Definition of a Micro Controller

Microcontrollers, as the name suggests, are small controllers. They are like single chip computers that are often embedded into other systems to function as processing/controlling unit. For example, the remote control you are using for controlling a Television, probably has microcontrollers inside that do decoding and other controlling functions. They are widely used in automobiles, washing machines, microwave ovens, toys ... etc.

So Micro Controllers, in addition to the processing unit, which does the tasks, will have additional componets like, input and output devices, memory etc., Thats the reason, it is called as single chip computers.

So the features of a Micro controller are

• Functionality
• Flexibility
• Easy to Use

Introduction to Embedded Systems

This Blog has been created to give some basic introduction to Embedded Systems. Today I want to start with the definition of an Embedded system. Embedded system is a specialized computer system that is part of a larger system or machine. Typically, an embedded system is housed on a single Micro Processor or Micro Controller board with the Applications and drivers code stored in ROM.

But now a days this definition does not hold good, as even a small or portable systems are used for housing many applications and can be used for performing many tasks. That’s the reason a normal PC can be considered as an Embedded System now, even though it performs so many functions instead of a dedicated function.