Anyone Seen The Maple?

[ArduinoAndy]

Looks good but at 369 Euro + Vat + shipping is nosebleed territory on the forum.
Some users were complaining about $65 USD for an Arduino Mega.
But you get what you pay for.

[RanTalbott]

It is a professional system which is also suited for hobby.

Only if your "hobby" is "defeating alarm systems for bank robberies and jewel heists".

Andy's comment was too mild by half:  that price is more like aneurysm territory for most hobby purposes.  It would be different if there were a low-cost "runtime" module,  and the US$500 or so were a one-time development system cost.

Something like the Arduino makes far more sense for hobby use:  it has a really low entry cost,  and excellent potential (so far) scalability.  It's been scaled down as far as ATTiny chips,  and could easily be scaled up to chips like ARMs and Coldfires for applications that need more horsepower.  That provides a wide variety of platforms that could affordably be permanently embedded in hobby projects.  And don't have multiple steep learning curves.

And also aren't at risk for viruses and other malware.

[starbug]

Okidoki.
I never said anything against the Arduino. I am using a lot of them for all kind of projects. We were talking about ARMs. I tried a lot of boards and was'nt satisfied. But i am still looking for new boards to test them. If people cannot afford to buy such expensive bords like the AUG AMI they should leave it and stay with there own small systems. Why not. I only wanted to present a board which is working well and can be used for evaluating small boards for hobby purpose. As already mentioned a friend of mine is working with this board to create a cheap Arduino like board which later can be programmed via IDE or MF4 just like the Arduino or XDuino. The status of this project is at 80% at the moment and only God knows when he will finish it. But it is really working a bit.

[ArduinoAndy]

friend of mine is working with this board to create a cheap Arduino like board which later can be programmed via IDE or MF4 just like the Arduino or XDuino. The status of this project is at 80% at the moment and only God knows when he will finish it. But it is really working a bit.

More info, link? blog?

[RanTalbott]

My objection to the AUG board is mostly based on the fact that it runs Windoze,  which bloats the platform and has a big learning curve for people who aren't already PC geeks.  For the price,  it arguably makes more sense to buy something like a netbook or an ARM-based PDA that can run Linux.

But it makes still more sense to get an Arduino(-like) environment running on a more-powerful board:  it's friendlier, more efficient, and cheaper.

For people who can't wait for that to happen,  I'd recommend looking into boards like the Netburners,  which are well-supported with documentation and examples,  and run a variant of uCOS that has an easier learning curve than Windoze for non-geeks.

[pracas]

The problem is that the ARM processor is so complex that even the MIT boys are having fits.

well well i was looking to buy this board and try to program it using normal gcc tools... i had brought myself upto this after a lot of pushing .... now this thread is pushing me back...

[wortelsoft]

What about the futurelec board:

http://futurlec.com/ET-ARM_Stamp.shtml

It has a similar price as an arduino.

[ArduinoAndy]

You got the old ARM stamp... the new ARM Stamp which uses the STM32 is this link:
http://futurlec.com/ET-STM32_Stamp.shtml

This is same ARM Stamp that is the "Xduino" in disguise. Support is AWOL and you cannot expand the libraries.
Of course you can use GCC on it but it would take light years of development.

So far Maple is the only ARM board with Arduino like easy to use commands and functions. Looks like they solved their nagging software problems - the board is on sale now. Go MIT  

Correction: Sold out for now?

[westfw]

One of the problems with putting the Arduino environment on a more complex CPU is that the arduino provides a sort of simplified abstraction of a very simple microcontroller.  Put in a fancier chip and it gets very frustrating not providing the more advanced capabilities available, or very difficult to provide simplified access to those capabilities.  For instance, TI/Luminary provides a standardized "driver library" for their "Stellaris" ARM chips, for which the documentation is well over 200 pages.
(Another piece of frustration is that you can LOSE capabilities.  Having 6 PWM outputs on the arduino is pretty unusual for such a small micro; having less on a supposedly "more powerful"
chip is annoying...)

[pracas]

Well a quick review on the Primer2

I got the Primer2 yesterday and have been playing around with it since. It seems cool though looks pretty cheap. The touch screen is one of those DS things with 4 wires. As of the moment i'm running through the tutorial programs and most of these seem easy because of the Libraries built in with the Circle OS however I'm wondering how it would be to do some direct coding for this without the Circle OS. Will keep updating as i proceed. In the meanwhile anybody here tried programming it without the Circle OS and using other tool chains(arm-gcc?).

[RanTalbott]

Put in a fancier chip and it gets very frustrating not providing the more advanced capabilities available, or very difficult to provide simplified access to those capabilities.

Examples?  Perhaps my background has biased my perspective more than I realize, but it seems to me that the Arduino's object-based system,  with its high degree of consistency from class to class,  does a really good job of providing that "simplified access".

[westfw]

Well, consider using native USB capability to simultaneously continue to emulate a serial port, while also providing for other USB endpoints.  Or DMA capture of anything, or timer support beyond PWM, or sleep modes, or debug features...

[ArduinoAndy]

Starbug ... Have you used your hammer on the Maple yet?
Looks like the MIT boys are solving your problems?

[RanTalbott]

Concurring in part and dissenting in part...  

I think the current object implementation for the serial port might actually make it easier to implement multiple USB endpoints.  At least for those who stick to the simplest stream-like methods.

DMA would certainly be difficult/impossible to do in a way that preserved downward compatibility with code written to do the kind of port I/O,  and even bit-banging,  that's common now.  But I think it could be done in a way that fits within the Arduino paradigm, so it would be workable and less "alien" than switching to a different "OS" model.

Debug features are pretty much doomed to being very CPU-dependent,  with little chance of encapsulating them in a way that makes them consistent from target to target.

Otoh,  features like pulseIn() and the Mstimer2 library should be portable to almost any CPU,  and it seems feasible to add some more-sophisticated capabilities that would also be portable.  When you add targets with unique timer features,  you can use ifdefs to enable them much the way that the existing hardware serial library handles the multiple ports on a Mega.

Overall,  I think the Arduino community would be better served by extending to platform to more-powerful CPUs,  even at the expense of sacrificing easy access to some of their features,  than by telling people "Once you exceed the limits of the ATMega family,  you must switch to a very different environment".  Certainly some people will want/need to,  but most,  especially artists and others who just want a flexible component to use in their "non-computer" projects,  will be happier to have a range of choices that work "the Arduino Way".

[Imahilus]

I have yet to reach the endpoint of atmega capabilities.. by a long shot.
However, a lot stronger chips do sound interesting, due to the 2kb memory restraint on my atmega328 I won't even bother making a neural net driven system, but it could be interesting to implement such a feature in a stronger chip.

So please, do go on with the ARM stuff, it is interesting stuff..
I also agree that the arduino makes the hardware, software, and where those two collide, accessible for a lot of people.. it would be a good thing if it could be extended to more powerful chips.