Re: [CAD_CAM_EDM_DRO] Re: USB on Linux

There are lots of microcontrollers out there that have everything on board,
for less than the cost of an FPGA. However I suppose I could be considered
biased as I spend most of my working life dealing with microcontrollers..

Les

>
> That's another reason why I did my interface on the parallel port.
> Although there is an incredibly complex protocol for intelligent devices
> associated with IEEE-1284, you don't have to use it. I chose not
> to incur all that overhead. I can use $6 CPLD logic chips (lower density
> than a true FPGA) to handle the lower-level bus protocol and run
> my DAC or digital I/O. For the encoder counter or stepper rate generator,
> I needed to implement these more complex functions, so I put it all on
> an $18 FPGA. With a processor, unless it is all integrated, you need
> RAM, ROM, the peripheral function itself, the CPU, the bus interface,
> etc.
>