I'm revisiting the Atmel famiiy of micros now that I've moved on from assembler to C. In my previous experience with Atmel parts I was using a simple STK200 style parallel port programmer. My new laptop doesn't have a parallel port so I'm wondering what everyone is using... ie. USB programmer or whatever ? Ideally it would be something listed in the GCC-WinAVR AVR-Dude list of programmers, my C compiler of choice.
Thanks, Hugh.
so I'm wondering what everyone is using
Well the arduino world does not encompass the whole Atmel AVR world, but in context with just arduino boards, they most all come equipped with a on board USB serial converter chip and the board's AVR chip has a bootloader program burned into high flash memory, so the arduino IDE uses simple USB serial communications to upload new programs into the AVR chip.
The Arduino IDE can also burn sketches onto to AVR boards directly without using a serial bootloader by using a hardware ISP programmer. The IDE supports about six different hardware programmers of which one is just another arduino board running a arduinoISP program and wired to the the target avr chip or board via the ICSP pins on the chip.
Lefty
Thanks for the reply. I ordered an Arduino Nano the other day so I guess I'll have to read up on the programming procedure using the bootloader. I'm a "dive right in" kinda guy, not big on RTFM lol 
In the meantime I just ordered a USBASP programmer off eBay. Hopefully I'll be able to use it with my non-Arduino Atmel boards.
Just out of curiousity, is the Arduino bootloader proprietary firmware or is it available to be loaded into a virgin Atmel uC ?
Tnx.
radeohedca:
Thanks for the reply. I ordered an Arduino Nano the other day so I guess I'll have to read up on the programming procedure using the bootloader. I'm a "dive right in" kinda guy, not big on RTFM lol
In the meantime I just ordered a USBASP programmer off eBay. Hopefully I'll be able to use it with my non-Arduino Atmel boards.Just out of curiousity, is the Arduino bootloader proprietary firmware or is it available to be loaded into a virgin Atmel uC ?
Tnx.
All the various official Arduino board bootloaders are open source and the source code files are included with the arduino IDE distribution.
Note that you can use the USBasp hardware programmer to load programs onto your nano. The IDE has a files option of 'upload using programmer' option that will burn the compiled program using the programmer type you select in the menu. This will of course erase the bootloader on the AVR, so all further uploads will have to also be done using the hardware programmer until you wish to reburn the bootloader back onto the avr chip and then be able once again to use normal USB serial uploading.
Lefty
radeohedca:
Just out of curiousity, is the Arduino bootloader proprietary firmware or is it available to be loaded into a virgin Atmel uC ?
The gratifying thing about the Arduino environment is first, you use the g++ compiler (via the IDE or your own toolchain), and second, virtually everything is open source, including the bootloader.
I have a post here about taking the "raw" chip, adding a bootloader, and then programming it with the IDE. The whole process of uploading new code using the IDE is ridiculously easy.
Thanks Nick. I'll check out the link and give it a read.
Hugh