New C2K LP owner

[spirilis 1,265]

Hi folks... late to the game but I took advantage of the half-off deal and snagged one of these, along with the LED boosterpack shortly after.  Just got the latter working, and working with the PC demo using CCSv6 early-adopter beta.  I'm normally found over @ 43oh.com but I am curious & interested in learning about buck converters, boost converters and the like.  For now, all I've ever used was prebuilt components with black-box ICs doing the hard work.  It sounds like the Piccolo makes an exquisite platform for creating custom power converters.  Looking forward to learning more about it & eventually making use somewhere.

[TI_Trey 38]

Excellent!  Glad to have you here Spirilis.

 

Energia for C2000 is in a alpha state at the moment, but should be ready soon.  When this is released it should significantly lower the barriers to entry with the C2k LP.  I'm also hoping to integrate some of digital power libraries into Energia to make power supply design even easier.

[msptest6 0]

Hi folks... late to the game but I took advantage of the half-off deal and snagged one of these, along with the LED boosterpack shortly after.  Just got the latter working, and working with the PC demo using CCSv6 early-adopter beta.  I'm normally found over @ 43oh.com but I am curious & interested in learning about buck converters, boost converters and the like.  For now, all I've ever used was prebuilt components with black-box ICs doing the hard work.  It sounds like the Piccolo makes an exquisite platform for creating custom power converters.  Looking forward to learning more about it & eventually making use somewhere.

Welcome!

[spirilis 1,265]

Hmm, I was under the misguided assumption the C2KLP had the Control Law Accelerator. I see now it's only in the 2803x and 2806x chips. So for the 2802x, thinking in terms of "What does this chip bring to the table and why do we care about it", we're basically looking at an MCU with good execution efficiency (60MHz harvard + DSP instructions), awesome PWM and ADC running manually-crafted control loops. Oh, and with IQmath tables (plus part of the library) in Boot ROM. That sound about right?

 

Sent from my Galaxy Note II with Tapatalk 4

 

[spirilis 1,265]

Reading the datasheet some more, it seems like a fascinating chip although the power consumption sounds a wee bit high for the speed. But that's because I'm spoiled by the MSP430... which doesn't hold a candle to the F28027's performance specs. Tiva might in some respects though. Not sure that its PWM or ADC performs anything like the C2K though.

 

I'm guessing a minor point of efficiency can be gained by using an external DC-DC converter to generate a 1.8V VDD instead of relying on the built-in Vreg on VDDIO?

 

Sent from my Galaxy Note II with Tapatalk 4

 

[TI_Trey 38]

Spirilis,

 

Sadly no it doesn't have the CLA.  I originally wanted to put a 2806x on the LP, but management decided to go with F2802x.  Your assessment about the device is correct.  Our CPU, PWMs, and ADC are really what make this device special.  Its really optimized for real time control applications which have been traditionally implemented with analog controllers.  C2000 devices enable the engineer to convert these applications to be controlled digitally with software.  This can reduce design time and increase product performance over its lifetime as things like filters don't drift because they are now implemented in software.

 

Certainly MSP430s are lower power, but we play in two very different application spaces.  Typically C2000 devices are used in power conversion or motor control where the efficiency we are able to offer in terms of control more than makes up for any power burned in the chip.

 

An external DC/DC will save you some power, but its probably not worth the added cost and effort.

[spirilis 1,265]

Spirilis,

 

Sadly no it doesn't have the CLA.  I originally wanted to put a 2806x on the LP, but management decided to go with F2802x.  Your assessment about the device is correct.  Our CPU, PWMs, and ADC are really what make this device special.  Its really optimized for real time control applications which have been traditionally implemented with analog controllers.  C2000 devices enable the engineer to convert these applications to be controlled digitally with software.  This can reduce design time and increase product performance over its lifetime as things like filters don't drift because they are now implemented in software.

 

Certainly MSP430s are lower power, but we play in two very different application spaces.  Typically C2000 devices are used in power conversion or motor control where the efficiency we are able to offer in terms of control more than makes up for any power burned in the chip.

 

An external DC/DC will save you some power, but its probably not worth the added cost and effort.

 

Sounds like I'm on the right page then.  Thanks again @TI_Trey for putting all this together!

 

PS- Do you ever do development & flashing of the C2K LP from commandline outside of CCS?  I see it's possible since Energia has the compiler+loader programs installed outside CCS.  Is there any guide (or guidelines you could provide) for starting a C2K project outside the IDE, e.g. for those of us who prefer VI or Emacs + Makefile development?  I'm assuming controlSUITE has all the necessary linker scripts, header files, etc. that I'd need to get started...