Articles :: Eeprom Programming Software

unstable -- Jun 27, 2007

A while back I was actively developing my EasyTitle device, which controls a mini disk unit to allow quick editing of titles and table of contents. It is controlled by a PIC16F84 (1K program EEPROM, 68 bytes data RAM, 64 bytes data EEPROM ). To store all the keyboard codes and macros it uses a 24LC64 EEPROM (64k). I was using a PDIP PIC but a SMD EEPROM. The problem I was faced with is populating the 64K eeprom, as I had no means to program a surface mount chip (Only own a home made PIC programmer so wouldn't have been able to program a PDIP eeprom either).

After searching the net to find a way of populating an eeprom in stages, or indirectly from the PIC and finding no solutions, I decided to dive in and try it myself. So using a C compiler and various data sheets I finally came up with some source code which allowed me to program the PIC with a chunk of the data I wanted putting into the eeprom. It was tedious but eventually got the job done. I needed to re-program the PIC for every segment of data and increment the buffer count so the PIC knew where to place the data.

Not being able to find a similar utility on the web made me think that others might also find this useful, so I am now (finally) posting the code for anyone and everyone to use as they wish.

Feedback is greatly appreciated, together with ideas of improvements or additional features (although with it being such a small utility there is little room to implement more). If anyone finds this useful please send me a quick email so I know my work was not in vain.

Download can be found here (in the downloads section).