picaxe opinions?

[blackbeard]

so i've been reading about this thing called the "picaxe" and essentially it seems like an mcu for hard core beginers. thing is though is that it's ungodly cheep! personally i don't really want to use it since i think it would be a step back for me but i'd like to here what other people have to say about it.

[Razor Concepts]

picaxe was the first microcontroller I used, way back when this stuff wasn't my hobby. Its okay, but VERY very limited... you cant even name your own variables, you have to use the ones they provide (b0, b1, b2, b3, etc etc), and usually they only give you with a handful of variables   

Its also fairly expensive, they charge like 2x or 3x the cost of the PIC chip alone.

[blackbeard]

picaxe was the first microcontroller I used, way back when this stuff wasn't my hobby. Its okay, but VERY very limited... you cant even name your own variables, you have to use the ones they provide (b0, b1, b2, b3, etc etc), and usually they only give you with a handful of variables   

Its also fairly expensive, they charge like 2x or 3x the cost of the PIC chip alone.

ya when i said it was cheep i was really comparing it to the $100 BS2 and even to the $30 arduino

[Soeren]

Hi,

Its also fairly expensive, they charge like 2x or 3x the cost of the PIC chip alone.

They're on sale?
(I seem to recall a much higher price difference).

They're both limited and slow, based on some very old PIC's (unless that has changed too).

Just buy PIC's and use a compiled BASIC like PBP, which can do all the Axe can (and then a lot more) - and much faster of course, not to mention the vast range you will then cover (from 6 pin PIC10Fxxx to eg. 100 pin PIC18F97J60) .

[MikeK]

They have their purpose.  2X to 3X the price of a PIC isn't bad when you consider that it makes programming easy and you don't have to learn assembly or buy a pricey compiler.

People have done quite a lot with them.  I think they're more attractive than Stamps, because of the price.