Lophtware's USB Type-C/PIC32 Breakout Board Offers Low-Cost Full-Speed USB 2.0 Development

Lophtware has launched a low-cost Microchip PIC32-based development board with full-speed USB 2.0 over a USB Type-C connector, compatible with the Human Interface Device (HID) endpoint standard.

"The USB Type-C/PIC32 Breakout Board is a breadboarding and prototyping aid with firmware providing common functionality for a variety of general-purpose use-cases," the company explains. "The board aims to be a more flexible offering compared to the FT232-type breakout boards by incorporating a 32-bit PIC. The major design goal is plug-n-play for rapid prototyping without the need for an in-depth knowledge of USB or having to install custom drivers."

"The chosen USB protocol for the stock firmware is HID (Human Interface Device) because it is ubiquitous and does not require drivers or (significant) configuration of the Host to be up and running fast. It should just work."

The core of the design is a PIC32MM0256GPM028 microcontroller with a 24MHz MIPS core, 32kB of RAM, and 256kB of flash storage. The board itself has 11 general-purpose input/output (GPIO) headers, an I2C bus controller, an SPI/I2S controller which operates in master mode only unless custom firmware is loaded, and a UART bus.

Additional features include a 12-bit analog-to-digital converter (ADC), analog comparators, pulse-width modulation (PWM) controllers, timers, and four configurable logic cells (CLCs), along with USB 2.0 full-speed HID endpoints which operate without drivers. New firmware can be loaded either through the USB Type-C port using Debug Accessory Mode, or via in-circuit programming through the GPIO header.

The board is now available on Tindie for $24.99, with schematics, firmware, and software examples available on the Lophtware GitHub repository.