Arduino Mega 2560 R3 vs. Uno R3 for beginners {Raspberry Pi}

I mean I'd love to support the creators though,

Except that it will cost you money. Do morals go out the window when it starts to cost you?

The money made from the real thing goes to make this forum possible, it is used to subsidies boards for education world wide and it goes to fund new developments like the Due.
So yes you can get an arduino cheaper but not that much cheaper so that it is worth undermining all the good work these guys do. None of them are the millionaires that the success of this project would guarantee them in any other walk of life.
Give them a break and do the right thing.

I am with GrumpyMike there, if it hadnt been for these Arduino guys, I would still be using CMOS, and wouldnt have had a wonderful ongoing micro learning experience.

Both my boards are genuine from a local agent.

So who/where in italy makes the "real" arduino boards?

So who/where in italy makes the "real" arduino boards?

From:-
http://arduino.cc/en/Main/FAQ

Most of the official Arduino boards are manufactured by SmartProjects in Italy. The Arduino Pro, Pro Mini, and LilyPad are manufactured by SparkFun Electronics (a US company). The Arduino Nano is manufactured by Gravitech (also a US company).

Regarding the Italian vs. Chinese made boards, here's my 2 cents.

I currently have two boards, a Uno bought from a reputable supplier and a mega bought off ebay and shipped from China. Both say "Made in Italy".

The reputable source Uno is rock solid, and has clean graphcs. The china sourced Mega was dirty on arrival, and the graphics were "fuzzy" like a photocopy of an original, which I suspect is close to what it is. Further, the Mega hangs about 10% of the time I send a program to it. After a couple days running a program, the Chinese sourced LCD connected to the mega is corrupt, showing characters not in the program.

All that said, I can't say anything definitive about the mega just voice suspicions. I have no experience with any other mega, so I don't know personally if they are less stable than the Unos. Further, I don't know that the Chinese sourced I2C display is causing the corruption issue.

I can only suspect the china sourced mega is causing problems. If all you want to do is tinker, stability is likely not an issue. However, if you want your project to run stable for weeks, then reducing suspicion might be worth a few bucks. After reading this thread, I think I'll stick with reliable sources, to support them and eliminate unknowns. It's worth the few bucks.

I can only suspect the china sourced mega is causing problems.

Hardware usually works reliably the way it is wired. On the other hand, 99% of issues like yours are likely to bad code.

99% of issues like yours are likely to bad code.

I have no experience with any other mega, so I don't know personally if they are less stable than the Unos.

Yes zoomkat when he programs the Uno he is spot on with his coding but when he selects the Mega in the tools menu he can't write code any more. It is a well known effect.

Nothing to do with using processors fished out of the reject bin at all.

Yes zoomkat when he programs the Uno he is spot on with his coding but when he selects the Mega in the tools menu he can't write code any more. It is a well known effect.

Where did he say that the same code runs on the UNO with LCD attached without the same errors as on the Mega? Reread what the person posted.

Where did he say that the same code runs on the UNO with LCD attached without the same errors as on the Mega

I never said he did, please re read what I said.

I never said he did, please re read what I said.

I was just trying to give a technical response to your non technical whine. Guess there is no good response to whines in a technical forum. As to ebay arduino boards, buy from vendors that have good feedback and have completed large numbers of transactions.

I was just trying to give a technical response to your non technical whine.

I resent that it was a very technical whine.

It is you who are the moral degenerate cheapskate happy to live off the back of others.

As to ebay arduino boards, buy from vendors that have good feedback and have completed large numbers of transactions.

Well that is your advice.
I have not always found that to be a reliable indicator of worth from an ebay supplier. In fact one of the worst supplier has one of those medallion logos saying what a good supplier they are and he ripped me off to the tune of £500.

zoomkat:

I can only suspect the china sourced mega is causing problems.

Hardware usually works reliably the way it is wired. On the other hand, 99% of issues like yours are likely to bad code.

Good point, but code runs rock solid on my Uno. Further my Uno never hangs when I upload code to it, and I've uploaded code to the Uno many more times than to the Mega. Like I said the Mega hangs frequently when uploading code. Additionally, code written by others hangs on the Mega as well.

Good point, but code runs rock solid on my Uno.

Does the same code run ok on the UNO with the LCD attached? No furture in comparing apples to oranges. From what I've read in this forum, hardware issues are somewhat rare, usually solder bridges, bent pins and such causing the boards to not work at all. Poor connections, bad cables and similar conditions succeptable to mechanical disturbance normally cause intermittent hardware issues. On ebay I use paypal and I've never had an issue getting my money back from a bad product.

zoomkat:

I never said he did, please re read what I said.

I was just trying to give a technical response to your non technical whine. Guess there is no good response to whines in a technical forum. As to ebay arduino boards, buy from vendors that have good feedback and have completed large numbers of transactions.

There is no reason to start acting like a child and insult people here. You are not helping and are WAY off topic here.
If you want to help people solve problems with displays, there is a thread for that.

Nobody was insulting you when the topic of Chinese made Arduino's was brought up.

Maybe you need a time out to remind yourself how to interact with people.

Maybe you need a time out to remind yourself how to interact with people.

Somebody lick the stripe off your candy cane? 8)

Geez, can't anyone respond with a less than 30-second-read-response? Cut to the chase! Does Mega give better connections and connectivity than Uno so it's worth the extra buck or two? I use RPi w/Uno clone. Works fine, but need more room for I/O, serial ports.

Why do you respond to an almost 3 year old post.

Because there are still people reading this thread.

FYI I have a Genuine Uno and a SainSmart Mega. Both are as reliable as I would expect.

The reality is these boards are mostly just pins-to-posts and there is not much electronics other than the cpu. If you are experiencing problems, it would be the chip. If you have a dip version, you can replace it.

What was not mentioned in this post is the Arduino platform normally does 5v logic, which is extremely friendly to the electronic hacker. I would never actually use a PI or variant to do any I/O, outside of pre-fab io. Connect your Arduino to a usb port and you have extended all the useful I/O you would probably need.

Hello all, im new to this site (and the arduino scene for that matter). A quick Google search for UNO r3 vs ATMega2560 landed me here. I just ordered this kit from amazon https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01EWNUUUA/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o01_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

i probably should have asked this before i bought it, but do you guys think that this is a good introductory purchase into this ecosystem? I have a fairly robust background with the GNU/Linux system, but always caught myself tearing things apart and rebuilding them, so i figured id jump head first (maybe not so much lol).
is the ATMega2560 a different manufacturers version of the original Arduino UNO ?

The Uno uses a 328P microcontroller; the Mega kit that you bought uses and ATmega 2560 microcontroller which is just a bigger version with more peripherals (timers, pins, serial ports etc).

Did you really have to revive a 6 year old thread?

Enjoy the tinkering.