MCP2200 breakout board

From DP

Project Summary
Name:	MCP2200 breakout board
Buy it:	[ Get one for $15 at Seeed Studio]
Price:	$15
Status:	Test production
Manufacturing:	Programming and testing
Forum:	[ MCP2200 breakout board Forum]

The MCP2200 is a new USB to serial converter chip from Microchip. This breakout board brings all the pins to bread-board friendly headers.

• USB CDC virtual serial port interface
• Secondary HID configuration interface
• Up to 8 additional IO
• TX/RX indicator LEDs
• All pins to bread-board friendly header

The MCP2200 is actually just a PIC 18F14K50 programmed with a firmware, but it's slightly less expensive than the PIC alone.

Contents 1 Hardware 1.1 MCP2200 1.2 LEDs 2 PCB 2.1 Partslist 3 Drivers 4 Configuration utility 5 Issues with the MCP2200 5.1 Windows XP SP3+ required 5.2 RTS/CTS 6 Get one! 7 Resources 8 License

Hardware

490px

Click for a full size schematic image. Schematic and PCB were designed with the freeware version of Cadsoft Eagle, download the latest project files from our Google Code project SVN.

MCP2200

File:2232H-fake.png

• Crystal
• caps
• USB powered

LEDs

• table of connections to GPIO pins

PCB

File:Pcb-scan.jpg

We used the freeware version of Cadsoft Eagle to make the schematic and PCB. Download the latest board files from SVN.

• PCB and placement notes
• soldering advise

Partslist

Click for a full size placement image.

partlist

Part	Quantity	Value	Package
cell	cell
cell	cell

Drivers

• Driver and configuration utility

Configuration utility

Issues with the MCP2200

Windows XP SP3+ required

Windows XP issues: SP3 or later required!

This is a composite USB device (serial port and HID configuration channel). A composite serial device will only work on Windows XP SP3 and higher. The device will connect and the transmit LED will blink (if configured) but no data is actually sent or received. Read more here and here.

RTS/CTS

RTS/CTS are handled locally on the chip!

The CDC serial device specification doesn't include CTS or RTS. The firmware in the MCP2200 handles the RTS and CTS signals internally. This means it probably can't reset your Arduino for programming.

Get one!

File:Breakout.jpg

You can [get one for $00], including worldwide shipping.

Your purchases at Seeed Studio keep the open source project coming, we sincerely appreciate your support!

Resources

• homepage
• datasheet
• Drivers and configuration utility
• programming examples

License

• CC-0, reference boards shouldn't be copyrighted!