STM8 development Tutorials for free tools

This is a collection of tutorials that show how to get started with STM8 development using free tools and various evaluation boards. The tutorials include an LED TIMER, which shows a binary counter that increments exactly once per second using the board LEDs and the STM8 timers, RS232 output using the STM8 UART, and standard benchmarks for embedded systems (both Whetstone and Dhrystone; Coremark is not included due to its license, but can easily be ported using the Whetstone and Dhrystone tutorials as examples).

The author used a Debian GNU/Linux system, but the tutorials should work for other Linux distributions, *BSD or other Unices.

All tutorials use:

The C compiler SDCC, version 3.7.0 or later to compile C programs for the STM8.
stm8flash, to write programs onto devices.

Minimal boards

These are very simple and cheap boards that have an STM8 µC, but very little else included. They are typically made by unnamed manufacturers. The ones featured here are a bit atypical since most come with pin headers already mounted. Many very cheap boards do not come with pin headers at all.

Some STM8S103 board³	HCDVBD0019³	HCDVBD0017³	STM8 Min. Sys. Dev.³	STM8S-DIP-LQFP48 mod³	STM8S105K4T6 Mod.³

Controller
STM8S103F3	STM8S103K3	STM8S103F3	STM8S003F3	STM8S105C6	STM8S105K4
Tutorials
No LED	LED Timer	LED Timer	LED Timer	No LED	LED Timer
Serial	Serial	Serial	Serial	Serial	Serial
Not enough RAM	Not enough RAM	Not enough RAM	Not enough RAM	Not enough RAM	Not enough RAM

Discovery boards

The STM8-Discovery are cheap boards made by ST that tend have only very few peripherals included. They have an integrated ST-Link or ST-Link/v2 though, which makes them ideal for getting started with little effort and cost.

STM8L-DISCOVERY¹	STM8S-DISCOVERY¹	STM8A-DISCOVERY⁴	STM8A-DISCOVERY⁴	STM8SVLDISCOVERY⁴	STM8-SO8-DISCO⁴

Controller
STM8L152C6	STM8S105C6	STM8AF5288	STM8AL3L68	STM8S003K3
Tutorials
LED Timer	LED Timer	LED Timer	LED Timer	LED Timer	TODO
Serial	Serial	Serial	Serial	Serial	TODO
Not enough RAM	Not enough RAM	Benchmarks	Not enough RAM	Not enough RAM	Not enough RAM

Arduino-compatible boards

The STM8 Nucleo-64 boards are made by ST and have Arduino Uno V3 connectivity support and ST morpho headers. These allow easy expansion of the Nucleo open development platform functionality with a wide choice of specialized shields. They have an integrated ST-Link/v2-1. The sduino boards have Arduino Uno V3 or Arduino Mega connectivity support. Both the Nucleo and the sduino feature an integrated USB-to-serial converter.

NUCLEO-8L152R8⁴	NUCLEO-8S208RB⁴	sduino UNO¹	sduino MB 208¹

Controller
STM8L152R8	STM8S208RB	STM8S105K6	STM8S208MB
Tutorials
LED Timer	LED Timer	LED Timer	LED Timer
Serial	Serial	Serial	Serial
Benchmarks	TODO	Benchmarks	TODO

Third-party mid-range boards

These boards are made by third-party manufacturers, and tend to have a reasonable range of included peripherals.

EX-STM8-Q64a-207²	Open8S208Q80²	EX-STM8-Q48a-105²	AS06-STM8³

Controller
STM8S207R8	STM8S208MB	STM8S105C6	STM8L101F3
Tutorials
LED Timer	LED Timer	LED Timer	TODO
Serial	Serial	Serial	TODO
Benchmarks	Benchmarks	TODO	TODO

High-end boards

These boards are made by ST and come with lots of peripherals.

STM8/128-EVAL²	STM8L101-EVAL⁴	STEVAL-MKI029V1⁵

Controller
STM8S208MB	STM8L101K3	STM8S207R6
Tutorials
LED Timer	TODO	TODO
Serial	Serial	TODO
Benchmarks	TODO	TODO

Power conversion controller boards

These boards are made by ST and feature STM8-based power conversion controllers.

STEVAL-ISA164V1⁴	STEVAL-ILL075V1⁴

Controller
STNRG388A	STLUX385A
Tutorials
LED Timer	LED Timer
Serial	Serial
Benchmarks	TODO

Other boards

Various boards that feature STM8 controllers.

STM8S001 ref. design⁴	ESP-14³	Core Board STM8L151CX³	STEVAL-IAS003V1⁵	STM8L15LPBOARD⁵	STEVAL-ISB027V1⁵

Controller
STM8S001J3	STM8S003F3	STM8L151C8	STM8L101K3	STM8L152C6	STWBC
Tutorials
LED Timer	No LED	No LED	TODO	TODO	TODO
Serial	TODO	TODO	TODO	TODO	TODO
TODO	TODO	TODO	TODO	TODO	TODO

Footnotes

¹	Donated by an SDCC user.
²	Bought using Goethe-Universität Frankfurt funding, used in Compiler research.
³	Bought using my own money.
⁴	Donated by ST.
⁵	Bought using Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg funding, used in Compiler research.

If you would like to see an additional board featured here and are willing to provide the board, please contact me.

ColecoVision

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µC Tutorials

µC Tools

Development

Tutorial

Hardware

Software

Games

Released

In development

Tutorials

STM8L-DISCOVERY

STM8S-DISCOVERY

STM8A-DISCOVERY

EX-STM8-Q64a-207

Open8S208Q80

EX-STM8-Q48a-105

STM8/128-EVAL

STM8L101-EVAL

Tutorials

EX-F320

C8051F340/380

C8051F V2.1 (F020)

C8051F300 Dev. B. Mod.

C8051F V2.1 (F120)

51 MCU SCM

STC89 DEMO BOARD

EZ-USB FX2LP

colecovision.eu

Tutorials for STM8 development using free software