LeafLabs Garden » Topic: Arduino Due

LeafLabs Garden » Topic: Arduino Due http://forums.leaflabs.com/topic.php?id=1044 A place to share, learn, and grow... en-US Fri, 22 Jan 2016 00:08:32 +0000 http://bbpress.org/?v=1.0.2 <![CDATA[Search]]> q http://forums.leaflabs.com/search.php gbulmer on "Arduino Due" http://forums.leaflabs.com/topic.php?id=1044&page=2#post-20858 Wed, 07 Nov 2012 12:33:26 +0000 gbulmer 20858@http://forums.leaflabs.com/ bubulindo - 39 Euro + tax, but they are sold out <a href="http://store.arduino.cc/ww/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=11_12&products_id=243" rel="nofollow">http://store.arduino.cc/ww/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=11_12&products_id=243</a> I haven't seen any elsewhere yet. bubulindo on "Arduino Due" http://forums.leaflabs.com/topic.php?id=1044&page=2#post-20844 Wed, 07 Nov 2012 03:34:11 +0000 bubulindo 20844@http://forums.leaflabs.com/ I had a look at the Arduino Due forum and I think that some code might end up being ported from Maple to the Arduino... Does anyone know where to get one of those boards? And for how much are they selling? blindbox on "Arduino Due" http://forums.leaflabs.com/topic.php?id=1044&page=2#post-20840 Wed, 07 Nov 2012 01:39:41 +0000 blindbox 20840@http://forums.leaflabs.com/ I'm bumping this seeing how Arduino Due has been released. I know I haven't done a lot of research on this subject, but how goes the libraries, now that Arduino has released their very own ARM version? Will the porting be easier? The read pwm function (pulseIn()?) would be lovely if it can be ported almost directly. gbulmer on "Arduino Due" http://forums.leaflabs.com/topic.php?id=1044&page=2#post-6565 Sat, 24 Sep 2011 17:45:21 +0000 gbulmer 6565@http://forums.leaflabs.com/ poslathian - were you talking about my post on Micromouse? If you were, I'll ask Pete Harrison, who is using STM32F in international competition (when he gets back from Taiwan). I think Pete said several people in the top 10 Micromouse robots in the world use STM32F. When people ask me what sort of robot they could make (i.e. is it a toy?), I quite like to point them at one of the championship competitions in Asia because they are insanely fast vehicles. Have a look at the first video on this page, the title says it all: <a href="http://www.botjunkie.com/2009/12/11/one-damn-fast-micromouse/" rel="nofollow">http://www.botjunkie.com/2009/12/11/one-damn-fast-micromouse/</a> One of the world class, veteran, Micromouse builders, Dave Otten, is 'just down the road from you' at MIT. poslathian on "Arduino Due" http://forums.leaflabs.com/topic.php?id=1044&page=2#post-6529 Fri, 23 Sep 2011 09:56:28 +0000 poslathian 6529@http://forums.leaflabs.com/ seems like a good demo op. Thanks for the tip! gbulmer on "Arduino Due" http://forums.leaflabs.com/topic.php?id=1044&page=2#post-6528 Fri, 23 Sep 2011 04:29:14 +0000 gbulmer 6528@http://forums.leaflabs.com/ Atmel have confirmed the SAM3UE used on the Arduno Due does only have one quadrature decoder. IMHO this is not a big issue for most users. By comparison the STM32F103xB on Maple and Maple Mini has 4 timers each of which implements a quadrature decoder. Maple Native and Maple RET6 have 6 timers which implement quadrature decoders. For mobile robots, for example Micromouse, which often have (at least) two independently driven wheels, only one quadrature decoder is a bigger issue. Keeping track of position (odometry), and speed is crucial for many mobile robots. Odometry is essential for Micromouse maze solving, and also gives a big advantage for line following robots which can use odometry to 'learn' a track. Some mouse builders use stepper motors which remove the need for encoders, but the fastest, most agile or lowest cost mice use DC motors which require two decoders. Even simple 'toy' robots which try to follow a pre-defined route would be easier to build with a quadrature decoder for each independently driven wheel. Something like a robot Scalextric car are likely okay as they have only one driven axle. It is practical to do quadrature decoding in software, but folks I talk to, who compete nationally and internationally, say there are often problems debugging the real-time code; errors can result in the robot crashing. Also high-performance miniature DC motors from Faulhaber and Maxon Motors with built in hall-effect encoders can generate 100,000 interrupts per second and more. So catching the quadrature interrupts, and not interfering with another real-time subsystem are hard problems to debug. Summary: quadrature decoders are an important resource to some classes of use, but irrelevant to most. I'll certainly mention this when people ask for my advice. JonnyBoats on "Arduino Due" http://forums.leaflabs.com/topic.php?id=1044&page=2#post-6483 Wed, 21 Sep 2011 10:52:45 +0000 JonnyBoats 6483@http://forums.leaflabs.com/ There is one really big plus for LeafLabs in the Arduino Due announcement; namely that you can't buy one right now, but you can buy a Maple! With Arduino announcing that the future is 32 bit, there will be a lot of people right now saying "maybe it is time to buy a 32 bit board...". And the best choice right now...Maple! gbulmer on "Arduino Due" http://forums.leaflabs.com/topic.php?id=1044&page=2#post-6481 Wed, 21 Sep 2011 09:04:22 +0000 gbulmer 6481@http://forums.leaflabs.com/ Darth Maker - I am with crenn on motor drives. The board I designed last year: <a href="http://ourduino.wordpress.com/2011/04/06/orone-cortex-m3-robot-controller-stm32f103/" rel="nofollow">http://ourduino.wordpress.com/2011/04/06/orone-cortex-m3-robot-controller-stm32f103/</a> had motor drives on board. But they didn't handle enough power for some motors we wanted to use, and another project wanted two stepper motors. So I have stripped everything from my new board. I plan to use discrete MOSFETs with a MOSFET gate driver to make my own H-Bridges, though here are some okay motor drive chips too. The PCB's can be pretty small. crenn - thanks for the feedback on the ChipKIT. The closed source compiler was the part that worried me. A $1000 for Open Source versions of those stacks seems very good value for money. Smart move. crenn on "Arduino Due" http://forums.leaflabs.com/topic.php?id=1044#post-6465 Tue, 20 Sep 2011 23:50:07 +0000 crenn 6465@http://forums.leaflabs.com/ gbulmer, currently the USB and Ethernet stacks are closed sourced, and there is still quite a bit that is closed sourced (primarily compiler stuff I believe, I don't own the ChipKIT so I can't say). They're currently running a competition with a prize of $1000+ (dangerousprototypes.com is adding $100 to the prize I believe) for each of the USB and Ethernet stacks. I have a Maple r3 in my backpack with a limited amount of electronics, but I'm switching to a Maple Mini r2 in a smaller container. While I understand there are uses for a lot of IO, most of the time I'm only using up to about 10 pins at a time while prototyping things (this excludes projects such as my university project which is using almost every IO available on the Maple Mini). The other problem I see with the Mega is that there is a lot of wasted space on that board, but it makes the layout easier and is still fine for prototyping. @Darth Maker, Having motor drivers is very specific. In my case, I don't need motor drivers as the controllers for the motors of my project are external and very specific to my needs. It could also be that someone needs more powerful motor drivers than what is on that PCB. However, I have seen some Arduino clones which are exactly what you're wanting. gbulmer on "Arduino Due" http://forums.leaflabs.com/topic.php?id=1044#post-6455 Tue, 20 Sep 2011 20:43:22 +0000 gbulmer 6455@http://forums.leaflabs.com/ Darth Maker - I am with you on the size of the Arduino boards. We use Freeduino Nano's for small robots. A friend has started using Maple Mini for a compact and unusual robot. The STM32F timers seem to support more quadrature decoders than the SAM3U. Quadrature decoders are very useful for DC motor driven mobile robots. <blockquote>The ChipKIT guys did not seem happy with the release. I think they feel they're product is threatened. </blockquote> Did they say if their software is all Open Source yet? Earlier in the year, they had included pieces which were closed. Darth Maker on "Arduino Due" http://forums.leaflabs.com/topic.php?id=1044#post-6452 Tue, 20 Sep 2011 19:38:46 +0000 Darth Maker 6452@http://forums.leaflabs.com/ Well, I got to hold and examine a Due prototype at the MakerFaire on Sunday. One thing I noticed very quickly is that they used a two layer board, and have the ADC lines crossing over digital lines on the other side. You can almost see the noise this would create doing 12-bit at 300Khz. I really don't like the size of the Due/Mega. I feel that anything that big should have motor drivers built in, and three pin headers for many, most or all I/Os. But, I'm a roboticist, not a prototyper. One thing is for sure though, the ST32 chips have far more PWM outputs, and this makes them very valuable for robotics. I asked the Arduino guys whether they would be following more of a Leaflabs approach of really bringing out the power of the hardware, or going the route of maximum compatibility, similar to ChipKIT. They said they were planning on having all core functions compatible, but then going to get the community involved with where it goes beyond that. The ChipKIT guys did not seem happy with the release. I think they feel they're product is threatened. Slammer on "Arduino Due" http://forums.leaflabs.com/topic.php?id=1044#post-6436 Tue, 20 Sep 2011 14:46:03 +0000 Slammer 6436@http://forums.leaflabs.com/ I am very happy because the arduino is moving to a different CPU. Think about it. What is arduino? It is not the hardware (actually the hardware is a simple naked atmega8 board). Arduino is the libraries, the shields and most of all the Community. There are many xDuino platforms around like maple, pinguino32, chipkit, etc... All these projects trying to make arduino style programming available in different platforms. Until now the arduino platform was limited in a specific architecture, now the door is opening to another architecture. It is a step for multi-architecture development. It is not an easy task. I hope to see all communities that working in different xduino architectures to work more closely for a common target: - common IDE - common libraries ( as common can be in different hardware) - common shields - many targets with different architectures. The user will select architecture according the requirements of a project. For all these, I welcome the new xDuino member and I believe that this will help maple. gbulmer on "Arduino Due" http://forums.leaflabs.com/topic.php?id=1044#post-6430 Tue, 20 Sep 2011 13:59:00 +0000 gbulmer 6430@http://forums.leaflabs.com/ corguy - <blockquote> Is your view that this hurts Maple? </blockquote> I have an open mind. You were the one saying <blockquote>I see it as a plus for the Maple because a lot more people will be working on STM32 stuff now </blockquote> and <blockquote> Before it was a bit of a risk behind moving to Maple because the relatively small Maple community and it seems to me this just expanded the community greatly. </blockquote> and I was the one asking you to explain why you said this. I repeat, the Maple's STM32F103 and the Atmel SAM3U4 peripherals are very different, so there is likely little code sharing between the Maple's low-level libraries and the Arduino Due. People working on Arduino Due will not be growing the size of the Maple community, though they are growing the size of the Cortex-M3 community which might help encourage the compiler and software tools community. poslathian - I agree with you that it will take significant effort to get the Arduino Due stabilised. But, IMHO the Arduino brand will attract support. The STM32F103 is more mature than the SAM3U. I had a look at the Errata sheet for the SAM3U, and there are a few 'interesting' bugs in the hardware. I don't know what Atmel's policy is about publishing Errata, so that may be the entire list, in which case it is getting better, or there may be some issues which have not yet been properly characterised and are unpublished. Other boards, for example the Teensy and Tennsy++, have the USB on the processor, and have both LUFA support (including contributions from the designer of Teensy) and unique USB bootloading. Teensy seems successful and quite popular. The current Arduino UNO uses an ATmega with on-board USB (to replace the FTDI chip), so I assume the Arduino team have some USB experience to build on. I agree the F2 series chips look very good, but you have put me off considering it with your comment in these forums about them being superseded by an F3. I should ping ST about the Cortex-M4. I do agree with the Arduino community that 32-bit ARM is a lot more complex than an 8-bit ATmega. BUT, IMHO, that might be the wrong criteria. There are a lot of really interesting things that can easily be done with a 32-bit STM32F103 which are very much more awkward, or even impractical, on an ATmega. So though the underlying MCU is more complex, the code the user writes can be simpler and easier to get working, or even possible. I strongly agree that the Arduino team releasing an ARM board will encourage people to come across to 32-bit more quickly. For me, the major technical strength of the Atmel SAM3U is the High-Speed USB. Weaknesses compared to Maple RET6 include: no DAC, fewer SPI, fewer quadrature decoders, no CAN. Also, the STM32F103 has three 12-bit ADCs, but the SAM3U has one 12-bit and one 10-bit ADC. The STM32F103 has the rather nifty 'dual sample mode' which might help me in a future project (ideally it would be triple sample, but I can't have everything :-) poslathian on "Arduino Due" http://forums.leaflabs.com/topic.php?id=1044#post-6412 Tue, 20 Sep 2011 11:42:38 +0000 poslathian 6412@http://forums.leaflabs.com/ Thanks for the great discussion on this issue. We have been having a very similar back and forth with each other here at LeafLabs. We had the pleasure of being at the (second) announcement of the Due, and generally we had a great time at Open Hardware Summit (OHS) and Maker Faire. I am glad that Arduino is finally waking up to 32 bit. Moving to 32 bit is a natural progression for the community, especially now that the chips are coming down in price. Obviously, everyone around here has "gotten it" for a while ;) When the available hardware is better, the output from the community will be better. When we first started with Maple, there was a considerable amount of pushback from the Arduino community, it was said that 32bit was too complicated, too expensive, and generally unnecessary. To me, the announcement feels like a win. In terms of the actual Due product, Arduino has a long way to go. As far as I can tell, Atmel provided the hardware platform, and the Arduino team has ported most of the "core" library over. I do not know how "100% compatible" the core will be, given 32bit versus 16bit issues like the max value of an int, or the default range of PWM. On Maple, we were always of the mind of breaking Arduino compatibility in favor of exposing the 32bit hardware. The Arduino developers might feel differently. To my knowledge they have not really stabilized a bootloader scheme, or ported the many Arduino libraries to the new platform. They are looking to launch in January, and are asking for substantial developer support from the community. They were handing out beta hardware by invitation only at the conference. Smoothing out the edges on the 32 bit platform was not easy for us, and I am sure Arduino will run in to many of the same problems. I look forward to seeing how they solve some of these issues, especially related the the USB and bootloading mechanisms. The Duo prototype they had only has one chip, like Maple. This turned out to be an enormous headache, since the USB programming interface lives on the same processor that is being reprogrammed (as you all know)! Overall, the processor looks good, and is a hair faster than the *current* maple (...). I look forward to seeing the first reviews of the device in January. Here at LeafLabs we have a very full product roadmap and have been working on some partnerships of our own that you will learn about in the coming months. Maple Native Betas are out the door, and with 1MB of external RAM! Oak has been admittedly behind schedule, but the finish line (aka release) is finally in sight! Further, STM32 is a very mature processor platform with a lot of life left in it. Our current hardware is based around STM32-F1 series processors, but we are looking forward to hardware with F2, and even F4 series chips! These are faster and better in every way ;) Overall we would like to say to Arduino, welcome to the 32bit playground! If I had to ask one favor from you guys, it would be that you use the next few months before the Duo comes out to teach the Arduino community what can be done with 32bit hardware! robodude666 on "Arduino Due" http://forums.leaflabs.com/topic.php?id=1044#post-6405 Tue, 20 Sep 2011 10:20:08 +0000 robodude666 6405@http://forums.leaflabs.com/ Only way I see this can "hurt" Maple or LeafLabs is because Arduino already has a name for themselves, and it will be easier for them to promote their new 32-bit board. So while LeafLabs will be affected by this, in some way, as long as they continue to make the great products that they are currently making, I shouldn't see them being hurt by it. I believe the LeafLabs folk looked at the SAM3U as an option previously, but decided against it for whatever reason. Regardless, they found the STM32 and built a wonderful line of boards around it with very well documented software. While arduino compatibility is great to see in a product, I am looking forward to more products like the Maple Native and Maple Mini that break away from the Arduino's form factor, provide some arduino compatibility in software, but still provide full native (pun intended) support for the hardware.