Vaporware Electronics

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Makerbot Generation 5 Electronics

Release status: concept

Description	Makerbot Generation 5 Electronics
License	GPL
Author	User:Mr. Bunny
Contributors
Based-on	[[]]
Categories
CAD Models
External Link

Many people have suggested upgrading from an 8-bit microcontroller to a 32-bit microcontroller, perhaps one that "can run Linux". Since all the RepRap firmware is written in C or C++, in theory it should be "easy to port"(*) to any microcontroller. Here are some of the suggestions so far:

TS-7500

Summary

A nice, compact board with pretty much exactly what we need and no extras that we don't. A good cost and pretty well powered board that should meet our needs well. Its also small and compact. It claims to be un-brickable and looks to be fairly rugged.

Price point: around $80/board at our quantities. Features

   * Great documentation
   * 250MHz ARM9 CPU
   * 64 MB DDR-RAM
   * 4 MB NOR Flash
   * Customizable 5K LUT OpenCore FPGA
   * 1 micro SDHC Card slot
   * USB2 480Mbit/s Host(2) / Slave(1)
   * 1 10/100 Ethernet
   * 8 TTL UART
   * 33 DIO, SPI and I2C interfaces
   * Watchdog Timer
   * Optional BB-RTC, CAN bus, WiFi
   * Power-over-Ethernet Ready
   * Fanless Operation from -20°C to 70°C
   * Small size (67mm x 75mm)
   * Low power (400mA @ 5V)
   * Unbrickable, boots from SD or Flash
   * DevKit includes base-board+enclosure
   * Boots Linux 2.6 in less than 3 seconds

Chumby board

Summary

Good mix of low price and stripped-down feature set. On-board LCD and touchscreen support. Good relationship with Bunny is a plus. New boards don't have chumbilical connector populated; we could get this added for peanuts.

Price point: Fully assembled chumby one w/ all the toppings runs $119, so I'm guessing we can get the board at ~$50-$60. Features

   * Open-source
   * 454 MHz ARM
   * 64 MB RAM
   * WiFi
   * boots off MicroSD
   * backlit 3.5" LCD, touchscreen
   * Breakout header: "Chumbilical"
         o +5V
         o 1 SPI interface
         o audio output
         o video output
         o 2 USB channels
         o 1 GPIO
   * Est. cost ~$50

Bug Labs bugbase

Summary

Tricked-out DeLorean of ARM modules. Nice feature set, way too pricey. May be worth talking to them to see if they're considering a stripped-down version, but a long shot.

Price point: Fully assembled retails at $450; probably could get a raw board for closer to $200 in quantity. Features

   * Open source
   * 532Mhz ARM 11 microprocessor
   * 128 MB SDRAM
   * 32 MB on-board flash storage
   * MicroSD card interface (support up to 16GB)
   * Integrated 802.11b/g WLAN
   * Bluetooth 2.0 + EDR
   * USB 2.0 OTG High Speed host interface
   * Breakout: 4 BUGmodule interfaces
         o
               + Four UART serial links
               + 4-channel SPI interface
               + I2C (400 kbits) interface/4 channels
               + I2S interface/ 2 channels
   * 10/100 Ethernet MAC
   * JTAG/ICE support
   * Serial debug port
   * Smart power management support
   * Battery-backed real-time clock
   * Way too expensive: retails for ~$450, could probably negotiate a clean board wholesale down to $125

Leaf Labs Maple

Summary

Arduino clone. Not sufficient pinnage or muscle. Open-source; could potentially be modified to work for us. Features

   * Open-source
   * STM32 ARM Cortex-M3 @ 72MHz
   * 20 KB SRAM
   * 128 KB Flash
   * Breakout header: arduino-compatible
         o Arduino pins
   * Retails ~$50, could probably wholesale down to ~$30

Coridium ARMmite PRO

Summary

Another underpowered arduino-like board, but the price point is nice— $30 retail. Features

   * ARM7 CPU running at 60 Mhz
   * 32K Flash memory and 8K SRAM memory
   * 24 TTL compatible digital I/O
   * 7 10-bit A/D converters, 100 KHz sample rate
   * 8 Hardware PWM channels
   * internal supplies of 5V, 3.3V and 1.8V

Expansion Board

2 x MCP3208 - 8 channel, 12 bit ADC, SPI, $2.64/chip 4 x MCP23S17 - 16 channel GPIO, SPI, $0.95/chip 1 x TLC5940 - 16 channel PWM, $1.30/chip

ADC: 16 GPIO: 64 PWM: 16 TOTAL: 92

Cost: 2.64*2+0.95*4+1.30*1+0.50*8 Operating System RTAI Realtime linux extension, pretty standard eCos

   * Includes TCP/IP stack
   * Includes USB stack
   * Active dev community
   * Supports just about every embedded platform you can think of

FreeRTOS

   * Pretty much the same as eCos, shares some of the same modules
   * Reputedly smaller than eCos
   * Two parallel projects: a GPL version and a licensed support version

Atmel AVR32

See 32 Generation X 1 Electronics.

Runs Linux, USB, Ethernet 10/100, etc.

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