What are the applications of the microcontroller?

Question

What are the applications of the microcontroller?

Answer 1

http://infohost.nmt.edu/~mlgordon/

http://www.lvr.com/microcib.htm

http://www.necel.com/en/faq/mi_com/__com...

Answer 2

Microcontrollers are very common place these days.  You will find them in all sorts of appliances around the home.  Some examples are Clothes waher and dryer, refrigerators, air conditioners, and even in toasters and irons!  The cost of a microprocessor ( take a look at www.microchip.com ) can be less than a dollar even in relatively small quantities.

A microcontroller is basically a very small computer, containing program memory, an instruction processor, data memore, and all sorts of I/O, such as digital, A to D converters, and serial or USB ports.

In general, besides being smaller, the differemce between a computer and a PC is that the Microcontroller generally does not use an operating system such as Windows, and is usally programmed once for a specific application, not like a PC that can do just about anything you want by changing its program.

Answer 3

Industrial machinery is a good example. Assembly lines , welding machines and the such.

Answer 4

Any system that requires process control - that is, some kind of output in response to an input. It can replace relays, analog computers, timers, hardwired logic and so forth.

Because of its flexibility, very sophisticated control schemes can be implemented with a microcontroller, often for lower cost and with a smaller footprint than a discrete solution.