Highly Anticipated 32-bit "Due" due When?

Everyday the Arduino Due being late reminds me of the old silicon valley term "VAPORWARE" ]:slight_smile:

Yes it's a shame, David C gave a pretty good explanation the gist of which (I think) is that there is too much to do an too few people to do it.

Many of us have offered to help but I guess throwing more engineers at a problem is not always the thing to do (there's a famous saying about that isn't there?).

That said you think you could farm out some things, like porting the libraries across. Many of the modules would be autonomous I would think, give SPI to one person, I2C to another etc. Maybe that is in fact what's happening with some selected developers, it's just such a big job.


Rob

Looks like the Raspberry Pi will be delivered before the Due.
T.

Yes but the Raspberry Pi is some what crippled from an I/O point of view. Of the 56 GPIO pins there are only 14 brought out to the header. There are a number of expansion boards in the pipe line but the "official one" in effect sticks an arduino on these pins and gives some port expansion. But this does not include I2C and will cost about £100, that is 4 times the price of the Pi itself.

On the main board there is no built in A/D and the drive on the 3V3 digital pins is some what minimal, so no driving LEDs at any great brightness without an expansion board.
It looks like it will be more of a programmers system than a physical computing platform.

My Pi's delivery has been put back from the middle of April to the start of May. I was lucky and managed to get an order in on the first day but about 12 hours after the start.

It looks like it will be more of a programmers system than a physical computing platform.

Looks like it. I just spent a couple of hours reading some of the RPi forum. Many of the comments are interesting, things like "Wow it's got I2C, I'll be able to talk to a sensor", "Can I connect the RS232 to USB?" and about 20 questions about if the IO is 5v or 3v3, and that's just on one thread!

It seems that the audience for this is coming from a different place to the average Arduino user.

expansion boards in the pipe line but the "official one"

Is that the Gert board or another?


Rob

Is that the Gert board

Yes, Gert is the hardware guy for the entire project, and his board is his own sideline.
I asked if it was going to be open source, but he said as he had spent a lot of his own money on the project so far he hoped to recoup some of it from sales of the boards. Can't exactly blame him for that, but it would not be the way I would have done it. He also seems to be trying ( and failing at the moment ) to implement the debugWire in the 328 system. So you can tell he is not so very experienced if he thinks such a simple processor needs this.

Many of the comments are interesting

Agreed, the comments fall into a few narrow categories:-

  1. Sycophantic - you are all doing such a wonderful job ( despite the evidence of such a botched launch )
  2. The amazed innocents - wow only £100 for an interface board we have to pay £800 for a control board at my school.
  3. The pissed off - you promised a computer at $25 and now I am expected to pay tax and carriage on top of that!
  4. The Linux code nerds - I am porting "big bits 6.3" to the Pi ( who knows or cares what that is )
  5. The haven't got a clue about interfacing but this sounds like it should be an impressive question - what is the pitch of the header.

Sycophantic /The amazed innocents

Them's the words I was looking for :slight_smile:

Things like (I paraphrase)

"Gee I can't believe you brought the serial port out to a header, what a fantastic design"

And the endless discussions about the header pins being NC or DNC.


Rob

Any news of when the Arduino DUE will be ready?
The first statements pointed at January 2012 but that has passed.

No, or to put it another way, no.

One post from David C a few weeks ago and that's been it. It's all very hush hush, even the processor being used is not being revealed, presumably to get the jump on clone makers. I even offered to sign an NDA but got no response.

There's nothing on the developer's mailing list either so either bugger-all is happening or it's going on with a select few out of the public eye. Hmmm, some of the more senior forum members have been very quite lately, maybe they are too busy porting code to an ARM :slight_smile:


Rob

even the processor being used is not being revealed,

Well they did say in the initial announcement:-

We’re using the SAM3U processor from ATMEL running at 96MHz with 256Kb of Flash, 50Kb of Sram, 5 SPI buses, 2 I2C interfaces, 5 UARTS, 16 Analog Inputs at 12Bit resolution and much more.

Looks like the Arduino design teams bit off more than they can handle?
The Arduino Due is at least 7 MONTHS late but who's counting.
What I believe why they announced the Arduino Due in Sept.2011 was to freeze others from developing their 32 bit platforms.
Guess what? No one bought it and now other platforms like the PIC32 will be eating their lunch. ]:slight_smile:

Grumpy_Mike:

even the processor being used is not being revealed,

Well they did say in the initial announcement:-

We’re using the SAM3U processor from ATMEL running at 96MHz with 256Kb of Flash, 50Kb of Sram, 5 SPI buses, 2 I2C interfaces, 5 UARTS, 16 Analog Inputs at 12Bit resolution and much more.

And then recently said

We have changed processor a couple of times because we want to have something powerful enough to cover many of the things you guys are already doing with Arduino and with other compatible platforms plus adding the power of the 32b. And don't worry it is a standard ARM processor, everything it can do with it at low level is already available in the datasheet of the processor chosen for the task. Please do not ask about the processor, this is the one secret we keep until release date.

I get why they are doing it (the clone makers must be circling) bit it's a real pain. I'd like to be studying the data sheet to get up to speed or even buy an eval kit.

And don't worry it is a standard ARM processor,

That is useless information, almost nobody cares what the core is, presumably an M3 but that doesn't really matter as the average person's C code will just run as before. It's the memory and IO that are of interest and that does vary a lot with different chips.

We haven't been given any useful information, what about the IDE, a new one based on VS (as per AVS5/6)?, the old IDE (please no). Eclipse? How many serial ports? 5v or 3v3 IO? Debugging support?

I guess we just have to wait, but it's been 7 months with no information is getting it's getting pretty tedious.


Rob

Yes but I assumed it would be from Atmel and one of that series.
The Raspberry Pi on the other hand has a processor that you can't get the data sheet of. It is from Conexant and they have a habit of making you sign an NDA before they will give you the password to open their data sheets.

They have released a partial data sheet for the Pi processor but that just covers the Arm peripherals on the chip. Nothing about the video engine or any of the hardware details. It is a very bad company to choose but the guy doing it works for them.

Yeah I see they are all calling for schematics, not much chance by the sound of it.

partial data sheet for the Pi processor but that just covers the Arm peripherals on the chip

I guess they have to do that so the community will get involved to write drivers.

the guy doing it works for them.

I bet he has access to the good stuff, sounds a bit like undocumented system calls that (supposedly) allowed M$ to produce better software than their competitors.

I think I'll stick with Arduino, the RPi looks nice in many ways but it has too much of what I don't need and not enough of what I do. But I guess the target demographic is not curmudgeony old farts who like to DIY :slight_smile:


Rob

Graynomad
You state:

Eclipse? How many serial ports?

What do you mean by that.
I'm asking because I'm currently working on a serial monitor in eclipse and I'm thinking about supporting 3 serial ports simultaneously.
I got it "kind off" to work (hard coded com name; only one port ....)
If you have experience on this any feedback is welcomed.
Best regards
Jantje

Sorry I have no experience with that, I was just mentioning things we'd (or at least "I'd") like to know about the new Due and the juxtaposition of "serial ports" and "Eclipse" was coincidental :slight_smile:

I do however like the idea of supporting multiple serial ports but can't help with doing that in Eclipse.


Rob

Rob
Glad to hear you are not aware of any blocking issues with eclipse and serial ports.
Best regards
Jantje

I'm not "aware" of a lot of things, for example if there's any serious blocking issues with faster-than-light travel, but that doesn't mean they don't exist :slight_smile:


Rob

Rob
The more I know the more I know there is llitle I know.
So just like you I'm aware there is little I'm aware about :astonished:
Therefore I'm always on the lookout for people who are aware of things in my space of interest. If they are "aware" of something it may save me lots of time.
And given the huge amount of unawareness saving time is a hard job. Luckily we know the answer is to all questions is 42
Best regards
Jantje

Little do they know how little I know about the little they know. If only I knew what the little that they know, I'd know a little. I'll have to keep my little ears open you know.

The Goon Show, Tales of Old Dartmoor, Series 6, Episode 21


Rob