Electronic building blocks with FEZ Medusa

FEZ Medusa is a recently debuted open source hardware (OSHW) processor board powered by Atmel’s ATmega328P microcontroller (MCU).

Aptly described as “electronic building blocks” by the GHI Electronics crew, the Fez Medusa is designed to keep soldering irons optional with a comprehensive ecosystem of mainboards, sensors and control modules.

“This modular design of building blocks does not require any hardware experience, we call it FEZ for fast and easy. On the software side, [Makers can] program using the Arduino IDE. On the hardware side, everything is modular building blocks, using a unified socket map,” the GHI Electronics team wrote in a recent Kickstarter post.

“[Meaning], FEZ Medusa uses modules instead of shields, [which offers] two [significant] advantages. First, there are no possible pin conflict issues. Second, when stacking multiple shields, the [finished] product is difficult to place inside an enclosure. Modules are smaller and connect through cables, ideal for laser-cut or 3D printed enclosures.”

In addition, the sockets on FEZ Medusa and modules are marked with one or more letters indicating the socket’s capability. For example, if the socket is marked with the letter “A” then it is an analog socket with three analog pins.

The Fez Medusa will be available in three iterations: Mini (one “program socket” and three user sockets), the S12 (12 sockets – one for programming, 11 for adding modules) and the 11-socket Shield, the latter of which can be plugged into an Arduino board like any other shield.

Interested in learning more about the Atmel-powered Fez Medusa? You can check out the project’s official page on Kickstarter.

Rapid IoT prototyping with SODAQ

The Atmel-powered SODAQ (ATmega328P) is a LEGO-like, plug-in, rapid prototyping board. Essentially, the multi-feature microprocessor board allows both Makers and engineers to easily connect a wide variety of sensors and devices to the Internet.

“It’s designed for connecting things efficiently, running off-grid with built-in, ready-to-go solar power. [That is why] we designed the SODAQ system (SOlar Data AcQuisition) to be able to communicate from anywhere, with a GPRS module and all the control code for it included from the start,” the SODAQ team wrote in a recent Kickstarter post.

“[There is] no breadboarding or soldering required. SODAQ [boasts] plenty of memory, sockets, solar panel, battery control and extra features – all on one board. [It is equipped with] built-in sockets for Grove modules; a real-time clock; extended flash memory; USB on-board and a Bee socket (WiFi/RF/XBee or compatible plugin).”

According to the SODAQ crew, early iterations of the board have already been deployed to various locations in Peru and Tanzania, where they are helping link weather stations, big commercial irrigation and school projects to the Internet. First-gen SODAQ boards have also been used to power an environmental monitoring system, tracking ecological factors for a WWF whale shark research project in the Indian Ocean.

“The (early version) SODAQ board with its built-in ability to handle all the power/solar/GPRS communications and easy plug in sockets for sensors made this project really simple. [It] saved thousands of dollars compared to commercial data loggers/large solar panels/industrial modem set-ups,” the SODAQ crew explained. “We’ve also already used it as the core to connect up weather, soil and river monitoring for small subsistence farmers in cooperatives in East Africa, for big irrigation management on large commercial farms and for a bunch of projects in the UK and Holland.”

Key SODAQ specs include:

• ATmega328P MCU running at 3.3V and 8MHz.
• Power Supply by LiPo Battery (3.7V) (supplied LiPo: 1,000mAh) or USB Cable.
• Programming by USB cable (and ICSP header also included).
• Solar Charge controller & JST connector for solar panel up to 2.5W (supplied panel: 0.5W).
• Battery monitor.
• DS3231 real time clock and temperature sensor.
• 16 MBit data flash module (AT45DB).
• Micro USB connector.
• 12 Grove connectors connecting Digital, Analog and I2C pins.
• On/off switch.
• Active solar charge circuit and powered RTC clock – even when switch is in “off” position.

Interested in learning more about the Atmel-powered SODAQ? You can check out the project’s official Kickstarter page here.

ATmega328P powers this GPS Cookie

Designed by Richard Haberkern, the open source GPS Cookie is built around Atmel’s popular ATmega328P microcontroller (MCU). As Haberkern notes, the Cookie’s compact form factor (available in two form factors, or shapes) makes it easy to carry, experiment with and expand.

“Take it with you, throw it in a bag or redesign the whole thing to create your own unique version of this GPS data logger. The unique open access design let’s you write code, make design changes and test your applications as you go. Think of the GPS Cookie or Sandwich as a prototyping platform and fully functional product in one great design,” Haberkern wrote in a recent Kickstarter post.

“Just insert two AAA batteries and any micro SD card to start recording and location data. The on board LEDs will tell you when the GPS Cookie is receiving satellite data and recording your route history. After your car ride, bike trip, walk or any other journey is over, just pull out the SD card, upload it to Google Earth and you are ready to view everywhere you or the GPS Cookie or Sandwich has been.”

Aside from Atmel’s ATmega328P MCU, key GPS Cookie specs and features include:

• All Arduino compatible I/O pins accessible via pin headers
• Compatible with Windows, MAC, Linux and Android
• Works on all computers and mobile devices
• Large storage capacity for years of data collection
• 5Hz (1/5 second) Max navigation update rate
• Factory firmware logs at 1Hz (Arduino code is adjustable)
• Power consumption can be controlled with your code
• 32 Kbytes Flash Memory
• 16 MHZ Clock Speed
• Arduino UNO Compatible Bootloader
• Micro SD Card Slot on board
• (2) AAA Battery holders
• 50 Channel GPS receiver
• NMEA and U-Blox binary datastreams
• High gain 360 degree fractal antenna doesn’t care which way it is pointed.
• GPS L1 Frequency
• SBAS, WASS, EGNOS, MSAS enabled
• Cold Start – 26 seconds Max
• Warm Start – 26 seconds Max
• Hot Start – 1 second
• -162 dBm tracking sensitivity
• -148 dBm Cold Start sensitivity
• 2.5 meter Horizontal accuracy
• 0.1 meters per second velocity accuracy
• 0.5 degree heading accuracy
• 50,000 meters maximum altitude

Interested in learning more about Richard Haberkern’s GPS Cookie? You can check out the project’s official Kickstarter page here.

Atmel-powered Moti makes it easy to build robots

Created by Nicholas Stedman, Rob King and Varun Vachhar, the Atmel-powered Moti is a comprehensive platform (hardware and software) for DIY Makers that helps simplify the process of building and controlling robots.

“Robotics is [sometimes] more complex than it needs to be, so we created Moti to make it easy,” Stedman explained. “Just attach your Moti smart motors to anything add power and immediately control it from a phone, tablet or any computer. Presto, instant robot! At the same time, Moti is advanced enough to satisfy even hardcore engineers and developers.”

On the hardware side, Moti features a Smart Motor, which Stedman describes as an “ideal servo” with a built-in Arduino-compatible microcontroller (Atmel ATmega328p), on-board sensors, continuous rotation and encoding, I/O pins for adding electronics, a web-API, instant networking and control over Bluetooth.

“We basically packed Moti full of sensors and a programmable microcontroller (Atmel ATmega328p), so you can attach electronics right to the motor,” he continued. “We also solved a major annoyance, the angle limits of servos. Moti turns continuously and seeks position…so you can tell it to go 10.5 rotations and it will stop on a dime. [Plus], we created a Bluetooth shield so you can control your robot wirelessly.”

In terms of software, Stedman told Bits & Pieces “the optiboot bootloader is loaded on and we have custom firmware programmed using the Arduino API on there as well.” In addition, Moti boasts a web-based API so Makers can more easily develop customized websites and apps to control robots.

“We picture new kinds of video games, visualizations and tutorials that integrate with real world contraptions… Moti allows you to start quickly and then take it any direction you want. Basically, it’s the kind of motor I wish I had 10 years ago, and the kind of motor that can help robotics finally move from industry into everyday life,” Stedman added.

Interested in learning more about Moti? You can check out the project’s official Kickstarter page here.

ATmega328P powers this slick DIY wristwatch

A talented Maker by the name of Zak Kemble has designed a rather impressive DIY wristwatch powered by Atmel’s ATmega328P microcontroller (MCU).

“The main incentive behind this project was to see how much I could cram, in terms of both hardware and software, into a wristwatch-like device that is no larger than the display itself,” Kemble wrote in a recent blog post.

“An OLED display was chosen for being only 1.5mm thick and not requiring a backlight (each pixel produces its own light), but mostly because they look cool. The watch was originally going to have a 0.96″ display, but this proved too difficult to get all the things I wanted underneath it. Going up a size to 1.3″ was perfect.”

Aside from Atmel’s ATmega328P, key project specs include a 2.5V regulator, Maxim DS3231M RTC, 1.3″ 128×64 monochrome OLED, 2 LEDs (red and green), two PCBs, a buzzer sounder, three-way switch for navigation and a 150mAh LiPo battery which can be charged via USB.

On the software side, Zak notes that he spent “a lot of time” optimizing the rendering code which involved copying bitmap images from flash to the frame buffer in RAM and sending the frame buffer over SPI to the OLED.

“The end result was being able to maintain 100+ FPS in almost all areas of the watch with an 8MHz AVR,” he explained. “However, since the animations are frame based instead of time based and to save power, the frame rate is limited to 60FPS.”

Interested in learning more about Zak Kemble’s DIY digital wristwatch? You can check out his official project page for additional details and schematics.

ATmega328P powers these Little Robot Friends

Little Robot Friends are both interactive and customizable, each with a unique and evolving personality. According to Mark Argo of Aesthetec Studio, the Little ‘bot family is built around Atmel’s ATmega328P MCU. Each Little Robot is powered by two rechargeable AAA batteries and depending on the frequency of use, should last for weeks or months on a single charge.

“Little Robot Friends can sense the amount of light in a room, they can hear with a small integrated microphone, they can detect your touch and they can also communicate with other Little Robot Friends using infrared light (like your TV remote),” Argo explained. “They have two RGB LED eyes and a 250mW speaker for expressing their current mood. The brain is an 8-bit 32K Atmega328p microcontroller that provides a lot of space for coding behaviours and storing memories.”

As Argo notes, the Atmega328p microcontroller is the very same MCU found in numerous Atmel-powered Arduino boards, which means the Little Robot Friends can be easily reprogrammed in an Arduino environment for Makers who like to tinker.

“We think we’ve created something beautiful and charming, but what makes it really special is the personality. Every Little Robot Friend has 6 resistor ‘shoelaces’, each representing a different personality trait. Depending on the value of the resistor, it changes the initial personality of the robot and determines some of its characteristics,” Argo continued.

“For example, one shoelace controls the continuum between brave and timid, and will affect how it responds to different stimuli – like being afraid of the dark. However, if you comfort your Little Robot Friend, it will gain confidence and slowly get braver. Each interaction with your Little Robot Friend is stored as a memory and changes how it will behave over time. We are working hard to make this a profound experience, one that can surprise you and make you smile as you watch your Friend grow up.”

Interested in learning more about the Atmel-powered Little Robot Friends? Be sure to check out the project’s official page on Kickstarter.

Arduino overclocked with liquid nitrogen

A modder named Michail recently snapped up some liquid nitrogen in Moscow and decided to try his hand at overclocking an Arduino with the LIN. As you can see in the video below, the Arduino’s temperature was brought down to a cool -196°C/-320°F as it hit speeds of 65.3MHz.

During the overclocking session, Michail ran several stability tests he designed specifically for the project to gauge if the ATmega was still working correctly, including SRAM read/write, flash read, arithmetic math and program flow test.

“The Arduino was externally clocked by a TTL-logic based square signal generator he designed, which can produce a clock between 16 and 100MHz,” the Hack A Day crew explained in a recent blog post about the project. “[As to] what happens to the different on-board components when cooled with LN2? Electrolytic capacitors becomes virtually non-existent, X7R capacitors’ impedance drop by 2/3, silicon diodes voltage drop increase by 50% and LED’s colors change.”

Michail said he overclocked the Arduino UNO (Atmel ATmega328P) to better understand how electronic equipment operates at cryogenic temperatures.

“[I was also] curious how much juice you can squeeze out of AVR if you push hard enough This also produced some results relevant to desktop processors overclocking with liquid nitrogen cooling,” Michail noted. “[Remember], overclocking microcontrollers with liquid nitrogen cooling promises to be harder, than overclocking desktop processors. Luckily for me, all [the] problems were sorted out at the end.”

Interested in learning more? Additional photos and data are available here on Michail’s official website.

Designing industrial sensors with Atmel AVR: Part 2

Yesterday, Bits & Pieces took a closer look at how Atmel’s versatile AVR portfolio can be used to power industrial sensors which are typically tasked with detecting, positioning or identifying an object or rotating axis in a factory-automated system.

And today we will discuss an Atmel-powered sensor reference design, or more specifically, the HMT7442 IO-link transceiver and optimized IO-Link device MESCO software stack – courtesy of Atmel, HMT and MESCO Engineering.

“IO-Link is the emerging industrial communication standard to connect the control unit to sensors and actuators. The standard is backwards compatible with the commonly used binary switch signaling and introduces a bi-directional digital communication. These capabilities bring several benefits to the end user, including easier cabling, remote diagnostics and configuration,” an Atmel engineering rep told Bits & Pieces.

“For many sensor designers, the physical size constraint is the key factor for integrating the IO-Link capability. And that is why Atmel, HMT and MESCO Engineering have placed a strong focus on saving board space in our offering of the TM96.0 GENIE Explorer Variant A reference design.”

More specifically, the TM96.0-A reference design demonstrates the high integration of the Atmel, HMT and MESCO solution. It acts as an IO-Link device and is equipped with a push button, two LEDs and a potentiometer to allow developers to add stimuli to the system.

“The reference design runs the MESCO IO-Link stack on an Atmel tinyAVR88 microcontroller and communicates on the IO-Link cable using HMT’s HMT7742 PHY IC,” the engineering rep continued.

“The implementation used in the reference design does not require external protection to sustain reverse polarity or to comply to the EMC surge protection defined in the IEC 60255-5 standard. This makes the TM96.0 an ideal tool to evaluate the Atmel-HMT-Mesco solution.”

Meanwhile, the TM96.0-B Evaluation Kit enables hardware and software designers to develop, test and debug the IO-link sensor application. Basically, the TM96.0B features the IO-link transceiver HMT7742 and the Atmel ATmega328P. It is equipped with all necessary connectors for in-system programming, while supporting debug sessions using Atmel’s free AVR StudioIDE, Atmel AVR Dragon or Atmel JTAGICE-mkII. Plus, an evaluation kit is provided with pre-compiled MESCO library software, which can be linked to the main application using the WinAVR GCC compiler.

Interested in learning more about how Atmel AVR MCUs can power your industrial sensors? Be sure to check out our detailed device breakdown here.