Sanguino blinky light build note

Just a heads up for anyone building a Sanguino - when I fired mine up, I wasn't getting any flashing on the red debug led at all, which led me to believe that the bootloader wasn't installed. I ordered two of them (as I tend to let the magic smoke out of semiconductors on occasion), and neither chip would flash the red LED on startup.

However, when I tried programming it, it worked perfectly once I got all the drivers installed, and I can turn on the debug LED by setting pin 0 to high. I do see some pulses on pin 1 just after a reset, so perhaps my version of the bootloader is a little out of date. Could be I have a messed up driver file somewhere as well, but everything else seems to work.

Also, I was happy to see that my blinkm.thingm I2C LED module plugs right into the I2C pins on the breakout board - that'll be cool to use as a general RepRap health indicator. Although it cost nearly as much as the Sanguino!

The Sanguino is a very nice little board - I think I'm going to take it with me while I'm traveling so I can geek out on the road.

Wade

Wade,

Now you need the LCD board I have been working on. I hope to have a first run at a library for it this week. I don's know what the cost is but I do know that screens cost about as much as a Sanguino. But then again it has the ability to interface to 5 buttons and a LCD screen.

Have you tried to talk to replicator-g yet? I have found that the my Sanguino has a hard time connecting to replicator-g but seems to work well with the latest Reprap host software.


Bruce

Sounds good! I have a stack of generic LCD's I got for $2 at the local surplus shop, but I haven't got around to writing drivers for them. They take a fair number of io pins, so your board sounds like a good idea! Are you having any boards made? I'd be happy to pay you for a couple of them! It'd be neat if it could stack on a Sanguino or Sanguino Breakout, but since it only needs 4 connections, I suppose it can go anywhere.

I haven't tried ReplicatorG yet. Will let you know how that goes.

Wade

Zach had a first run made, I think he is waiting on documentation and code before he releases through the RRRF. So send him an email if not I have one I can send you.

You just would need some header pins and a few resistors the chip I have a few spares.

It works very well the only thing lacking is the code for it. I want to incorporate it in to the GCode interpreter along with a SD card so the printer can run stand alone.

The cool thing with the LCD interface is that it can be used for anything not just my plans.

Bruce

Wade Wrote:
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> Just a heads up for anyone building a Sanguino -
> when I fired mine up, I wasn't getting any
> flashing on the red debug led at all, which led me
> to believe that the bootloader wasn't installed.
> I ordered two of them (as I tend to let the magic
> smoke out of semiconductors on occasion), and
> neither chip would flash the red LED on startup.
>
> However, when I tried programming it, it worked
> perfectly once I got all the drivers installed,
> and I can turn on the debug LED by setting pin 0
> to high.

Wade, et al,

Yes, this difference (RED LED on a different pin) had me worried at first, as well. IMHO, this should be more prominently documented, or better yet, have a header so one could jumper it to put the LED on pin0/pin1/none. Maybe in the next version.

I was going to put my thoughts re Sanguino in a mini-review on the rrrf.org store website, but I'm now getting "Sorry, the product was not found." when I click on the photo of the Sanguino kit. Strange..... Hope Zach attends to this when he returns.

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Larry Pfeffer,

My blog about building repstrap Cerberus:
[repstrap-cerberus.blogspot.com]

all,

not sure if yall have seen this before, but it's from the guy who makes my favorite "flavor" of arduino clone, the "Really Bare Bones Board" or RBBB for short.

[www.moderndevice.com]

It is basically a serial interface to most generic LCDs. only needs 3 lines (+5v, gnd, and 1 output) plus it has some great built in features such as custom characters and even a "big number" mode that automatically converts characters to 4x tall on 4x20 LCDs. (i've used this for some simple displays for some test equipment i've build for work.) just really easy to work with. i keep one around to use as a simple debug tool.

There is an arduino library to turn any pin into a serial output, btw.

Andres

Andres,

I have, and also love the moderndevices lcd interface and not because modern devices is around the corner (ok it is 20 min. away ) Rhode Island is small.

I went with I2c because is is addressable not that serial is not. But it also has the connection for 5 buttons which can be used for control of the menu and machine. and if 5 buttons is not enough you could just add a 2nd board....

It is a little more work to program but I am working on a library.

Bruce

brucew Wrote:
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>
> It is a little more work to program but I am
> working on a library.
>
So do I understand that the Arduino firmware compiler doesn't have a I2C library already?

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Hell, there are no rules here - we're trying to accomplish something.

Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.

Thomas A. Edison

hey bruce,

didn't know the specifics of your display, just thought i'd mention the similar display board. i can definitly see the benefits of that many buttons on top of the display while only interfacing on the i2c required pins.

you dont happen to have a link to a blog post or some such on it, right now i can only think to search the forum for "bruce's LCD thing".

thanks!

andres

Sorry to be defensive I searched and tested about 6 different options and thought this was the best for what we or at the very least I might need.

It was posted on the main blog here [blog.reprap.org]

I don't know how to capture just the one post so it was a few down.

I think I might get some of the code done today. I will also ask Zach about the release status of the board at the very least.

I tested the sd card on my sanguino motherboard prototype and it works so now to test it with the gcode software and LCD..

Bruce

bruce,

don't sweat it, the board looks great, and i can't wait to see what a fully furnished reprap motherboard looks/works like with an SD card and lcd screen and buttons.

Andres

Forest,

Yes it does have an I2C library but the library I am working on is to just control the lcd and button interface.
So it would be easier for anybody to get the LCD to work since the lcd needs to be initialized to work they are a pain.
Also the LCD library for the arduino will not work because it is not for I2c comm.

Bruce

Ah! Okay! Now I understand. I would have been really shocked if the Arduino C compiler didn't have a basic set of calls to enable I2C.

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Hell, there are no rules here - we're trying to accomplish something.

Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.

Thomas A. Edison