what is the best protocol to connect more than 512 devices to an arduino??

I think you will have trouble using any bus with 500+ loads hanging off it.

How fast do you need to update the nodes?

Can you split them into a few groups?

What about daisy-chaining as that has no practical limit to the number of nodes (or the distance between them depending on the speed required).

Does it have to be a single motor per node? Can you say have 4 to reduce the number of nodes to 128?


Rob