Microstick II board notes

I recently bought Microstick II demo board from tme.eu - nice tiny and simple board for PIC24, dsPIC(33) and PIC32MX PDIP-28 micro-controllers.

Here are my 1st thoughts:

USB cable

Ensure that you are using PROVIDED USB cable only! When I tried old stock cable I got very weird errors (both timeouts and power suppply errors)

Checking hardware connection for the 1st time.

I strongly recommend to start running MPLAB X IPE (v5.25 in my case) to verify that hardware connection is working:

• install latest version of MPLAB X IDE (which contains also MPLAB X IPE). Tested version v5.25
• ensure that switch is in A position on board
• there should be already placed PIC32MX250F128B in socket of board
• connect Microstick II to your PC using provided (from Microstick II package) USB cable.
• run MPLAB X IPE
• select:
  • family: 32-bit MCUs (PIC32)
  • Device: PIC32MX250F128B
  • click on Apply
  • Tool: Starter Kits (PKOB) S.No: BURxxxxx (it should be already selected
• now click on Connect

You should see messages like:

Connecting to Starter Kit on Board...

Currently loaded firmware on Starter Kit on Board
Firmware Suite Version.....01.56.00
Firmware type..............PIC32MX
Programmer to target power is enabled - VDD = 3.250000 volts.
Target device PIC32MX250F128B found.
Device ID Revision = A1

Import example project for PIC32MX

Unfortunately provided demo MicroStickII PIC32 Code Example from https://www.microchip.com/DevelopmentTools/ProductDetails/dm330013-2#additional-summary is very antique - according to README.txt it expects:

Complier:	MPLAB C32 v1 or higher
		MPLAB IDE v8 or higher

Using Legacy Import in MPLAB X IDE does not work well - see https://www.microchip.com/forums/m977477.aspx

I "solved" this problem creating my own project using MPLAB Harmony Configurator 3 Plugin. The project is available here: https://github.com/hpaluch/pic32mx-blink (Note - unlike original project it just blinks LED D6/RA0) at fixed rate).

MPLAB® Code Configurator

MPLAB Code Configurator (also known as shortcut MCC) is official wizard like tool that can be used to generate C templates with code for hardware configuration and support functions. It can be installed as Plugin to MPLAB X IDE.

Official list of PICs includes with Microstick II is on:

• https://www.microchip.com/en-us/development-tool/dm330013-2

Here is my list with tool support:

• PIC24FJ64GA002 - not included in my case
• I got PIC24FJ64GB002 instead - this one is really cool, because it has USB OTG and is also supported by MCC Tool, tested on USB CDC (Virtual COM port) project
• PIC24HJ128GP502 - no MCC tool support
• DsPIC33FJ128MC802 - no MCC tool support
• PIC32MX250F128B - supported with Harmony tool