gbulmer - you make very good points. However... We can all agree the Arduino UNO is more capable than the Basic Stamp. But with your reasoning, the UNO ($29.95) should be more expensive than the Basic Stamp? The Stamp as of today is $49.00. Does it really have $20 dollars worth of extra RAM, ADC, speed, etc.? I agree with you, price is not the only criteria, but it sure is a big one. And you are correct, most will waste their money on the Stamp because "they have heard of it". I think the Basic Stamp is known because its one of the first "hobby" microcontrollers to hit the market and frankly, good "marketing". Arduino is known because of its capability beyond the Stamp and I dare say price! What should the Maple devices be known for? What's the brand? What's the selling point?
Maple-Mini vs. Netburner 5213 Module
(98 posts) (15 voices)-
Posted 4 years ago #
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I agree with gbulmer that price should not be a dominant factor for this product in its target market. If I look at liam.ll's earlier post:
"BOTTOM LINE: MAPLE MINI PRICE IS CRITICAL. If you offer it for $33 and I'm able to download programs via USB, you got me. If you offer the Mini at $25, in my opinion, you may well end up cornering the 32-bit module market! For $25, I'll buy at least two of them. Frankly, for $25, I'm not sure why anyone would need 8-bit modules. Anyway, I'm excited for your innovative company."
If I read that right you are arguing price based on 2 units! If the the part sells for $33 instead of $29 its a total of $4! That doesn't make any sense to me. As long as the part is in the $50 or less range its fine. I would rather pay more for the h/w and have better tools, more examples, etc. than save $4 (I spent that at starbucks today). The tools and examples are what have made the basic stamp and early microchip products successful. I honestly can't believe the amount of time and words expended on trying to reduce the price by such a small amount, since the target market seems to be a small number of units to many people, versus many thousands per customer. Just my opinion.
I also believe its true that if you do have a product that is superior, a higher price to differentiate does in fact generate more notice and higher sales. If you do sell it for a lot less, information and marketing is key to inform uses is not just the same thing as the competition.
Posted 4 years ago # -
Price is a difficult subject for sure. Its ultimately up to the leafblowers and I wish them the best regardless. Any estimate on when we can order the Mini? Thanks.
Posted 4 years ago # -
I just noticed the new Maple Mini images in the blog (March 1st). The red silk-screen is fantastic and unique. Very easy to read those pins and the module fits in a standard breadboard with plenty of room for peripherals. Congratulations.
Posted 4 years ago # -
liam, thanks so much! We're pretty excited with how they turned out as well. Fab should be starting any... moment... now... (if it hasn't been started already. what time is it in Shenzen?) We should have an announcement regarding price in the next week-ish.
Posted 4 years ago # -
Hong Kong* ;)
Posted 4 years ago # -
Hi, I'm also very excited and looking forward to trying out the Maple Mini when it becomes available!
-Glen
Posted 4 years ago # -
It would also be nice to be able to get the Mini with out the headers soldered in. I would like to get female headers with long pins so that I could still plug the mini into a 40pin socket but still be able to plug something in on the top. Best of both worlds! :)
-Glen
Posted 4 years ago # -
A few questions:
1. I'd love, love, LOVE having 64k of RAM. I need to capture several seconds worth of microsecond-precise timestamps to the device before dumping them to Serial, and this would triple my capture limit. Is the maple mini HD also being fabbed? As a ballpark figure, can I expect it to be available closer to 1 month, 6 months or 1 year? How about the Maple Native?
2. I'll also need to use ethernet (which Mbed has onboard, and most other 32-bit boards have as available add-ons) to control a network device. I've been watching the LeafLabs website for the past 9 months, and the ethernet library status is "planned". I realize that the Arduino ethernet card would block half of the pins on the maple, and would be pin-incompatible with the maple mini - so is there anything in the pipes as an alternative solution? Perhaps a library for something like the WizNet chip:
http://www.sparkfun.com/products/9473Thanks!
Josh
P.S. I didn't mean to sound like a kvetch. I wish I weren't so slammed finishing my thesis so I could learn the system better and develop ethernet support myself as a contributor... I would really prefer to use Maple, because the language's similarity to Arduino allows newcomers to leverage from the zillions of Arduino tutorials all over the web. (I have designed an open hardware, open-source device that will be used in at least 3 neuroscience labs, and several others have expressed interest... but Biologists are not always the greatest computer scientists so the "open" angle would be lost on most of them without Arduino's level of noob-accessibility!)
Posted 4 years ago # -
The Maple mini uses a 48-pin LQFP part.
The largest memory available for that part is 128K Flash/ 20K RAM.The parts with more than 20K RAM are 64-pin (Maple) or bigger.
Posted 4 years ago # -
Have the leafblowers considered a Maple or Maple Native on a breadboard friendly module like the Mini? So share the same width but make it ~50% longer. The 32-bit PIC Whacker has 78 pins on a 1" wide module:
http://www.sparkfun.com/products/9713
I also like GlenA's suggestion about female headers on your Mini (or future breadboard friendly modules) to enable Maple "Shields".
I suppose one step at a time. I'm sure your immediate focus is getting the Mini distributed. I'd love to see the Mini in Sparkfun competing with the other 32-bit mcus.
Posted 4 years ago # -
@gbulmer: I was referring to discussion of the Maple Mini HD on the wiki:
http://wiki.leaflabs.com/index.php?title=Maple_Mini_HD
I guess that project is not that far along...Posted 4 years ago # -
JoshSanders - I apologise for my comments. I had not 'clocked' the Maple Mini HD. Thanks for pointing it out.
liam.ll - I think it's gonna be very hard to get a 64-pin part into the same 0.6" width as the Maple mini.
The mini's 48-pin LQFP part is 7mm x 7mm, or 9.9mm across the diagonal corners (almost 0.4")
Looking at the pcb (http://leaflabs.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/maplemini-r21.png) it is very tight. I am impressed!A 64-pin LQFP part is 10mm x 10mm, or 14.1mm across the corners, almost 0.2" wider than 48-pin, over 0.5".
It might be doable with a Ball-Grid-Array (BGA) part, but I think that using BGA packages make the board harder to manufacture. Even then, it would be a lot of signals to route in a very narrow area.If you'd accept something much wider, but still breadboard friendly, then it'd be very doable.
What would be an acceptable width between rows of pins? 1.5 inches?
If bigger is okay, would something like this, but with USB, be okay:
http://www.futurlec.com/ET-STM32_Stamp.shtmlPosted 4 years ago # -
Honestly, I'm not concerned about size - just thought the mini HD might be available before the native (which as I understand, needs a few more rounds of iteration with design and fab).
Posted 4 years ago # -
gbulmer - for me, wider is okay so long as the module fits on a "standard" 7-inch by 2.2-inch breadboard with room for a free pin on either side of the narrow part of the module. The futurlec product you referenced is too big - IMHP.
The following form factor is very creative but not as structurally stable:
I'd say the best breadboard friendly 32-bit module beyond 40-pins is the PIC 32-bit Whacker. Although I'm not a PIC fan and you have to purchase the compiler separately.
Posted 4 years ago #
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