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A Customer Testimonial For The Propeller Chip — Parallax Forums

A Customer Testimonial For The Propeller Chip

idbruceidbruce Posts: 6,197
edited 2011-06-07 21:29 in Propeller 1
To Whom It May Concern

My name is Bruce Drummond, and I am an inventor/entrepreneur. Over the last three years, I have been building a wire bending CNC machine to produce a product for which I have a patent pending. I had six key factors to consider when choosing the microcontroller for this machine:
  1. An abundance of I/O pins
  2. Capability of multitasking
  3. Ease of programming
  4. Speed
  5. Customer support
  6. Product documentation
After reviewing several products, I decided that the Propeller chip should fulfill my needs. I could go into all the details, but the datasheet already provides quite a bit of the information. However, I will provide some information that the datasheet is unable to provide.

Let me start by covering the issue of customer support. I am not a hobbyist, nor am I patient man, so when it comes time to getting straight answers, I go straight to the source. I have called Parallax customer support on numerous occassions, and on all occassions, thier staff was always very friendly and very willing to help me resolve any problem that I might be having at the time. Additionally, the Propeller forum has a wealth of forum members that are more than willing to help you resolve some of the simpler and even more complex issues.

There are several ways to program the Propeller chip, but I chose Spin because of the handy documentation provided by the Propeller Manual. It is actually quite easy to learn if you have any kind of programming experience. However I must add that I would like to see much more documentation and examples in the future.

After three years of hard work, I would like to sum it all up. I am glad I chose the Propeller to control this machine, because it works flawlessly.

Bruce Drummond
Novel Solutions

Comments

  • ErNaErNa Posts: 1,752
    edited 2011-06-07 02:36
    And they are not only willing, what can be found quite often, they are able. Incomparable!
    ErNa
  • Cluso99Cluso99 Posts: 18,069
    edited 2011-06-07 03:53
    Bruce, I concur whole heartedly.
  • SarielSariel Posts: 182
    edited 2011-06-07 04:27
    I could not agree more. I have worked on/with electronics and computers as a hobbyist since I was very young, and now being able to bring that into myprofessional life, I have always found one standard to be true. The products offered by Parallax to be of the highest quality, compared to some of the other options out there simple to grasp, Great documentation for entry level design, and it is all backed up by a wonderful support team. Both in the forums, or within the company itself. I have used these microcontrollers in everything from robotic critters that my son and I have built, to a Hi-Pot switching controller capable of withstanding in excess of 3000 volts. All have stood up to enormous abuse, and have never failed me, or those that operate them on a daily basis.

    I'm sure I am not alone when I say thank you all for your diligent work in creating wonderful products that will spark curiosity in future engineers, and give us all something to keep us out of trouble.
  • idbruceidbruce Posts: 6,197
    edited 2011-06-07 04:54
    @Sariel
    The products offered by Parallax to be of the highest quality

    Good point! This is also very true. I have never ordered a product from Parallax that I was dissatisfied with. Their products are always of the highest quality.

    EDIT: However, I wish Parallax would supply (2) four pin headers with the protoboard, (1) straight and (1) right angle, and leave it as an option for the user to solder together. Those connections are a bit touchy for removal and reassembly.
  • HollyMinkowskiHollyMinkowski Posts: 1,398
    edited 2011-06-07 10:25
    Parallax is an amazing company.

    You can communicate directly with the engineer who designed the Propeller
    uC (and his brother :-) this is just so cool.

    They seem to not only be interested in their bottom line but in the joy the technology
    brings to the end users of their products. This is really unusual!

    I have never actually contacted anyone at parallax for any help but I'm sure the
    many testimonials I have read about the quality of their help are accurate.
  • TappermanTapperman Posts: 319
    edited 2011-06-07 12:59
    I've only contacted parallax once ... when I bought my first uC (basic stamp), got instant results and very friendly staff. Since then, I have purchased the propeller. What a dream!

    I can say, though, without the forum ... I may have been a 'pest' from parallax's point of view. But this forum stands as a giant resource for me. I search entry's that are years old ... and find each and every one of them still applies. Yes sir, if you took away the forum ... I might actually have to do 'research' (Yuk).

    Most all the members on the forum are friendly & experienced, and the input you get can save hundreds of hours, frustration and even hardware from melt down (if you listen, that is).

    When you put it all together, it spells 'success' for my projects. Humble as they are, I enjoy them. And the parallax product (propeller) is my choice for uC.

    ... Tim
  • K2K2 Posts: 693
    edited 2011-06-07 14:59
    I fell in love with Parallax with the release of the first SX-Key. It was the most perfect product I'd ever encountered. I can still recall the amazement.

    It took me a long time to warm up to the Propeller, though, mostly because it wasn't the SX. I should never have waited so long. The Prop is fantastic! I've never had so much fun developing applications on any other processor or platform.

    Perhaps the best feature of the Propeller is the fact that the chip and the IDE encompass high-speed deterministic code and high-level abstraction at the same time. Usually you have to make a choice of one or the other.
  • ElectricAyeElectricAye Posts: 4,561
    edited 2011-06-07 15:28
    If I can make this thing work, anyone can.
  • markaericmarkaeric Posts: 282
    edited 2011-06-07 18:55
    I really like how spin makes it so easy to break up one big main loop into smaller loops spread across multiple cogs with each spin cog having access to the global variables (as long as they're within the same "object"). And despite Spin being interpreted, you can still get a good overall performance satisfactory for many tasks, so it's memory efficiency is icing on the cake. I also find the language itself to be quite intuitive.. It was quite easy for me to pick up despite me not being a professional programmer.
  • TtailspinTtailspin Posts: 1,326
    edited 2011-06-07 21:29
    Thats not saying much from you ElectricAye, :)
    Please allow me to lower the bar even more with the exact same statement...
    "If I can make this thing work, anyone can."

    In fact I like to say, "this thing is so easy it's hard"...

    Great letter idbruce.

    -Tommy
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