Our company has developed a shield for the Arduino Mega 2560 (and Due?). A lot of software has been written to test the board and now the support libraries need cleaning up and a few additional functions added. In return for the help we would give you one of the fully functional first production boards to keep.
The board has the following features:
Real Time Clock chip
- Microchip MCP795W10 (20).
- Coin cell holder on underside of PCB.
- Includes 64 bytes of user battery backed RAM
- 1K or 2K bits of EEPROM ( 128x8 or 256x8 )
- Unique ID area for MAC address (which we will populate)
- Calibration register to fine tune clock frequency (plus or minus)
- Watchdog timer with output jumper option to reset Mega
- IRQ output with option jumper for Alarms
- Two alarm option timers
- Time/Date registers to store time/date when power is lost and when power is restored.
Wiznet 5100 Ethernet interface
- Two chip selects available on 3 pin header. One is for standard IO pin. Allows you to have 2 Ethernet Ports (with library update).
- Full debug LEDs on RJ-45 jack and the PCB.
- Comes with unique MAC address stored in RTC ID registers so you can have multiple boards safely on the same net. MAC sticker is on the back of the PCB.
XBee Radio socket
- Jumper selection to connect XBee radio to Serial Port 1, 2 or 3 on Mega.
- RSSI output connected to Mega analog input pin with filter.
- Supports all XBee & XBeePro radios in Series 1 or 2 footprint (DigiMesh 2.4G & 900MHz, 802.15.4, 900MHz, 868MHz, Zigbee, & WiFi).
- On-board LEDs for TxD & RxD activity.
LCD Interface
- Two 16-Pin headers (2x8 and 1x16) to support most LCD displays
- All control lines connected, including R/W, so you can read back display data and status.
- 8 bit data bus connected to Port A, IO22-29 for fast byte wide I/O.
- +5V & GND provided on Pins 15 & 16 for back lit displays
- Trim pot on board for contrast angle adjustment
- Buffered E signal for longer cable runs
Micro SD card socket
- Two chip selects available on 3 pin header. One is for standard IO pin. Allows you to have 2 micro SD cards (with library update).
- Card inserted switch input available to check if card present.
Other
- Buzzer for audible alarms
- Reset Switch
- High Current on-board +5V & 3.3V regulators to support all types of XBee radios and back lit LCD displays.
- Power on LED.
- Multi-layer circuit board.
Please contact me and I can provide PDF files for the PCB and SCH.
One of the two libraries we will provide is the LCD since it uses byte wide I/O and status polling of the display. The library works - just needs a little cleanup.
The other one is the RTC library that will need a few functions added.