The SBC45EC is an embedded Single Board Computer (SBC) with 10Mbs Ethernet and RS232 interface for 44 pin PLCC PIC18Fxxx microcontrollers. It is delivered with a PIC18F452 CPU, a 24LC256 EEPROM for web pages, and with the Modtronix Web Server installed! By using a terminal program, like Hyperterminal, the demo web page can be replaced with a custom one - no programming is required.

If you need an Ethernet enabled board with more I/O, Flash, RAM, EEPROM and a network bootloader, please have a look at our SBC65EC and SBC68EC Ethernet enabled boards with network bootloader. These products also have better documentation and many example programs included with them!

Click here to view a live SBC65EC demo board that is accessible via the internet! The SBC65EC also uses the Modtronix TCP/IP stack, and has a similar performance then the SBC45EC board. This demo has been created by simply connecting a SBC65EC board to a Billion ADSL Modem/Router. The router is then configured to make the SBC65EC a virtual server that is accessible via the internet. Most modern routers have this feature built in, and can be used.

The only difference between this board and the SBC44EC is that this board uses PIC port pins RA0-RA3 and RA5 to address the Ethernet chip, where the SBC44EC uses PIC port pins RB0-RB4. These differences make this board suitable for RS232 to Ethernet, RS485 to Ethernet and CAN BUS to Ethernet interface converters when used with the appropriate Frontend Boards. The CAN BUS of the PIC18F458 uses PIC port pins RB1 and RB2, and are not available on the SBC44EC.

This board also has some additional solder straps to disable the onboard RS232 interface driver. When using this board as an Ethernet to RS485 interface converter, the RS232 interface driver has to be disabled by making solder strap SJ1 and SJ2 and breaking solder strap SJ3 and SJ4.

All source code and a tutorial for the Modtronix Web Server can be downloaded below for free! It was created by using the free Microchip TCP/IP stack (written in C), that can be compiled with the HiTech or Microchip MPLAB C18 compilers. A Free, student version of the Microchip MPLAB C18 compiler is available and can be used to compile the project. The compiled code generated with the student version is only slightly larger than that created with the commercial version. For a forum discussion of the free compiler click here.
Typical applications include HTTP Web servers (like the Modtronix Web Server), Mail clients, Ethernet to RS232 interface converter, Ethernet to RS485 interface converters, Remote control via Web Server, Protocol Bridge applications - Ethernet to USART, CAN, I2C, SPI etc.
It has been tested with the following 44 pin PLCC PIC chips and the Microchip TCP/IP stack:

• PIC18F452, PIC18F458

• Delivered with PIC18F452 CPU, 24LC256 EEPROM and Modtronix Web Server.
• 32KBytes FLASH, 1536 Bytes SRAM and 32Kbytes EEPROM. The Modtronix Web Server uses about half the available EEPROM memory, which leaved heaps of space left for custom web pages!
• 13 user programmable I/O pins, of which 3 can be configured as External Interrupt pins.
• Red Power LED to indicate when module is powered.
• Red LED for Collision/Link indication.
• Green LED for RX/Carrier Sense indication.
• Yellow LED to indicate when a packet is transmitted.
• RS232 interface via 3 pin connector or Frontend board. The SER3S6FT serial port cable can be used to connect to the serial port of a target DTE device (comm port of a personal computer for example) - see
• Is part of our MicroX product range, meaning you can upgrade or expand it with any of the other MixroX products. For details see www.modtronix.com/microx.
• Modular, it has the following MicroX connectors(For details see www.modtronix.com/microx/expansion):
  • Frontend connector.
• Conforms to standard MicroX Compact Main Board dimensions (58mm wide and 54mm high). For details see www.modtronix.com/microx/dimensions.
• 2.1mm power connector for standard DC transformer.
• Wide operating voltage range from 7 – 30V.
• Assembled with 10BaseT Ethernet and RS232 interface with +- 15kV ESD protection.
• Has an ICSP (In Circuit Serial Programming) connector (ICPC1 type) - CPU can be programmed in circuit. For details see Programming Modtronix PIC based boards.
• Is designed to run out the box with the excellent free Microchip TCP/IP stack, that features:
  • Includes MAC, IP, ARP, ICMP, TCP, UDP, HTTP, FTP, DHCP, IP Gleaning, MPFS
  • Socket support for TCP and UDP
  • Portable across PIC18 MCUs
  • Out-of-box support for Microchip C18 and Hi-Tech PICC-18 compilers
  • RTOS independent
  • Full TCP state machine
  • Modular Design

• Additional source code and user contributions for this board is located on our new file download page. If anyone has any code they would like to contribute, please upload it onto our file download page for other users!
• See forum for getting started guide and other userfull information.