So I just started learning about PIC microcontrollers starting with the 8-bit PIC16F84A. I have written a simple code that blinks an LED and I wanted to ask something. Here is a segment of the code that turns on the LED and waits. What I wanted to ask is that in the loop it counts to 255, 255 times. If one instruction takes 1uS to execute then the whole loop takes a time of 255*255*(1E-06)=65ms. But when I simulate the same program in Proteus, it shows that the LED stays on for 198ms and not 65ms. What could I be doing wrong?
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\$\begingroup\$ maybe one instruction takes 3us to execute... or maybe it takes three instructions to execute one iteration of your loop... \$\endgroup\$ – vicatcu Apr 19 '17 at 3:41
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1\$\begingroup\$ If your two count variables both start as zero (and I can't tell if they do, but the code looks like it expects that), then the total number of cycles is: \$256\cdot\left(256\cdot 3+3\right)=197376\$ cycles. That doesn't count set-up times and/or cycles after the code that takes place in between changing LED port pins. \$\endgroup\$ – jonk Apr 19 '17 at 4:19
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Your loop takes 3 instruction cycles to execute. Not every instruction on the PIC takes exactly one instruction cycle. See Table 7-2 in the PIC16F84A datasheet.
DECFSZ takes 1 instruction cycle usually (2 when it skips) and GOTO takes 2 instruction cycles. That's 3 cycles normally. So, given 3uS per loop, that's almost exactly the timing you got (196ms). The extra time probably comes from the 5 cycles that the loop takes when COUNT1 underflows and the 4 cycles in the very last loop cycle.
