RRRF+Zach+Arduino => Sanguino

Congratulations go to Zach for releasing an awesome new super-souped-up Arduino clone, the Sanguino! He can explain it better than I can, so check it out at [www.sanguino.cc]

This should make life easier on the electronics front because now we don't have to decide between, say, a second extruder or limit switches. The chip also has a second serial port built in, which raises interesting possibilities with daisy chaining.

Get one at [store.rrrf.org]. You'd think they'll sell out quickly, but in the 15 minutes since I first checked the listing it has gone from 87 available to 100, so... *shugs*

Nice job man.

This chip is pretty much the 40 pin PDIP Pic 18F4610 that I stopped using about a year ago. The 4610 is a good chip, mind, but it depends on serial comms. I switched over to the near pin compatable 18F4550 which has native USB capabilities though only 32K flash memory.

I looked to see if if Atmel had a plug in upgrade that gives you native USB. While they have a bunch of native USB processors, they don't have one in PDIP at all, much less 40 pin. It's a shame.

Forrest, you got me confused there. I am a PICuser and I have never played with Atmel stupp before I got my Arduino (which I may bodge into being a Sanguino using the USB>serial IC )
PIC and AVR are similar but different. Which compilers do you use on the PICs - I use PBP and assembler. Looks like I need to get into C, but it does seem to be a resource hog on this weeny little hardware.

Lampbus Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Forrest, you got me confused there.
>
No need to be. I just compared the data sheets on the two chips.
>
> I am a PICuser
> and I have never played with Atmel stupp before I
> got my Arduino (which I may bodge into being a
> Sanguino using the USB>serial IC )
> PIC and AVR are similar but different.
>
I'm sure that are differences, but there are also similarities, in this case rather close ones.
>
> Which
> compilers do you use on the PICs - I use PBP and
> assembler.
>
I'm currently using the Oshonsoft BASIC IDE for the Pic 18F family of chips. So far I haven't had to resort to using assembler inserts for anything. It's an inexpensive and pretty darned good good development environment.

[oshonsoft.com]

I'm currently looking at the Mikroelectronika line of compilers, specifically their BASIC offering, which, as a family, have a much larger set of features and impressive documentation and sample code patches for just about everything.

[www.mikroe.com]

Mikroelectronika gives me a path into the 24F chips and also ARM, two options I'm interested in pursuing in future.
>
> Looks like I need to get into C, but it
> does seem to be a resource hog on this weeny
> little hardware.
>
Is that fair? In some ways I think it's a matter of expectations.

The problem with microcontrollers, if it can be called a problem from what I've seen is that they are small, simple cpu's with very limited amounts of flash and RAM memory. Programming them rather reminds me of when I was doing work on the old Z80 and 8048 chips back at the beginning of the 1980's. You don't have a lot of elbow room in memory or processor speed to use features like floating point maths or USB comms, for example, much less doing tricky stuff like file handling using FAT addressing on a SD card. Nophead was saying a few days ago that it took about 10^3 lines of raw C code to work with an SD card. You KNOW that that doing something like that is going to eat up memory and cpu power.

Most of the snarls I've got myself into during the last two years has come from trying to make a good little microcontroller do too many things at the same time, like, for example, trying to do serial comms at the same time I'm keeping track of half a dozen things with an interrupt routine. I used to try to do that on the 16F877A before I realised that that family of chips had a VERY small interrupt stack and no overflow bit to tell me when I'd overloaded it.

Although I've been doing programming of microcontrollers like Pic's on and off for over 25 years I've never taken the time to get really sophisticated in how I do things like Nophead or Simon obviously are. That's why I stay away from open source compilers and go for the more inexpensive commercial ones with lots of built in capabilities. Once I have those, I try to use them sparingly on as powerful a microcontroller as I can afford. I generally find that that keeps me out of the crazier kinds of trouble.

I like the new board, So glad its come out now as i have spent a little time trying to work out the best method to get more pins (multiplexing etc). This one should make it easer for me to make the multiple head system i want.

On the ARM chip note, i was thinking about this , the ARM9 or ARM7TDMI if someone can make the hardware i should be able to program it easy ive spent 12 months working on differnt bits of code for the ARM7TDMI for my old work (doing a phd now).

So the offer is outhere if anyone wants it. just msg me.

PS if someone wants adrinio code for a lcd then msg me (uses alot of pins though)
pps 160X160 graphical screen.

The Gameboy Advanced makes a cheap ARM7TDMI platform.

I believe that the cartridge slot is connected to the ARMs data and address buses. If it is it should be relatively simple to add a memory mapped I/O chip, or two, for controlling the reprap.

This site contains a lot of hardware information about the GBA, interfacing with it and programming it.
[nocash.emubase.de]

There are also libs around to interface with the various bits of hardware such as the screen and buttons.

awesome Zack! i can't wait to order and try one of these

little off topic question.. does this still fit on the arduino breakout board that you made too?

Just a thought on the breakout board, and the need or otherwise for one on the Zarduino.

RS Components do .1" screw terminals (RS part number 220-4355 for a 10 way), so you could have the same screw terminal interface that you have on the breakout board on the same circuit board, just by substituting these for the patchboard pins on the edges of the board. I am sure others make similar connectors - according to the RS catalogue they are actually made by Pheonix Contact. There are also Lever/Cage clamp terminals on the same pitch, for a 12 way the part number is 181-4664. The only thing that might need changing on the circuit board would be to increase the number of power and ground points.

Note that all the part numbers are from an old catalogue so you should verifiy them on the web site.

that's a great idea! i didn't know they made them that small.
i think i'll do that then.

btw, do you guys know if it's possible to add the FTDI chip to make this board usb capable instead of using a ttl cable? would it be as simple as connecting rx/tx and 5v/ground to it or is there some extra changes that need to happen?

I have laid out a PCB that has a DIL array to plug into an Arduino's CPU socket, a surface mounted Atmega644p, a header for the extra I/O and a header for ICP. The idea is that I can upgrade Arduino descimilla etc to the bigger brain just by plugging it in.

Problem is I need to make 50 of them to bring the unit cost down below ten pounds.

Anyone want to share?

i'm in for one.. lol
can you post the schematic?

Hi Richard

I am also interested in your PCB

I have sent you a PM


cheers

Patrick

I have added details of my brain transplant design on my blogspace here : [fusedfilaments.blogspot.com]

Unfortunately, I need to get enough interest to go ahead with boards. Remember, this replaces 40 dollars of sanguano AND USB>TTL cable. I intend to supply with the Processor surface mounted and bootstrapped but the 0.1" headers loose so users can fit whatever connectors they like.