Is there an emulator of MSP430 chip that works without the actual chip and integrates with Code Composer Studio?

Question

I need to learn to program MSP430, but don't have the actual chip yet. All configurations that I've tried at Code Composer Studio (except Snapshot, but it does not count, right?) require something on my USB. How do I learn to program the chip without the chip?

And what is an emulator that requires a USB?

Answer 1

This emulator is pretty awesome, once you can get it running. Note that it does claim GDB support, which likely means you can get a pure eclipse CDT C project & CDT-GDB-HW-Debugging session up and running against it (making sure to compile with the msp430's tool chain, of course).

http://opencores.org/project,openmsp430

As far as a simulator, the answer is truly 'no'. I would like to be wrong on that... But consider for a moment the number of variants of the msp430, the peripherals, and so on. Not sure if any company can justify that kind of cost!

Especially when launchpad/etc are so cheap and fast.

Answer 2

Online emulator (used chrome): http://www.msp430emulator.com

This MSP430 Emulator is open source, and can be used directly online without downloading anything. Still under construction but has a good debug interface. Unfortunately no integration with CCS.

It is on the TI Open source page: TI Open Source Project Page

"The MSP430 Online Emulator provides a complete software model of the MSP430 16-bit instruction set. It is an interactive debugger for advanced development and in depth firmware/hardware analysis. Peripherals include UART, GPIO Ports, BCM+, Timer_A, and more! Open source, and absolutely free - access to the TI MSP430 Launchpad allows you to effectively build and debug firmware. No hardware setup, emulate anytime anywhere!"

open source on github: https://github.com/RudolfGeosits/MSP430-Emulator

If you need something implemented you can add to the code yourself and run a local emulation server for real time applications.

Answer 3

If you can afford £10 then the launchpad is the way to go just to teach yourself about the MSP430. You can use either IAR Embedded Workbench or Code Composer Studio, both which come in code size limited version which will be plenty big enough to learn with. I don't like either, but of the two the IAR one is, IMHO, the better bet as it's not Eclipse based. If you don't mind Java and Eclipse, then CCS is a viable option for you. One huge advantage with CCS is it runs on Linux, but really, it's still not a patch on Rowley Crossworks which runs on Linux. The latter has a cheap educational licence.

As far as the emulator and USB question is concerned, it's maybe being slightly pedantic, but it's not an emulator, it's a debug interface. There is a debugger built into the chip that enables you to load the code into the chip, set breakpoints, single step through code.

This kit is a great way to start because the debugger interface is built into the kit, you can access pins on the processor, see LEDs come on and all that good stuff that gives you the warm feeling you're programming a chip properly. For the sake of £10 you'd be mad not to!