PIC-ISA Control Board
This PIC project makes very
clever use of the large assortment of IO devices that are
available
for personal computers. Dr. Edward Cheung of NASA's Goddard Space
Flight Center built a
simple board that interfaces a PIC microprocessor to any standard
PC ISA card. The board
includes a PIC CPU, an RS-232 serial port and edge connector that
make up a single slot for a
PC ISA card.
The PIC processor emulates the
PC's ISA bus allowing it to interface to a large variety
of low cost devices. This photo shows the PIC board with a
standard Ethernet card
plugged into its slot.
Here the PIC-ISA board is used
to build a web-cam. The digital camera interfaces to the
board through the RS-232 port. The PIC's firmware runs a full web
server. The camera and
electronics are packaged in sealed enclosure with a clear cover
for outdoor environments.
The web-cam is connected to the
Internet via a 10BaseT cable. The screenshot above shows
the web interface you see when visiting the web-cam with
Netscape. Clicking on "Large Image"
displays a 320 x 240 picture. The picture automatically refreshes
every 30 seconds.
This shows an example of Netscape displaying a web-cam picture.
The photographs are courtesy of Dr. Edward
Cheung
Copyright © 2007 Dr. Edward Cheung