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From: totty@m.cs.uiuc.edu
Newsgroups: sci.electronics
Subject: UARTs, uControllers, & Serial Data
Message-ID: <21000091@m.cs.uiuc.edu>
Date: 17 Aug 90 17:22:00 GMT
Lines: 35
Nf-ID: #N:m.cs.uiuc.edu:21000091:000:1414
Nf-From: m.cs.uiuc.edu!totty    Aug 17 12:22:00 1990



	I am trying to build a circuit to convert a synchronous serial
	data line (with no flow control or error detection) into RS-232
	serial data.

	My original idea was to build a finite state machine to take the
	synchronous serial data, pack it into a byte, and sent the byte
	to a UART, which will send out RS-232 data on the other end.
	Unfortunately, most available UARTs I have seen are intended to
	be connected to a CPU bus, which make them more complicated to use
	(I have to simulate the bus protocol and write initial data to
	initialize the UART), and the FSM looks fairly complicated to build.

	Here are my questions:

	(1) What simple UARTs to people recommend, especially simple ones
	    whose options can be hard-wired and not require writing words
	    or initialization data to the UARTs?
	(2) Are there any chips to do what I want (synchronous serial to
	    RS-232)?
	(3) Would it make sense to use a microcontroller instead?  If so
	    what microcontrollers are recommended, how wide are their I/O
	    paths, and what support circuitry do they need?  Are they
	    easily programmable?

						Thanks For The Help,


						--- Bri

   /                      Brian Totty              o o
  /__  __  o        406 E. Michigan / Apt. 6        o  
 /  / /   /             Urbana, IL 61801           \_/  "We have corn in
/__/ /   /             totty@cs.uiuc.edu                Massachusetts too!"