in RealTerm. (You can view the data sent to the RealTerm as ASCII or Hexadecimal). 7. Send the following ASCII character according to the sequence listed and explain your observation. Does PIC reply back after each sequence?
Sequence 1 `F` `T` `K` `\n`
Sequence 2 `B` `E` `T` `C` `\r’
REMINDER
1. Double click on PIC18F4550 component and locate the hex file obtained in step 14 of Part 1. Set the clock frequency to 20MHz. Please save your ISIS design file before you start the simulation.
Figure 4.6: PIC18F4550 Property Window
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5.0 DISCUSSION/QUESTIONS
1. Based data observed in explain how the character/data converted into voltage level. Validate the bit duration for 1 bit by using the calculated value and the observe value. 2. Calculate the appropriate SPBRG (baud variable) value for the system to communicate at 57600 bps. 3. Modify the code in main.c file in Part 2 to enable the system to communicate at the speed of 57600 bps. Without changing the RealTerm Serial Port Configuration, explain what happens when you send character ‘A’, does the RealTerm display the sent data by PIC correctly? 4. Explain do we need to configure same baudrate at receiver and transmitter side? 5. Explain the operation in the SerialRxPinInterrupt() function. 6. What is the character used as serial data termination character in the function? 7. Modify the code to toggle pin RA4 value 0 to1 when complete last received and 1 to 0 when it echo the character back to RealTerm software. Measure the time between ising edge and falling edge to indicate the processing time. 8. What is the average processing time for 1 character (sent to PIC and transmit back ealTerm)?
