INTEL 8051 MICRCONTROLLER

Introduction:
A decade back, the process and control operations were totally implemented by the
Microprocessors only. But nowadays, the situation is totally changed and it is occupied by the
new devices called Microcontroller. The development is so drastic that we cant find any
electronic gadget without the use of a microcontroller. This microcontroller changed the
embedded system design so simple and advanced that the embedded market has become one of
the most sought after for not only entrepreneurs but for design engineers also.
What is a Microcontroller?

A single chip computer or a CPU with all the peripherals like RAM, ROM, I/O Ports,
Timers , ADCs etc... on the same chip. For ex: Motorolas 6811, Intels 8051, Zilogs Z8 and
PIC 16X etc
MICROPROCESSORS & MICROCONTROLLERS:

Microprocessor:
A CPU built into a single VLSI chip is called a microprocessor. It is a general-purpose device
and additional external circuitry are added to make it a microcomputer. The microprocessor
contains arithmetic and logic unit (ALU), Instruction decoder and control unit, Instruction
register, Program counter (PC), clock circuit (internal or external), reset circuit (internal or
external) and registers. But the microprocessor has no on chip I/O Ports, Timers , Memory etc.
For example, Intel 8085 is an 8-bit microprocessor and Intel 8086/8088 a 16-bit microprocessor.
The block diagram of the Microprocessor is shown in Fig.1

Fig.1 Block diagram of a Microprocessor.

MICROCONTROLLER:
A microcontroller is a highly integrated single chip, which consists of on chip CPU (Central
Processing Unit), RAM (Random Access Memory), EPROM/PROM/ROM (Erasable
Programmable Read Only Memory), I/O (input/output) serial and parallel, timers, interrupt
controller.

For example, Intel 8051 is 8-bit microcontroller and Intel 8096 is 16-bit

microcontroller. The block diagram of Microcontroller is shown in Fig.2.

Fig.2.Block Diagram of a Microcontroller

Distinguish between Microprocessor and Microcontroller

S.No
1

Microprocessor

Microcontroller

A microprocessor is a general

A microcontroller is a dedicated chip which

purpose device which is called a

is also called single chip computer.

CPU
2

A microprocessor do not contain

onchip I/OPorts, Timers, Memories
etc..

Microprocessors

A microcontroller includes RAM, ROM,

serial and parallel interface, timers,
interrupt circuitry (in addition to CPU) in a
single chip.

are

most Microcontrollers are used in small,

commonly used as the CPU in minimum component designs performing

microcomputer systems
4

Microprocessor

control-oriented applications.

instructions

are Microcontroller instructions are both bit

mainly nibble or byte addressable

5

Microprocessor instruction sets are Microcontrollers

mainly

intended

Microprocessor

The

instruction

sets

outputs.

based

system Microcontroller based system design is

design is complex and expensive

7

have

for catering to catering to the control of inputs and

large volumes of data.

6

addressable as well as byte addressable.

Instruction

set

rather simple and cost effective

of The instruction set of a Microcontroller is

microprocessor is complex with very

large number of instructions.

simple

with

less

number

of

instructions. For, ex: PIC microcontrollers

have only 35 instructions.

A microprocessor has zero status A microcontroller has no zero flag.

flag

EVOLUTION OF MICROCONTROLLERS :
The first microcontroller TMS1000 was introduced by Texas Instruments in the year
1974. In the year 1976, Motorola designed a Microprocessor chip called 6801 which replaced
its earlier chip 6800 with certain add-on chips to make a computer. This paved the way for the
new revolution in the history of chip design and gave birth to a new entity called
Microcontroller. Later the Intel company produced its first Microcontroller

8048 with a

CPU and 1K bytes of EPROM, 64 Bytes of RAM an 8-Bit Timer and 27 I/O pins in 1976. Then
followed the most popular controller 8051 in the year 1980 with 4K bytes of ROM,128 Bytes of
RAM , a serial port, two 16-bit Timers , and 32 I/O pins. The 8051 family has many additions
and improvements over the years and remains a most acclaimed tool for todays circuit
designers. INTEL introduced a 16 bit microcontroller 8096 in the year 1982 . Later INTEL
introduced 80c196 series of 16-bit Microcontrollers for mainly industrial applications.
Microchip, another company has introduced an 8-bit Microcontroller PIC 16C64 in the year

1985.The 32-bit microcontrollers have been developed by IBM and Motorola. MPC 505 is a 32bit RISC controller of Motorola. The 403 GA is a 32 -bit RISC embedded controller of IBM.
In recent times ARM company (Advanced RISC machines) has developed and introduced 32 bit
controllers for high-end application devices like mobiles , Ipods etc...

TYPES OF MICROCONTROLLERS :
Microcontrollers can be classified on the basis of internal bus width, architecture, memory and
instruction set as 4-bit,8-bit,16-bit and 32-bit micrcontrollers.
4-bit Microcontrollers: These 4-bit microcontrollers are small size, minimum pin count and
low cost controllers which are widely used for low end applications like LED & LCD display
drivers ,portable battery chargers etc.. Their power consumption is also low. The popular 4-bit
controllers are Renasa M34501 which is a 20 pin DIP chip with 4kB of ROM,256 Bytes of
RAM,2-Counters and 14 I/O Pins. Similarly ATAM862 series from ATMEL.
8-bit Microcontrollers : These are the most popular and widely used microcontrollers .About
55% of all CPUs sold in the world are 8-bit microcontrollers only.The 8-bit microcontroller has
8-bitinternal bus and the ALU performs all the arithmetic and logical operations on a byte
instruction. The well known 8-bit microcontroller is 8051 which was designed by Intel in the
year 1980 for the use in embedded systems. Other 8-bit microcontrollers are Intel 8031/8052 and
Motorola MC68HC11 and AVR Microcontrollers, Microchips PIC Microcontrollers 12C5XX ,
16C5X and 16C505 etc...
16-bit Microcontrollers : When the microcontroller performs 16-bit arithmetic and logical
operations at an instruction, the microcontroller is said to be a 16-bit microcontroller. The
internal bus width of 16-bit microcontroller is of 16-bit. These microcontrollers are having
increased memory size and speed of operation when compared to 8-bit microcontrollers.These
are most suitable for programming in Highlevel languages like C or C++ .They find applications
in disk drivers,modems,printers,scanners and servomotor control.

Examples of 16-bit

microcontrollers are Intel 8096 family and Motorola MC68HC12 and MC68332 families, The
performance and computing capability of 16 bit microcontrollers are enhanced with greater
precision as compared to the 8-bit microcontrollers.
5

32-Bit Microcontrollers :These microcontrollers used in highend applications like Automative

control,

Communication

networks,Robotics,Cell

phones

,GPRS

&

PDAs

etc..For

EX:PIC32,ARM 7,ARM9 ,SHARP LH79520 ,ATMEL 32 (AVR) ,Texas Instruments .

TMS320F2802x/2803x etc..are some of the popular 32-bit microcontrollers.

COMMERCIAL MICROCONTROLLERS
There are various manufacturers who are supplying various types of microcontrollers suitable
for different applications depending on the power consumption and the available features..They
are given below in tables . First the various members of INTEL 51 family are given in below
table.
INTEL MCS 51 Family
Microcontroller

On chip RAM

On chip program

(Bytes)

memory

Timers/Counters

Interrupts

Serial ports

8031

128

None

8032

256

None

8051

128

4K ROM

8052

256

8K ROM

8751

128

4K EPROM

8752

256

8K EPROM

The following table gives the 4-bit microcontrollers from different manufacturers.

4-Bit Microcontrollers.

8-Bit Microcontrollers.

16-Bit Microcontrollers
The following table gives the list of PIC microcontrollers from Micro chip Inc
Microcontroller

Pins

I/O Lines

On chip ADCs

EPROM

On chip RAM

X 12 words

(Bytes)

16C54

18

12

None

512

25

16C55

28

20

None

512

24

16C56

18

12

None

1k

25

16C57

28

20

None

2k

72

17C42A

40

33

None

2k

232

17C43

40

33

None

4k

454

17C44

40

33

None

8k

454

17C71

18

13

8bit ADCs

1kx14

36

17C752

40

33

10Bit ADC

8kx16

678

MICROCONTROLLER

DEVELOPMENT TOOLS:

To develop an assembly language program we need certain program development tools.

An assembly language program consists of Mnemonics which are nothing but short abbreviated
English instructions given to the controller.The various development tools required for
Microcontroller programming are explained below.
1. Editor : An Editor is a program which allows us to create a file containing the assembly
language statements for the program. Examples of some editors are PC write Wordstar. As we
type the program the

editor stores the ACSII codes for the letters and numbers in successive

RAM locations. If any typing mistake is done editor will alert us to correct it. If we leave out a
program statement an editor will let you move everything down and insert a line. After typing all
the program we have to save the program . This we call it as source file. The next step is to
process the source file with an assembler.

Ex: Sample. asm

2.Assembler :

An Assembler is used to translate the assembly language mnemonics into

machine language( i.e binary codes). When you run the assembler it reads the source file of your
program from where you have saved it. The assembler generates a filee with the extension .hex.
This file consists of hexadecimal values encoding a sequence of data and their starting offset or
absolute address.
3.Compiler : A compiler is a program which converts the high level language program like C
into binary or machine code. Using

high level languages it is easy to manage complex data

structures which are often required for data manipulation. Because of its ease , flexibility and
debug options now a days the compilers have become very popular in the market. Compilers
like Keil ,Ride and IAR workbench are very popular.
3. Debugger/Simulator : A debugger is a program which allows

execute the program, and

troubleshoot or debug it. The debugger allows to look into the contents of registers and memory
locations after the program runs. We can also change the contents of registers and memory
locations and rerun the program. Some debuggers allows

to stop the program after each

instruction so that you can check or alter memory and register contents. This is called single step
debug. A debugger also allows to set a breakpoint at any point in the program. If we insert a
break point , the debugger will run the program up to the instruction where the breakpoint is put
and then stop the execution.
A simulator is a software program which virtually executes the instructions similar to a
microcontroller and shows the results. This will help in evaluating the results without committing
any errors. By doing so we can detect the possible logic errors

INTEL 8051 MICRCONTROLLER :

The 8051 microcontroller is a very popular 8-bit microcontroller introduced by Intel in
the year 1981 and it has become almost the academic standard now a days. The 8051 is based on
an 8-bit CISC core with Harvard architecture. Its 8-bit architecture is optimized for control

applications with extensive Boolean processing. It is available as a 40-pin DIP chip and works at
+5 Volts DC. The salient features of 8051 controller are given below.
SALIENT FEATURES : The salient features of 8051 Microcontroller are
i. 4 KB on chip program memory (ROM or EPROM)).
ii. 128 bytes on chip data memory(RAM).
iii. 8-bit data bus
iv. 16-bit address bus
v. 32 general purpose registers each of 8 bits
vi. Two -16 bit timers T0 and T1
vii. Five Interrupts (3 internal and 2 external).
ix. Four Parallel ports each of 8-bits (PORT0, PORT1,PORT2,PORT3) with a total of 32 I/O
lines.
x. One 16-bit program counter and One 16-bit DPTR ( data pointer)
xi. One 8-bit stack pointer
xii. One Microsecond instruction cycle with 12 MHz Crystal.
xiii. One full duplex serial communication port.
ARCHITECTURE & BLOCK DIAGRAM OF 8051 MICROCONTROLLER:
The architecture of the 8051 microcontroller can be understood from the block diagram.
It has Harward architecture with RISC (Reduced Instruction Set Computer) concept. The block
diagram of 8051 microcontroller is shown in Fig 3. below1.It consists of an 8-bit ALU, one 8bit PSW(Program Status Register), A and B registers , one 16-bit Program counter , one 16-bit
Data pointer register(DPTR),128 bytes of RAM and 4kB of ROM and four parallel I/O ports
each of 8-bit width.

10

Fig.3. Block Diagram of 8051 Microcontroller

8051 has 8-bit ALU which can perform all the 8-bit arithmetic and logical operations in one
machine cycle. The ALU is associated with two registers A & B
A and B Registers : The A and B registers are special function registers which hold the results
of many arithmetic and logical operations of 8051.The A register is also called the Accumulator
and

as its name suggests, is used as a general register to accumulate the results of a large

number of instructions. By default it is used for all mathematical operations and also data
transfer operations between CPU and any external memory.
The B register is mainly used for multiplication and division operations along with A register.
MUL AB

DIV AB.

It has no other function other than as a location where data may be stored.
The R registers: The "R" registers are a set of eight registers that are named R0, R1, etc. up to

11

and including R7. These registers are used as auxillary registers in many operations. The "R"
registers are also used to temporarily store values.
Program Counter(PC) : 8051 has a 16-bit program counter .The program counter always points
to the address of the next instruction to be executed. After execution of one instruction the
program counter is incremented to point to the address of the next instruction to be executed.It is
the contents of the PC that are placed on the address bus to find and fetch the desired
instruction.Since the PC is 16-bit width ,8051 can access program addresses from 0000H to
FFFFH ,a total of 6kB of code.
Stack Pointer Register (SP) : It is an 8-bit register which stores the address of the stack top. i.e
the Stack Pointer is used to indicate where the next value to be removed from the stack should
be taken from. When a value is pushed onto the stack, the 8051 first increments the value of SP
and then stores the value at the resulting memory location. Similarly when a value is popped off
the stack, the 8051 returns the value from the memory location indicated by SP, and then
decrements the value of SP. Since the SP is only 8-bit wide it is incremented or decremented by
two . SP is modified directly by the 8051 by six instructions: PUSH, POP, ACALL, LCALL,
RET, and RETI. It is also used intrinsically whenever an interrupt is triggered.
STACK in 8051 Microcontroller : The stack is a part of RAM used by the CPU to store
information temporarily. This information may be either data or an address .The CPU needs this
storage area as there are only limited number of registers. The register used to access the stack is
called the Stack pointer which is an 8-bit register..So,it can take values of 00 to FF H.When the
8051 is powered up ,the SP register contains the value 07.i.e the RAM location value 08 is the
first location being used for the stack by the 8051 controller
There are two important instructions to handle this stack.One is the PUSH and the Other
is the POP. The loading of data from CPU registers to the stack is done by PUSH and the
loading of the contents of the stack back into aCPU register is done by POP.
EX : MOV R6 ,#35 H
MOV R1 ,#21 H
PUSH 6
PUSH 1
12

In the above instructions the contents of the Registers R6 and R1 are moved to stack and
they occupy the 08 and 09 locations of the stack.Now the contents of the SP are incremented by
two and it is 0A
Similarly POP 3 instruction pops the contents of stack into R3 register.Now the contents of the
SP is decremented by 1
In 8051 the RAM locations 08 to 1F (24 bytes) can be used for the Stack.In any program if we
need more than 24 bytes of stack ,we can change the SP point to RAM locations 30-7F H.this
can be done with the instruction MOV SP,# XX.
Data Pointer Register(DPTR) : It is a 16-bit register which is the only user-accessible.
DPTR, as the name suggests, is used to point to data. It is used by a number of commands which
allow the 8051 to access external memory. When the 8051 accesses external memory it will
access external memory at the address indicated by DPTR. This DPTR can also be used as two
8-registers DPH and DPL.
Program Status Register (PSW) : The 8051 has a 8-bit PSW register which is alsoknown as
Flag register.In the 8-bit register only 6-bits are used by 8051.The two unused bits are user
definable bits.In the 6-bits four of them are conditional flags .They are Carry CY,Auxiliary
Carry-AC, Parity-P,and Overflow-OV .These flag bits

indicate some conditions that resulted

after an instruction was executed.

The bits PSW3 and PSW4 are denoted as RS0 and RS1 and these bits are used th select the
bank registers of the RAM location. The meaning of various bits of PSW register is shown
below.
CY

PSW.7

Carry Flag

AC

PSW.6

Auxiliary Carry Flag

FO

PSW.5

Flag 0 available for general purpose .

RS1

PSW.4

Register Bank select bit 1

13

RS0

PSW.3

Register bank select bit 0

OV

PSW.2

Overflow flag

---

PSW.1

User difinable flag

PSW.0

Parity flag .set/cleared by hardware.

The selection of the register Banks and their addresses are given below.
RS1

RS0

Register Bank

Address

00H-07H

08H-0FH

10H-17H

18H-1FH

Memory organization : The 8051 microcontroller has 128 bytes of Internal RAM and 4kB of
on chip ROM .The RAM is also known as Data memory and the ROM is known as program
memory. The program memory is also known as Code memory .This Code memory holds the
actual 8051 program that is to be executed. In 8051 this memory is limited to 64K .Code
memory may be found on-chip, as ROM or EPROM. It may also be stored completely off-chip
in an external ROM or, more commonly, an external EPROM. The 8051 has only 128 bytes of
Internal RAM but it supports 64kB of external RAM. As the name suggests, external RAM is
any random access memory which is off-chip. Since the memory is off-chip it is not as flexible
interms of accessing, and is also slower. For example, to increment an Internal RAM location by
1,it requires only 1 instruction and 1 instruction cycle but to increment a 1-byte value stored in
External RAM requires 4 instructions and 7 instruction cycles. So, here the external memory is
7 times slower.
Internal RAM OF 8051 :
This Internal RAM is found on-chip on the 8051 .So it is the fastest RAM available, and it is also
the most flexible in terms of reading, writing, and modifying its contents. Internal RAM is

14

volatile, so when the 8051 is reset this memory is cleared. The 128 bytes of internal RAM is
organized as below.
(i) Four register banks (Bank0,Bank1, Bank2 and Bank3) each of 8-bits (total 32 bytes). The
default bank register is Bank0. The remaining Banks are selected with the help of RS0 and
RS1 bits of PSW Register.
(ii) 16 bytes of bit addressable area and
(iii) 80 bytes of general purpose area (Scratch pad memory) as shown in the diagram below.
This area is also utilized by the microcontroller as a storage area for the operating stack.

15

The 32 bytes of RAM from address 00 H to 1FH are used as working registers organized as four
banks of eight registers each.The registers are named as R0-R7 .Each register can be addressed
by its name or by its RAM address.
For

EX : MOV A, R7

or

MOV R7,#05H

Internal ROM (On chip ROM): The 8051 microcontroller has 4kB of on chip ROM but it
can be extended up to 64kB.This ROM is also called program memory or code memory. The
CODE segment is accessed using the program counter (PC) for opcode fetches and by DPTR
for data. The external ROM is accessed when the EA(active low) pin is connected to ground or
the contents of program counter exceeds 0FFFH.When the Internal ROM address is exceeded the
8051 automatically fetches the code bytes from the external program memory.

SPECIAL FUNCTION REGISTERS (SFRs) : In 8051 microcontroller there certain registers

which uses the RAM addresses from 80h to FFh and they are meant for certain specific
operations .These registers are called Special function registers (SFRs).Some of these registers
are bit addressable also.
The list of SFRs and their functional names are given below. In these SFRs some of them are
related to I/O ports (P0,P1,P2 and P3) and some of them are meant for control operations
(TCON,SCON, PCON..) and remaining are the auxillary SFRs, in the sense that they don't
directly configure the 8051.

16

S.No

Symbol

Name of SFR

Address (Hex)

ACC*

Accumulator

0E0

B*

B-Register

0F0

PSW*

Program Status word register

0DO

SP

Stack Pointer Register

81

DPL

Data pointer low byte

82

DPH

Data pointer high byte

83

P0*

Port 0

80

P1*

Port 1

90

P2*

Port 2

0A

P3*

Port 3

0B

10

IP*

Interrupt Priority control

0B8

11

IE*

Interrupt Enable control

0A8

12

TMOD

Tmier mode register

89

13

TCON*

Timer control register

88

14

TH0

Timer 0 Higher byte

8C

15

TL0

Timer 0 Lower byte

8A

16

TH1

Timer 1Higher byte

8D

17

TL1

Timer 1 lower byte

8B

18

SCON*

Serial control register

98

19

SBUF

Serial buffer register

99

20

PCON

Power control register

87

5
DPTR
6

The * indicates the bit addressable SFRs

Table:SFRs of 8051 Microcontroller
PARALLEL I /O PORTS

17

The 8051 microcontroller has four parallel I/O ports , each of 8-bits .So, it provides the user 32
I/O lines for connecting the microcontroller to the peripherals. The four ports are P0 (Port 0),
P1(Port1) ,P2(Port 2) and P3 (Port3). Upon reset all the ports are output ports. In order to make
them input, all the ports must be set i.e a high bit must be sent to all the port pins. This is
normally done by the instruction SETB.
Ex: MOV A,#0FFH
MOV P0,A

; A = FF
; make P0 an input port

PORT 0:
Port 0 is an 8-bit I/O port with dual purpose. If external memory is used, these port pins are used
for the lower address byte address/data (AD0-AD7), otherwise all bits of the port are either input
or output.. Unlike other ports, Port 0 is not provided with pull-up resistors internally ,so for
PORT0 pull-up resistors of nearly 10k are to be connected externally as shown in the fig.2.
Dual role of port 0: Port 0 can also be used as address/data bus(AD0-AD7), allowing it to be
used for both address and data. When connecting the 8051 to an external memory, port 0
provides both address and data. The 8051 multiplexes address and data through port 0 to save the
pins. ALE indicates whether P0 has address or data. When ALE = 0, it provides data D0-D7, and
when ALE =1 it provides address and data with the help of a 74LS373 latch.

Port 1: Port 1 occupies a total of 8 pins (pins 1 through 8). It has no dual application and acts
only as input or output port. In contrast to port 0, this port does not need any pull-up resistors

18

since pull-up resistors connected internally. Upon reset, Port 1 is configured as an output port.
To configure it as an input port , port bits must be set i.e a high bit must be sent to all the port
pins. This is normally done by the instruction SETB. For Ex :
MOV A, #0FFH ; A=FF HEX
MOV P1,A ;

make P1 an input port by writing 1s to all of its pins

Port 2 : Port 2 is also an eight bit parallel port. (pins 21- 28). It can be used as input or output
port. As this port is provided with internal pull-up resistors it does not need any external pull-up
resistors. Upon reset, Port 2 is configured as an output port. If the port is to be used as input port,
all the port bits must be made high by sending FF to the port. For ex,
MOV A, #0FFH

; A=FF hex

MOV P2, A

; make P2 an input port by writing all 1s to it

Dual role of port 2 : Port2 lines are also associated with the higher order address lines A8-A15.
In systems based on the 8751, 8951, and DS5000, Port2 is used as simple I/O port.. But, in 8031based systems, port 2 is used along with P0 to provide the 16-bit address for the external
memory. Since an 8031 is capable of accessing 64K bytes of external memory, it needs a path for
the 16 bits of the address. While P0 provides the lower 8 bits via A0-A7, it is the job of P2 to
provide bits A8-A15 of the address. In other words, when 8031 is connected to external memory,
Port 2 is used for the upper 8 bits of the 16 bit address, and it cannot be used for I/O operations.
PORT 3 : Port3 is also an 8-bit parallel port with dual function.( pins 10 to 17). The port pins
can be used for I/O operations

as well as for control operations. The details of these

additional operations are given below in the table. Port 3 also do not need any external pull-up
resistors as they are provided internally similar to the case of Port2 & Port 1. Upon reset port 3
is configured as an output port . If the port is to be used as input port, all the port bits must be
made high by sending FF to the port. For ex,
MOV A, #0FFH

; A= FF hex

MOV P3, A

; make P3 an input port by writing all 1s to it

Alternate Functions of Port 3 : P3.0 and P3.1 are used for the RxD (Receive Data) and TxD
(Transmit Data) serial communications signals. Bits P3.2 and P3.3 are meant for external
19

interrupts. Bits P3.4 and P3.5 are used for Timers 0 and 1 and P3.6 and P3.7 are used to provide
the write and read signals of external memories connected in 8031 based systems

S.No
1

Port 3 bit
P3.0

Pin No
10

Function
RxD

P3.1

11

TxD

P3.2

12

P3.3

13

P3.4

14

T0

P3.5

15

T1

P3.6

16

P3.7

17

Table: PORT 3 alternate functions

Interrupt Structure: An interrupt is an external or internal event that disturbs the

microcontroller to inform it that a device needs its service. The program which is associated with
the interrupt is called the interrupt service routine (ISR) or interrupt handler. Upon receiving
the interrupt signal the Microcontroller , finish current instruction and saves the PC on stack.
Jumps to a fixed location in memory depending on type of interrupt Starts to execute the
interrupt service routine until RETI (return from interrupt)Upon executing the RETI the
microcontroller returns to the place where it was interrupted. Get pop PC from stack
The 8051 microcontroller has FIVE interrupts in addition to Reset. They are

Timer 0 overflow Interrupt

Timer 1 overflow Interrupt

External Interrupt 0(INT0)

External Interrupt 1(INT1)

Serial Port events (buffer full, buffer empty, etc) Interrupt

20

Each interrupt has a specific place in code memory where program execution (interrupt service
routine) begins.

External Interrupt 0: 0003 H

Timer 0 overflow:

External Interrupt 1: 0013 H

Timer 1 overflow:

001B H

Serial Interrupt :

0023 H

000B H

Upon reset all Interrupts are disabled & do not respond to the Microcontroller. These interrupts
must be enabled by software in order for the Microcontroller to respond to them. This is done by
an 8-bit register called Interrupt Enable Register (IE).
Interrupt Enable Register :

EA : Global enable/disable. To enable the interrupts this bit must be set High.
---

: Undefined-reserved for future use.

ET2 : Enable /disable Timer 2 overflow interrupt.

ES : Enable/disable Serial port interrupt.
ET1 : Enable /disable Timer 1 overflow interrupt.
EX1 : Enable/disable External interrupt1.
ET0 : Enable /disable Timer 0 overflow interrupt.
EX0 : Enable/disable External interrupt0
Upon reset the interrupts have the following priority.(Top to down). The interrupt with the
highest PRIORITY gets serviced first.
1. External interrupt 0 (INT0)

21

2. Timer interrupt0 (TF0)

3. External interrupt 1 (INT1)
4. Timer interrupt1 (TF1)
5. Serial communication (RI+TI)
Priority can also be set to high or low by 8-bit IP register.- Interrupt priority register

IP.7: reserved
IP.6: reserved
IP.5: Timer 2 interrupt priority bit (8052 only)
IP.4: Serial port interrupt priority bit
IP.3: Timer 1 interrupt priority bit
IP.2: External interrupt 1 priority bit
IP.1: Timser 0 interrupt priority bit
IP.0: External interrupt 0 priority bit

TIMERS in 8051 Microcontrollers : The 8051 microcontroller has two 16-bit timers
Timer 0 (T0) and Timer 1(T1) which can be used either to generate accurate time delays or as
event counters. These

timers are accessed as two 8-bit registers TLO, THO & TL1 ,TH1

because the 8051 microcontroller has 8-bit architecture.

TIMER 0 : The Timer 0 is a 16-bit register and can be treated as two 8-bit registers (TL0 &
TH0) and these registers can be accessed similar to any other registers like A,B or R1,R2,R3
etc
Ex : The instruction Mov TL0,#07 moves the value 07 into lower byte of Timer0.
Similarly Mov R5,TH0 saves the contents of TH0 in the R5 register.

22

TIMER 1 : The Timer 1 is also a 16-bit register and can be treated as two 8-bit registers (TL1 &
TH1) and these registers can be accessed similar to any other registers like A,B or R1,R2,R3
etc
Ex : The instruction MOV TL1,#05 moves the value 05 into lower byte of Timer1.
Similarly MOV R0,TH1 saves the contents of TH1 in the R0 register

TMOD Register : The various operating modes of both the timers T0 and T1 are set by an 8-bit
register called TMOD register. In this TMOD register the lower 4-bits are meant for Timer 0 and
the higher 4-bits are meant for Timer1.

GATE: This bit is used to start or stop the timers by hardware .When GATE= 1 ,the timers can
be started / stopped by the external sources. When GATE= 0, the timers can be started or stopped
by software instructions like SETB TR0 or SETB TR1
C/T (clock/Timer) : This bit decides whether the timer is used as delay generator or event
counter. When C/T = 0 ,the Timer is used as delay generator and if C/T=1 the timer is used as
an event counter. The clock source for the time delay is the crystal frequency of 8051.

23

M1,M0 (Mode) : These two bits are the timer mode bits. The timers of the 8051 can be
configured in three modes.Mode0, Mode1 and Mode2.The selection and operation of the modes
is shown below.
S.No
1

M0

M1

Mode

Operation
13-bit Timer mode
8-bit Timer/counter. THx with TLx as 5-bit
prescalar

16-bit Timer mode.16-bit timer /counter

without pre-scalar

8-bit auto reload. THx contains a value that

is to be loaded into TLx each time it
overflows
Split timer mode

PIN Diagram of 8051 Microcontroller : The 8051 microcontroller is available as a 40 pin DIP
chip and it works at +5 volts DC. Among the 40 pins , a total of 32 pins are allotted for the four
parallel ports P0,P1,P2 and P3 i.e each port occupies 8-pins .The remaining pins are VCC,
GND, XTAL1, XTAL2, RST, EA ,PSEN.
XTAL1,XTAL2: These two pins are connected to Quartz crystal oscillator which runs the onchip oscillator. The quartz crystal oscillator is connected to the two pins along with a capacitor of
30pF as shown in the circuit. If we use a source other than the crystal oscillator, it will be
connected to XTAL1 and XTAL2 is left unconnected.

24

RST: The RESET pin is an input pin and it is an active high pin. When a high pulse is applied to
this pin the microcontroller will reset and terminate all activities. Upon reset all the registers
except PC will reset to 0000 Value and PC register will reset to 0007 value.
(External Access): This pin is an active low pin. This pin is connected to ground when
microcontroller is accessing the program code stored in the external memory and connected to
Vcc when it is accessing the program code in the on chip memory. This pin should not be left
unconnected.

(Program Store Enable) : This is an output pin which is active low. When the
microcontroller is accessing the program code stored in the external ROM ,this pin is connected
to the OE (Output Enable) pin of the ROM.

25

ALE (Address latch enable): This is an output pin, which is active high. When connected to
external memory , port 0 provides both address and data i.e address and data are multiplexed
through port 0 .This ALE pin will demultiplex the address and data bus .When the pin is High ,
the AD bus will act as address bus otherwise the AD bus will act as Data bus.
P0.0- P0.7(AD0-AD7) : The port 0 pins multiplexed with Address/data pins .If the
microcontroller is accessing external memory these pins will act as address/data pins otherwise
they are used for Port 0 pins.
P2.0- P2.7(A8-A15) : The port2 pins are multiplexed with the higher order address pins .When
the microcontroller is accessing external memory these pins provide the higher order address
byte otherwise they act as Port 2 pins.
P1.0- P1.7 :These 8-pins are dedicated for Port1 to perform input or output port operations.
P3.0- P3.7 :These 8-pins are meant for Port3 operations and also for some control operations
like Read,Write,Timer0,Timer1 ,INT0,INT1 ,RxD and TxD
ADDRESSING MODES OF 8051 :
The way in which the data operands are accessed by different instructions is known as the
addressing modes. There are various methods of denoting the data operands in the instruction.
The 8051 microcontroller supports mainly 5 addressing modes. They are
1.Immediate addressing mode
2.Direct Addressing mode
3.Register addressing mode
4. Register Indirect addressing mode
5.Indexed addressing mode
Immediate addressing mode : The addressing mode in which the data operand is a constant and
it is a part of the instruction itself is known as Immediate addressing mode. Normally the data
must be preceded by a # sign. This addressing mode can be used to transfer the data into any of
the registers including DPTR.

26

Ex: MOV A , # 27 H

: The data (constant) 27 is moved to the accumulator register

ADD R1 ,#45 H : Add the constant 45 to the contents of the accumulator

MOV DPTR ,# 8245H :Move the data 8245 into the data pointer register.
MOV P1,#21 H
Direct addressing mode: The addressing mode in which the data operand is in the RAM
location (00 -7FH) and the address of the data operand is given in the instruction is known as
Direct addressing mode. The direct addressing mode uses the lower 128 bytes of Internal RAM
and the SFRs
MOV R1, 42H : Move the contents of RAM location 42 into R1 register
MOV 49H,A : Move the contents of the accumulator into the RAM location 49.
ADD A, 56H : Add the contents of the RAM location 56 to the accumulator
Register addressing mode :The addressing mode in which the data operand to be manipulated
lies in one of the registers is known as register addressing mode.
MOV A,R0 : Move the contents of the register R0 to the accumulator
ADD A,R6 :Add the contents of R6 register to the accumulator
MOV P1, R2 : Move the contents of the R2 register into port 1
MOV R5, R2 : This is invalid .The data transfer between the registers is not allowed.
Register Indirect addressing mode :The addressing mode in which a register is used as a
pointer to the data memory block is known as Register indirect addressing mode.
MOV A,@ R0 :Move the contents of

RAM location whose address is in R0 into A

(accumulator)
MOV @ R1 , B : Move the contents of B into RAM location whose address is held by R1
When R0 and R1 are used as pointers, they must be preceded by @ sign

27

One of the advantages of register indirect addressing mode is that it makes accessing the
data more dynamic than static as in the case of direct addressing mode.
Indexed addressing mode : This addressing mode is used in accessing the data elements of
lookup table entries located in program ROM space of 8051.
Ex : MOVC A,@ A+DPTR
The 16-bit register DPTR and register A are used to form the address of the data element stored
in on-chip ROM. Here C denotes code .In this instruction the contents of A are added to the 16bit DPTR register to form the 16-bit address of the data operand.
Interfacing of ADC 0804 to 8051 Microcontroller :
ADC 0804

is a single channel analog to digital converter i.e., it can take only one analog

signal. ADC 0804 has 8 bit resolution. The higher resolution ADC gives smaller step size. Step
size is smallest change that can be measured by an ADC. For an ADC with resolution of 8 bits,
the step size is 19.53mV (5V/255). The time taken by the ADC to convert analog data into
digital form depends on the frequency of clock source. The conversion time of ADC 0804 is
around 110us. To use the internal clock a capacitor and resistor are used as shown in the circuit.
The input to the ADC is given from a regulated power supply and a 10K potentiometer
The 8051 Microcontroller is used to provide the control signals to the ADC. CS(chip
select) pin of ADC is directly connected to ground. The pin P1.1, P1.0 and P1.2 are
connected to the pin WR, RD and INTR of the ADC respectively. When the input
voltage from the preset is varied the output of ADC varies also varies.

28

From the circuit it is clear that the ADC interfaced directly to the microcontroller. The Port1 is
used as an input port which receives the digital data from the ADC.Port pins P2.5 and P2.6 are
used for SOC and EOC operation.When the conversion is over the ADC will send an interrupt
signal to the microcontroller through the pin P2.7 .Now the Microcontroller receives digital data
through the Port1.This data after conversion to decimal data is displayed on the LCD module .
The assembly language program for ADC is given below .
MOV P1 , 0FF H ; Make the port1 high and configure port1 as Input port
BACK: CLR P2.6
SETB P2.5

; Generation of SOC pulse

;

LOOP JB P2.7 , LOOP ; Wait for conversion, Is conversion over?

CLR P2.5

; Enable Read the digital data

29

MOV A ,P1

; Read digital data through Port1

SETB P2.5

; Disable read after read operation

CALL DISPLAY ; Display the data on LCD module

SJMP BACK

; Continue the conversion process

Stepper motor Interfacing

A stepper motor is a device that translates electrical pulses into mechanical movement. The
stepper motor rotates in steps in response to the applied signals. It is used in applications such as
disk drives, dot matrix printers, plotters and robotics.It is mainly used for position control.
Stepper motors have a permanent magnet called rotor (also called the shaft) surrounded by a
stator . There are also steppers called variable reluctance stepper motors that do not have a PM
rotor. The most common stepper motors have four stator windings that are paired with a centertapped. This type of stepper motor is commonly referred to as a. four-phase or unipolar stepper
motor. The center tap allows a change of current direction in each of two coils when a winding is
grounded, thereby resulting in a polarity change of the stator.

30

ASSEMBLY LANGUAGE PROGRAM

Main

mov stepper, #0CH ; move the code to phase1 into the port
acall delay
mov stepper, #06H ; phase II code
acall delay
mov stepper, #03H

;Phase III code

acall delay

;Call delay subroutine program

mov stepper, #09H

;Phase IV code

acall delay
sjmp Main
CALL DELAY PROGRAM :
mov r7,#4
wait2:
mov r6,#0FFH
wait1:
mov r5,#0FFH
wait:
djnz r5,wait
djnz r6,wait1
djnz r7,wait2
ret
end

31

8051-SERIAL COMMUNICATION :
Basics of Serial communication
Data transfer between two electronic devices (Ex Between a computer and microcontroller or a
peripheral device) is generally done in two ways
(i).Serial data Transfer

and

(ii).Parallel data Transfer

Serial communication uses only one or two data lines to transfer data and is generally used for
long distance communication. In serial communication the data is sent as one bit at a time in a
timed sequence on a single wire. Serial Communication takes place in two methods,
Asynchronous data Transfer and Synchronous data Transfer.

Serial Data Transfer

Asynchronous data transfer allows data to be transmitted without the sender having to send a
clock signal to the receiver. Instead, special bits will be added to each word in order to
synchronize the sending and receiving of the data. When a word is given to the UART for
Asynchronous transmissions, a bit called the "Start Bit" is added to the beginning of each word
that is to be transmitted. The Start Bit is used to alert the receiver that a word of data is about to
be sent, and to force the clock in the receiver into synchronization with the clock in the
transmitter.

32

Serial data transmission

After the Start Bit, the individual bits of the word of data are sent .Here each bit in the word is
transmitted for exactly the same amount of time as all of the other bits. When the entire data
word has been sent, the transmitter may add a Parity Bit that the transmitter generates. The Parity
bit may be used by the receiver to perform simple error checking. Then at least one Stop Bit is
sent by the transmitter. If the Stop Bit does not appear when it is supposed to, the UART
considers the entire word to be corrupted and will report a Framing Error.
Baud rate is a measurement of transmission speed in asynchronous communication , it represents
the number of bits/sec that are actually being sent over the serial link. The Baud count includes
the overhead bits Start, Stop and Parity that are generated by the sending UART and removed by
the receiving UART.
In the Synchronous data transfer method the receiver knows when to read the next bit
coming from the sender. This is achieved by sharing a clock between sender and receiver. In
most forms of serial Synchronous communication, if there is no data available at a given time to
transmit, a fill character will be sent instead so that data is always being transmitted.
Synchronous communication is usually more efficient because only data bits are transmitted
between sender and receiver, however it will be more costly because extra wiring and control
circuits are required to share a clock signal between the sender and receiver.
Devices that use serial cables for their communication are split into two categories.
1. DTE (Data Terminal Equipment). Examples of DTE are computers, printers & terminals.
2. DCE (Data Communication Equipment). Example of DCE is modems.
Parallel Data Transfer :
Parallel communication uses multiple wires (bus)

running parallel to each other, and can

transmit data on all the wires simultaneously. i.e all the bits of the byte are transmitted at a time.

33

So, speed of the parallel data transfer is extremely high compared to serial data transfer. An 8-bit
parallel data transfer is 8-times faster than serial data transfer. Hence with in the computer all
data transfer is mainly based on Parallel data transfer. But only limitation is due to the high
cost ,this method is limited to only short distance communications.
Differences between Serial data transfer and Parallel data transfer
S.No

Serial Communication

Parallel Communication

Data is transmitted bit after the bit in a Data is transmitted simultaneously

single line
through group of lines(Bus)

Data congestion takes place

No, Data congestion

Low speed transmission

High speed transmission

Implementation of serial links is not an Parallel

data
links
easy task.
implemented in hardware

5.

In terms of transmission channel costs It is more expensive

such as data bus cable length, data bus
buffers, interface connectors, it is less
expensive

No , crosstalk problem

No effect of inter symbol interference and Parallel ports suffer extremely from
noise
inter-symbol interference (ISI) and
noise, and therefore the data can be
corrupted over long distances.

The bandwidth of serial wires is much The bandwidth of parallel wires is much
higher.
lower.

Serial interface is more flexible to Parallel data transfer mechanism rely on

upgrade , without changing the hardware
hardware resources and hence not
flexible to upgrade.

10

Serial communication work effectively Parallel buses are hard to run at high
even at high frequencies.
frequencies.

are

easily

Crosstalk creates interference between

the parallel lines.

SERIAL COMMUNICATION IN 8051 MICROCONTROLLER

34

The 8051 has two pins for transferring and receiving data by serial communication. These two
pins are part of the Port3(P3.0 &P3.1) .These pins are TTL compatible and hence they require a
line driver to make them RS232 compatible .Max232 chip is one such line driver in use. Serial
communication is controlled by an 8-bit register called SCON register,it is a bit addressable
register.
SCON (Serial control) register :

SM0

SCON.7

Serial port mode selector

SM1

SCON.6

Serial port mode selector

SM2

SCON.5

Used for multiprocessor mode communication

(not applicable for 8051)

REN

SCON.4

Receive enable. Set or cleared by making this bit

either 1 or 0 foe enable /disable reception.

TB8

SCON.3

9th data bit transmitted in modes 2 and 3

RB8

SCON.2

9th data bit received in modes 2 and 3.it is not

used in mode 0 & mode 1.If SM2 = 0 RB8 is the
stop bit .

TI

SCON.1

Transmit interrupt flag

RI

SCON.0

Receive interrupt flag.

M0

, SM1 : These two bits of SCON register determine the framing of data by
specifying the number of bits per character and start bit and stop bits. There are 4 serial
modes.
SM0

SM1

: Serial Mode 0

35

: Serial Mode 1, 8 bit data,

: Serial Mode 2

: Serial Mode 3

1 stop bit, 1 start bit

REN (Receive Enable) also referred as SCON.4. When it is high,it allows the 8051 to
receive data on the RxD pin. So to receive and transfer data REN must be set to 1.When
REN=0,the receiver is disabled. This is achieved as below
SETB SCON.4
&

CLR SCON.4

TI (Transmit interrupt) is the D1 bit of SCON register. When 8051 finishes the transfer of
8-bit character, it raises the TI flag to indicate that it is ready to transfer another byte.
The TI bit is raised at the beginning of the stop bit.
RI (Receive interrupt) is the D0 bit of the SCON register. When the 8051 receives data
serially ,via RxD, it gets rid of the start and stop bits and places the byte in the SBUF
register. Then it raises the RI flag bit to indicate that a byte has been received and should
be picked up before it is lost. RI is raised halfway through the stop bit.
Communication through RS232
A personal computer has a serial port known as communication port or COM Port used to connect a
modem for example or any other device, there could be more then one COM Port in a PC. Serial ports are
controlled by a special chip called UART (Universal Asynchronous Receiver Transmitter).

RS 232 standard describes a communication method where information is sent bit by bit on a
physical channel. The RS stands for Recommended Standard.The information must be broken
up in data words. The length of a data word is variable.
It is one of the popularly known interface standard for serial communication
between DTE & DCE. This RS-232-C is the commonly used standard when data are
transmitted as voltage .This standard was first developed by Electronic industries
association(EIA). For the RS-232C, a 25 pin D type connector is used . DB-25P male and

36

DB-25S female. RS-232 standard was first introduced in 1960s by Telecommunications

Industry Association(TIA).
Interfacing the 8051 Microcontroller to PC:
As the RS-232 standard is developed earlier to TTL devices ,a USART such as 8251 is not
directly compatible with these signal levels .Because of this ,voltage transistors called line
drivers and line receivers are used to interface TTL logic with RS-232 signals . The line driver
MC 1488 is used to convert RS-232 to TTL.The microcontroller is connected to the PC using
the DB9 connector.

The TxD and Rx D pins are connected to the TI in and RI in pins of the MAX 232 IC and the TI
out and RI in pins of the MAX IC are connected to the RxD and TxD pins of the DB9 connector
as shown in the interface diagram.

INTERFACING DC MOTOR- 8051

37

A DC motor runs with the help of Direct Current. It produces torque by using both electricity and
magnetic fields. The DC motor has rotor, stator, field magnet, brushes, shaft, commutator. The
DC motor requires more current to produce initial torque than in running state.Interfacing the DC
motor directly to 8051 microcontroller is not possible. Because the DC motor uses large current
(200-300mA in small DC motors) to run. When this current flow into the 8051 microcontroller,
the IC will get damaged. Therefore we use a driving circuit with an opto isolator and a L298
Dual H-Bridge driver. The opto-isolator provides additional protection to the
microcontroller.

Continuous, sustained operation of the motor will cause the L293 Dual H-Bridge driver to
overheat. So,a suitable heat sink must be used.

Assembly Language program

38

ORG

0000H

Remarks

MAIN

CLR

P1.0

CLR

P1.1

CLR

P1.2

SETB

P2.7

SETB

P1.0

JNB

P2.7 CLOCKWISE

CLR

P1.1

SETB

P1.2

SJMP

MONITOR

SETB

P1.1

MONITOR

CLOCKWISE

Enable the H-bridge driver

01 is for Counter clockwise

10 is for clockwise

CLR P1.2
SJMP

MONITOR

INTERFACING DAC -8051 MICROCONTROLLER

The DAC 0800 is a simple monolithic 8-bit D/A converter. It has fast settling time of
100ns. It can be directly interfaced to TTL, CMOS, PMOS and others. It operates at
4.5V to +18V supply. The number of data bit inputs decides the resolution of the
DAC since the number of analog output levels is equal to 2, where n is the number
of data bit inputs. Therefore, an 8-input DAC such as the DAC0808 provides 256
discrete voltage (or current) levels of output.

The interfacing circuit is shown below. port 1(8 bits of the microcontroller is connected to the
input data lines of DAC-08.The reference current is determined by the resistor R 1 and the
reference voltage V ref. The resistor R2 is generally equal to R1 to match the input impedance of
reference source. The output (taken from pin number 4 is observed either on a digital multimeter
or on a cathode ray oscilloscope.
39

The output current Io is calculated as follows:

Io = Vref/R1[Ao/2 + A1/4 + A2/8 + +A7/256]

The output voltage Vo is obtained as follows:

V o =Io * R1

Assembly Language Program

MOV
START :

A, #DATA*

MOV

; (A) = #Data

90H, A

; (port -1) = (A)

INC A
LJMP

START

; Repeat

---------------------xxx--------------------REFERENCE : Muhammed Ali Mazidi, Janice Gillies Pie Mazidi, The 8051 Microcontroller
and Embedded Systems Pearson EducationAsia.

40