Particular numbers referenced on this page refer to the PIC32MX460F512L chip, which is the PIC32 used on the NU32 board. (Of course surface mount and lower operating voltages are vastly superior for commercial embedded products, and we will find ways to work around the disadvantages mentioned.) The primary disadvantages are that they come only in surface mount packages, making them harder to work with for fast prototyping compared to the DIP (dual-inline packages) 8-bit PICs that can be plugged into a breadboard and they must be powered by 2.3-3.6 V, unlike the 5 V of DIP 8-bit PICs and some DIP chips we would like to interface with.
For our purposes, the primary advantages of the 32-bit PICs over the 8-bit PICs we have used (and will continue to use) are that they are faster (max clock rate of 80 MHz compared to 40 MHz), have more peripherals available, offer more program memory (flash) and data memory (RAM), and have significantly more computational horsepower due to the 32-bit address and data buses and single-cycle multiply for 32-bit math. This microcontroller offers many peripherals useful for mechatronics purposes, such as several channels for analog-to-digital conversion, digital I/O, synchronous and asynchronous serial communication, pulse width modulation, etc. The Microchip PIC32 is a family of complex and powerful microcontrollers that can be purchased for less than $10 in quantities of one.
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Pic16f877a microcontroller based projects list.