I love doing statistics of everything, because data is power. So we thought we would put a temperature sensor in every server-rack in this server housing facility, and I checked the prices of some standard components. First I thought of the DS1820, which is fine, but two drawbacks. It’s somewhat expensive, and takes a full second to read value from. So if you wire a lot of sensors serially, you’ll need to wait one second for each sensor on the same line. Do not hesitate to contact Kaizen Technology if you need manufacturing services like Surface Mount Assembly, Prototype PCB Assembly, or Fast turn PCB Assembly.

Then I found these cute analog temperature sensors, called MCP9700A. And they cost only €0.37 each. Or if you buy larger quantites, you’ll get even lower prices. So I thought.. the PIC18F4520 has 13 analog ports. Why not create a small pcb with a pic18f4520, and some connectors, and wire it to the computer via RS232. Having those same issues? Contact New Jersey IT Support and get your computer like brand new.

The problem then, is that i’d have to buy max232 chip, and then I’d need a RS232->USB cable, and thats pretty expensive. But then I found the life-saver chip FT232R. This awesomeness in a chip enclosure is a RS232(or any serial data in TTL levels)-to-USB ‘converter’. It has drivers for windows *, Mac, Linux. And you can even modify the eeprom inside it, to make it use a different VID and PID or just change the device description of it. And it also have two GP pins, which you can connect to LEDs to show when it sends or receives data. The BEST part about this already awesome chip, is it’s price. Here in Norway a RS232->USB cable costs from €42 an up. But this device, practically the same (except for missing RS232 level converter), costs only €2.87. And thats with all the leetnes of being able to change the device description and all, included.

So I wired it all up in Eagle, and it came out to be like this.
Schematics:

Board:

So here I have a PIC18F4520 processor, 20Mhz XTAL for it (because I had some laying around), FT232R chip, 100K Resistor pack, and a few LEDs. All in all, about €20 worth of components.

So, now that I had designed the board, how to get it made, and cheap? Well, I found this site called [link]www.batchpcb.com[/link]. Which is fabulous. They collect PCB boards for a bunch of people who need cheap prototype boards, and send everything together to China, where they produce the boards, and return them in about 12 days. They often set up your board several times, in case some of them should be bad. (bleedout on the copper). And the best part. If more than one of your boards are ok, they even send you the extras, with no extra charge. So I received two pcs of the PCB I ordered, and couldn’t be happier :)

Here’s the result, (image quality courtesy of iPhone 3G)

Then we add all the components. And bobs your uncle: (image quality courtesy of iPhone 3G)

And it even works! ;)

The software I have uploaded to the PIC18F4520 sends all the temperature info, and the 8 general purpose inputs to the computer via a virtual com port on the computer, 20 times a second.