AVR-Chat

Hi,

as I wrote earlier my butterfly based project is probably dead. So I'm 
considering alternatives. The goal is a focuser for my telescope and it 
will need to talk to a host PC. At first I intended to use RS232 for 
that but as you know many laptops don't have that interface any more so 
native USB seems more natural. I was pleasantly surprised at how easy it 
is to hook up an AT90USBxxx device to a USB port. Two zeners is all it 
takes. The devices also aren't expensive. So I'm a little surprised I 
can't find any boards out there that use one of these chips, put a USB 
connector on the board and provide pads for the IO pins to an experiment 
area ala Graham's butterfly carrier. Graham, if you don't have one 
planned yet, this may be something to consider. We can talk more about 
features if you like but it would basically be a butterfly carrier with 
an AT90USB82 instead of a bf.

Maybe I missed one so if you know of someone who sells such a starter 
kit, please let me know. I know Atmel sells a few kits but they have too 
many bells and whistles for my purposes. Then again if you think I 
missed one that's worth trying, please let me know.

I've also looked at http://gnusb.sourceforge.net/ and may try to port 
that to mega163 or mega48 (I have those in my parts box). But I think 
I'd prefer to use a dedicated USB enabled AVR.

Thanks,

    Sander

How about the AT90USBKEY, Sander?

       http://www.atmel.com/dyn/products/tools_card.asp?tool_id=3879

32 bucks at either Mouser or Digi-Key.  Both have stock.


REB



Sander Pool wrote:

> Hi,
>
> as I wrote earlier my butterfly based project is probably dead. So I'm 
> considering alternatives. The goal is a focuser for my telescope and it 
> will need to talk to a host PC. At first I intended to use RS232 for 
> that but as you know many laptops don't have that interface any more so 
> native USB seems more natural. I was pleasantly surprised at how easy it 
> is to hook up an AT90USBxxx device to a USB port. Two zeners is all it 
> takes. The devices also aren't expensive. So I'm a little surprised I 
> can't find any boards out there that use one of these chips, put a USB 
> connector on the board and provide pads for the IO pins to an experiment 
> area ala Graham's butterfly carrier. Graham, if you don't have one 
> planned yet, this may be something to consider. We can talk more about 
> features if you like but it would basically be a butterfly carrier with 
> an AT90USB82 instead of a bf.
>
> Maybe I missed one so if you know of someone who sells such a starter 
> kit, please let me know. I know Atmel sells a few kits but they have too 
> many bells and whistles for my purposes. Then again if you think I 
> missed one that's worth trying, please let me know.
>
> I've also looked at http://gnusb.sourceforge.net/ and may try to port 
> that to mega163 or mega48 (I have those in my parts box). But I think 
> I'd prefer to use a dedicated USB enabled AVR.
>
> Thanks,
>
>     Sander
>
>
>
>

Hi Roy,

now that you mention it, I did look at that one briefly. Looks good. I 
seem to recall it has some non-standard headers that turned me off but 
it's a good option. In fact I think I'll order one as soon as I take a 
closer look at the remaining IO capabilities of this board.

It seems there's a market for a small board with just the bare 
essentials to start with one of the USB chips:

- USB connector (B type)
- jumper based USB or external power
- clock
- JTAG connector
- ISP
- headers in single rows so the board can be pushed into a breadboard 
for easy experimenting

I suppose it would be hard to compete with the key at $32.

Thanks!

    Sander

Roy E. Burrage wrote:

>
> How about the AT90USBKEY, Sander?
>
> http://www.atmel.com/dyn/products/tools_card.asp?tool_id=3879 
> <http://www.atmel.com/dyn/products/tools_card.asp?tool_id=3879>
>
> 32 bucks at either Mouser or Digi-Key. Both have stock.
>
> REB
>
>

> It seems there's a market for a small board with just the 
> bare essentials to start with one of the USB chips:

Maybe this one:

http://www.olimex.com/dev/avr-usb-162.html

Alex

Yes, that's more like what I had in mind. Bummer no JTAG support. Also 
the price is higher than the Atmel Key. At least for folks in the US 
like me. It had been a while since I perused the Olimex site. They have 
some nice products.

On a note related to my other inquiry regarding the dead butterflies it 
seems AVR Studio 1.13 SP2 has a bug. Olimex made mention of it on one of 
their product pages. The patch is no longer available on the beta site 
but there's now a 1.14 beta that is supposed to fix it as well:

http://www.avrfreaks.net/index.php?name=PNphpBB2&file=viewtopic&p=397121

Thanks,

   Sander

Alex Shepherd wrote:

>
> > It seems there's a market for a small board with just the
> > bare essentials to start with one of the USB chips:
>
> Maybe this one:
>
> http://www.olimex.com/dev/avr-usb-162.html 
> <http://www.olimex.com/dev/avr-usb-162.html>
>
> Alex
>

Sorry, that's 4.13 and 4.14 of course. I'll report later if it revived 
my bfs.

    Sander

Sander Pool wrote:

>
>
> On a note related to my other inquiry regarding the dead butterflies it
> seems AVR Studio 1.13 SP2 has a bug. Olimex made mention of it on one of
> their product pages. The patch is no longer available on the beta site
> but there's now a 1.14 beta that is supposed to fix it as well:
>
>
> <http://www.avrfreaks.net/index.php?name=PNphpBB2&file=viewtopic&p=397121>
>