

Daruino embedded platform wish list - Viva La Evolution - Exoseq

Hi Hacker News!! The Daruino team here, working on making the world a smarter, more connected place....<p>In preparing to launch our Minumum Viable Product, we'd really like to know, which of these would you be most likely to use or to fund on kickstarter?<p>All of these are projects which I have found to be personally useful and I would definitely purchase and use if they were available on the market as described, but I am a "special use case" so I thought I would throw this out to the HN community and see what comes back!<p>Please answer either (I,II,III,or III+IV), and include any additional info that you want to! I Have all of these projects prototyped , but trying to decide what the market needs more...Thanks for checking this out!<p>I) A tiny, lightweight 14 pin DIP Package that costs &#60;$8 with the following specs:
ARM Cortex M0 processor, 50MHZ
32KB Flash, 8KB SRAM
4 channel 10 bit ADC
10 GPIO lines
16&#38;32 Bit timers
1 Uart, SPI
Pins optional for stand-alone integration
Programmable in C/++ using readily available open source tools over serial port<p>II) A tiny, lightweight Dip28 Package that costs &#60;$15 with the following specs:
ARM Cortex M0 processor, 50MHZ
128KB Flash, 16KB SRAM
Pin compatible with ATmega328p / Arduino Uno, plugs into arduino board if desired
Drop in to "Arduino" circuits to give a big boost in capability
16&#38;32 Bit timers
2x Uart, SPI, 2xI2C
Pins optional for stand alone integration
Programmable in C/++ using readily available open source tools over serial port, could probably be readily made compatble with the Arduino DUE IDE<p>III) A 4cmx6cm systemboard that costs &#60;$25 with the following specs:
ARM Cortex M3 processor, 100(120)MHZ
512KB Flash, 64KB SRAM
8 channel 12 bit ADC
10 bit DAC
70 GPIO lines
16&#38;32 Bit timers
4xUart, SPI, 3xI2C, I2S, CAN (tranciever not on board)
USB Host support (HOST connector not on board)
Ethernet MAC (PHY not onboard)
Pins optional for stand alone integration<p>III+IV) This unit would also optionally include a daughterboard (&#60;$25) that provides Ethernet PHY w/ RJ45, USB Host connector, uSD slot, CAN transceiver, possibly other functions.<p>Programmable in C/++ using readily available open source tools over usb port
Out of the box Programmable in structured scripting language (BASIC-Like) with built in IDE via web browser, telnet, serial(USB), or composite video (or vga) / keyboard (stand alone retro computer action set capability!).<p>Note that III / III+IV are in the price range of the Raspberry Pi, which is -much- more capable computer, but as an application processor, not a microcontroller, it is not optimised for low power battery operation (months of operation from a few AAA's or lithium pack) and is not equipped with a similar range of analog peripherals, nor a similar quantity of GPIO.<p>Viva La Evolution!
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marssaxman
What is "Daruino"?

I do a lot of microcontroller hobby projects using Arduino boards, ATMega
chips, and STMicro ARM chips, so I'm a likely customer for your project.

I don't think I'd have a use for #1. I am not often performance-limited on the
ATMega328, except for applications involving lots of high-resolution PWM,
which wouldn't fit on such a device due to its limited array of IO pins.

#2 is interesting, though I wonder how long the Dip28 format will remain
relevant. The LeafLabs people have tried doing the straight-line upgrade path
from Arduino by designing a board with the same form factor, but your idea is
even more elegant. I might use a handful of these for prototyping.

#3 sounds a lot like the Maple board. The crucial thing here is the growth
path from protoboards up to custom circuits. The STM32Discovery board is cheap
and capable, but its toolchain story is totally fucked (windows only
proprietary uploader, undocumented protocol!), so it ends up being useless for
prototyping. The Maple board is good, but it is hampered by the use of the
Arduino IDE. It's really easy to outgrow the editor's constraints when you are
developing for a Cortex-M3 chip, but it's not easy at all to break your
project out into a gcc/makefile/upload type world. At least, I've had no luck
making it work.

#3+#4 sounds like you're reinventing Arduino shields, no? Again, maple did
basically the same thing and it seems to work out ok.

I don't think you need to worry about collision with Raspberry Pi, despite the
price-point overlap. Not in the near term, at least, simply because of power
consumption and complexity. It's a miniature computer, not a beefy
microcontroller; I generally don't _want_ an operating system getting in my
way when I'm building embedded stuff.

Arduino took over because it offered a totally unbeatable development
experience and didn't try to box you in. It's about as simple a process as one
could possibly expect: you write code, pick a target board, push "upload", and
it runs. It's all open standards under the hood, and they document everything
you need to know about the board design, so there's no vendor lock-in
anywhere. Mimic this strategy and you will go far. In fact I would say that
your toolchain is _more_ important than the capabilities of your board! Anyone
who is capable of pushing through a dodgy toolchain to get their prototypes
working is probably capable of building their own devboards, or of adapting
some existing devboard to their needs. The real market opportunity comes from
offering a seamless experience to beginners which still allows them a smooth
upgrade path out of your environment. Beginners don't stay beginners forever,
but the Arduino experience shows that ex-beginners will stick with your brand
and buy your products as a convenience even once they've moved on and learned
how to design their own, but only if you make it easy for them to outgrow you.

~~~
Exoseq
thank you for your well considered reply....good info, and we're listening!!!

~~~
marssaxman
just found the "Daruino" pages - Google had been not-so-helpfully redirecting
me to a search for "Arduino", assuming "Daruino" was a typo. Perhaps a more
unique name would improve your searchability?

Your 28-DIP plug-in board seems like a great place to start. It's a useful
gizmo in its own right, as an ARM-breadboarding tool, but the "just swap this
in to make your Arduino run faster" angle is a great gimmick. I would
definitely buy this, if only to play with it.

What scale of manufacturing do you have in mind? If I decide to order fifty
and want them in two weeks, is that likely to be possible?

