i have used a cell line SH-SY5Y, you can differentiate such as Chemicals retinoic acid. .

Unless you want to work with primary cells (more laborious, animal work) I would recommend SH-SY5Y as well. Those are human bone marrow derived neuroblastoma cells which can be very well differentiated using step wise treatment with 10 µM ATRA (5 days in DMEM + 15% FBS) and 50 ng/ml BDNF (5-10 days in DMEM without serum) in simple DMEM. A good start for the protocol ist Encinas et al 2000. They will be something like dopaminergic CNS neurons afterwards.

PC12 cells on the other hand are rat pheochromocytoma cells, i.e. a tumor of the adrenal gland. As such, they are rather attributed to the PNS. They can easily be differentiated with NGF and will be something like sympathic ganglion cells, IRC.

Thank you All for your answers. they were really helpful. 

Neuro2a cell line (differentiation with very low serum, 0.1% overnight)

SH-SY5Y cell line (differentiation with retinoic acid)

Hippocampal primary culture (from E18 rats, or E-18-P1 mice, Banker)

Note that Neuro2a and SH-SY5Y don t have exactly the same proteins expressed and also lack of some proteins that you will find only in primary culture of neurons.

The difficulty in culturing increases in this order: PC12, neuronal stem cell lines, primary neurons. At the same time, the approximation of in situ neurons increases in the same direction. In other words: the closer you want your neurons to resemble neurons in a living and behaving organism, the more complex your culture system will have to be. In my experience, I would hardly even consider cells differentiated from PC12 cells and neuronal stem cell lines to be true neurons. They don't respond to stimulation as well as primary neurons, they don't express the same neuronal markers, and their spatial differentiation (axon initial segment, synapses) is less well developed and defined. So if you can, I would always go for primary neurons.

Thank you for the detailed answers.