I'm using the PIC32MZ2048EFM100 on a project here. The part itself is over $10USD in quantity, so it's going to be hard to get a eval board for that part for the price point you're looking for. However, if you're looking for more performance, you might need to go there. The MZ has a hardware FPU which does 32 bit floating point math very quickly, and is rated at 415DMIPS. If you go this way, stay far away from the *EC* parts, they're crap. I joke that the 'C' must stand for crap, and 'F' (as in the EF parts) stands for 'Fixed'.
I suspect the PIC32MM parts will actually be slower than what you're using. They're designed for low-power applications, i.e. battery driven.
The PIC32MX may be fast enough, and there should be some boards out there at a reasonable price point.
Thank you forrest, i already know the main differences in the three families... and the related problems! The MZ EF still have a pretty scary errata.
As i later said, i think i'm oriented with the MX. don't need the more advanced features, i think, and the simpler things are the better. infact, i plan
NOT to use harmony. (of course, i'm not planning to use usb/ethernet/whatever peripherals need a software stack to operate reliably at this time)
the MM? I wanted a reason to use them since the moment they came out. Ah, but i can't use them at work due to commercial temperature range only and time for hobby projects is scarce, and i usually want to use more advanced peripherals and core (so i go to dspics).
Also, for this project i need at least a 44 pin device
PIC32MK (MM with connectivity? yes please), PIC32WK (supposedly MX/Z with wireless/wifi) and PIC32MZ DA.. ah when will they be unveiled??
I unfortunately tend to buy the fairly expensive microchip ones mainly because it's easier to convince Microchip there's a problem if you can reproduce it on one of their eval boards, so I don't have a good reference for the ultra-low-cost boards.
true that.
I've somehow skipped over the dspics so I don't have a good reference to compare to. Are you just running out of cpu cycles, or is it memory, or is it something else? Have you spent some time verifying your math is as optimized as possible? If you can characterize what type of processing you need to do and how much of it I might be able to tell you if the PIC32MZ would run it.
-forrest
Well, newer dspics are something you should at least give a look at. I'm talking about the dsPIC33EV family (currently one model only, i think it's the cheapest micro you can find with two hardware SENT peripherals, without having to go for much more expensive cores. Plus, it's five volts. I plan to do great(er) things if they release a bigger chip.. i've run out of ram,timers,pwm,everything and i am considering making a dual-mcu board with this one if necessary) and the dsPIC33EP64GS504 and others from its family. same complaint, run out of flash/ram and stuff.
Anyway, the problem i was having on the dspic is that even though the 33E can achieve 70 MIPS, in practice you are limited by (i suspect*) the memory access time, as per reference manual the MCU need one additional cycle (so 2 or 3-4-5) for any operation that access non SFR ram. Loading/storing a variable? two cycles. using indirect addressing to GP ram? two cycles. Reading flash is slow as hell too.
My firmware surely need a rewriting, i became much better at coding in this last year. it's working but it could be better.. but i'm also in the mood of trying new things
*i suspect that, because this additional instruction cycle is fixed, at every frequency... but it was not necessary on the 33F that can achieve 30 or 40 MIPS, depending on model..