Something that's unique to the industrial sector
is the sheer scale of designs. It isn't out of the
realm of possibility that a single system could
consist of thousands of dispersed nodes, many
of which could be identical to one another.
Because of this scale, you don't want to buy
an overly complex device that isn't optimized
for your application. You want to cut the costs
as low as you can, and you want to get the
application as simple as you can. Here is where
8-bit MCUs come in."
Mia-Lida Smit
Senior Marketing Specialist, Microchip Technology Inc.
The advantage of having a networked approach with
an MCU in the edge node is to reduce the workload
of the central processor by intelligently reducing the
amount of data that needs to be transferred over
the network. For example, instead of having sensor
nodes all send their data back to a single central
processor, each node is controlled by a single MCU
that communicates with the main processor as
needed — a considerably more efficient approach.
A challenge in the design of these systems is that
industrial settings are uniquely large in scale,
with any single building potentially consisting of
thousands of individual modules for carrying out
functions. If each node requires an expensive and
power-hungry MCU, then operating thousands
of such nodes will result in an inefficient system.
Because of this scale, industrial design can quickly
become extremely expensive and complex. This is
where 8-bit MCUs come in handy.
To limit the cost and complexity associated with
industrial designs, 8-bit PIC & AVR MCUs have
become the solution of choice for designers. PIC &
C h a p t e r 2 | 8 - B i t f o r I n d u s t r i a l
11
The Mighty 8-Bit Microcontroller: Still Enabling Innovation in Modern Applications
