Finding the right board

Projects General Guidance
1

Hey folks,

for a project, where I will read the voltage of four axes, transfer the info wirelessly to another board and output that voltage to four motors, I am looking for the right board for the output.

I will need to output four different pwm signals with 10bit. As the reference (https://www.arduino.cc/en/Reference/AnalogWriteResolution) did not make it absolutely clear to me: Do boars capable of outputting 12bit also work with 10bit? And what is the difference between a pwm-pin and a DAC-pin? Will the DAC output an actual analog stream instead of pwm?

Thanks for any help,
a noob :smiley:

2

cycophyp:
Do boars capable of outputting 12bit also work with 10bit?

Sure, you just scale the values by 4. Your project does sound quite ambitious for someone that doesn't know that.

3

Thanks, also thanks for the implied motivation! Would you care to also answer my other questions, like the difference between pwm-pins and dac-pins?

4

cycophyp:
Would you care to also answer my other questions, like the difference between pwm-pins and dac-pins?

I think it would be wise for you to explain exactly what you are trying to do so that we do not accidentally give misleading advice.

What are you reading the voltage from?
What are you reading the voltage with?

  • The Arduino analogWrite() functon takes an 8-bit value in the range 0-255.
  • The Arduino analogRead() function produces a 10-bit value in the range 0 - 1023.
  • The normal Arduino boards such as Uno, Mega, Leonardo do not have DACs

The analogWrite() function probably has a misleading name. What it actually does is produce a PWM signal with a duty cycle of 0 for analogWrite(0) and a duty cycle of 100% for analogWrite(255) and proportionate duty cycles for intermediate values.

You say that you "need to output four different pwm signals with 10bit" which seems to rule out the use of the regular Arduino boards. But you have not said WHY you need 10 bit PWM signals. I can't see how the extra precision of 10 bit PWM would matter for motor control.

...R

5

cycophyp:
Thanks, also thanks for the implied motivation!

I'm just a realist. I've seen a lot of projects succeed and fail. It's my way of saying, "there is too much for you to learn, for it to all to be presented in a forum thread alone"... or possibly, "you may have bitten off more than you can chew".

The question you asked is answered in the documentation. For example the Due documentation explains the dual DAC outputs. If you need more there is the SAMX datasheet.