
Why we won't be selling Genuino or Arduino any more - whiskers
http://blog.pimoroni.com/why-we-wont-be-selling-genuino-arduino-any-more/
======
nathancahill
Serious question: what are people building with these boards? The recurring
projects I've seen are controlling lights, doors/locks and monitoring water in
plants. I don't find these particularly compelling, am I missing something?
How is this the next big thing?

~~~
manyxcxi
Because they're much friendlier to get started for the novice, most of the
widespread examples seem extremely trivial to someone with experience.

Now- I'm DEFINITELY not an expert, probably barely mediocre with the EE
fundamentals, but I did take a lot of EE and some robotics at Uni to get my
degree in Computer Engineering. I am nothing more than a hobbyist but some of
my cooler projects have been:

\- Autonomous 4WD robot

\- Quadcopter

\- A USB nerf gun that shoots at the developer who broke the Jenkins build

\- Used an electronic photo frame as a display to show happy birthday tweets
and Facebook posts to my wife from all the friends and family on her birthday

\- WiFi/Proximity garage door opener (before they were cool)

\- Garage freezer monitor (after an accidental unplug that spoiled a season's
worth of salmon and elk)

\- A vending machine that let you pay with your work badge from 'points' you
earned (this involved a Raspbery Pi and a surface tablet as well, but the
Arduino was what actually controlled the vending machine)

I've done a ton of random home automation IoT gizmos, mostly just for the fun
of it, and a lot of robot builds for the boys. But the reason I use a lot of
Arduino is that they are pretty friendly to use, there's a lot of help when
I'm stuck, and I often don't need more. When I do, sometimes I just add
another Arduino (or 4) and use serial or SPI communications between them. I've
got some PIC chips for stuff, and some other random chips laying around, but I
get more done quickly with the Arduino.

Now, if I ever got on to an idea I wanted to make more permanent I would look
elsewhere, but for a hobby, everything else provides more friction and ramp up
in the few hours a month I can free up to work on stuff.

EDIT: I'll add I've gotten some ESP8266 chips/breakouts that I've gotten more
used to and I may start using them in a lot of places I've previously used
Arduino + WiFi because the WiFi breakouts use a LOT of the available I/O and
are usually the most expensive part of a build. I think I have 2 or 3 that I
reuse.

~~~
timlyo
>A USB nerf gun that shoots at the developer who broke the Jenkins build

Anywhere I can read any more about this?

~~~
manyxcxi
I always mean to write up my projects but never do. The gist is really,
through trial and error I was able to map developer's desks to coordinates and
elevation angles to get to their seat and just made a flat file that had their
username, X, Y, and Z values in it.

The main loop was just the standard socket server you'd find in a Ethernet
module example and I wrote a Jenkins plugin that would connect on break and
send the offending username over the socket.

There were at the time a number of examples showing how to control the USB
launcher from Geekwire w/ an Arduino that I pretty much just copied.

~~~
ayuvar
You probably could have done some basic artillery calculations.

Then again, you might work in one of those weird offices where trying to
measure the distance from your desk to theirs is more awkward than repeatedly
attempting to shoot your coworkers while you fine-tuned the numbers.

Neat project!

~~~
manyxcxi
Actually, having someone sit at their desk while I continued to shoot closer
and closer to their face was probably the most fun of the entire project.

I tried some basic calculations, but as you could guess with a nerf dart,
building HVAC, and all the other things going on it wound up being faster and
easier (and again, more fun) just shooting until I was on target a couple of
times.

After the first few desks it was pretty easy to get close on the first shot
because you could generally know that 4ft left or right was about an
adjustment value of +/\- whatever from the last coordinate you had dialed in.

~~~
soylentcola
Plus then they can build defense fortifications and start an arms race!

~~~
fapjacks
Precisely. I immediately started thinking about Arduino-powered counter-
battery fire.

------
chappi42
If this [untold Arduino
history]([http://arduinohistory.github.io/](http://arduinohistory.github.io/))
link is true, it seems like Massimo Banzi is not only difficult to do business
with but that he had a very particular way to give credit.

Better buy clones...

~~~
alex_hitchins
I was going to post the same link. I have no qualms buying clones what so ever
since reading this story. I've had several now and there have been no issues
with quality or stability. Not even been hit with any fake FDTI chips either.

------
snarfy
The whole thing is a sham really when you consider the heritage from the
Wiring/Processing.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiring_(development_platform)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiring_\(development_platform\))

Arduino is a commercial version of somebody else's academic work.

~~~
kaffeemitsahne
_> Arduino is a commercial version of somebody else's academic work._

How is this a sham? The wikipedia page you link even says Wiring is LGPL (and
thus allows commercial/proprietary use).

~~~
ocdtrekkie
Well, I guess the point would be that the whole Arduino/Genuino vs. Arduino
spat is about who "owns" Arduino. Which is kinda ironic given it's an open
source product built from someone else's original work.

------
rocky1138
This is what happens when a company crosses the line from being a small,
hacky, indie, startup shop to a corporation.

It's a line that can only be seen after you cross it, making it especially
onerous.

------
SEJeff
I really don't see the point of the arduinos when you can buy an esp8266 that
is arduino compatible (you can use the arduino IDE and sketches).

You can get the bare esp8266 chips for $1-$2 from aliexpress, or buy a tricked
out one from adafruit (the huzzah) for $9. They have a full wifi stack,
support micropython, etc.

I think we're in a post-arduino age for microcontrollers. There are simply
better options out there, of which the esp8266 is just one of the current
better choices.

~~~
ohitsdom
I don't understand the comments that ESP8266's can replace Arduinos. Don't you
still need to wire the ESP8266 to a microcontroller?

I'm a hardware novice, and I love Arduinos. I'd appreciate any info to help me
learn, seems like I'm missing something. To me the ESP8266 is a superior
alternative to Arduino wifi shields, not the Arduino itself.

~~~
TeMPOraL
Also, don't you need weird hardware to drop the voltage and connect it to the
PC? I've only managed to do anything with NodeMCU so far, which is basically
ESP8266 glued to the aforementioned weird hardware.

~~~
catdog
3,3V is a pretty common if not prevalent voltage level with this type of
embedded Hardware, nothing weird. Also these USB to Serial converters are
pretty common.

~~~
TeMPOraL
Weird from the POV of an electronics noob, who sees ESP8266 recommended as
Arduino-killer. One of the two plugs straight into PC and doesn't require a
soldering iron to use...

~~~
reportingsjr
The NodeMCU is absolutely no different than an arduino. The ESP chips are the
equivalent of the AVR chips that are on an arduino. When people say "use an
ESP chip" they really mean one of the many ESP based boards.

------
rootbear
The local Microcenter sells Arduino Uno R3 clones under their Inland store
brand for $10, currently and frequently on sale for $6. Ideally, I'd like to
support Arduino LLC, but given how absurd this whole feud has been, I don't
feel especially guilty when I buy a clone. I have bought a few Arduino brand
101 boards from Microcenter as well so I'm not a total sell out!

~~~
ocdtrekkie
The Mega R3s are often down at $10 as well.

Inland brand hardware has always been pretty well-built too. I've never had
issues in over a decade of purchases of their store brand stuff.

------
jklinger410
TLDR: Reseller is pissed that "Genuino" has to be sold as "Arduino" in the US
and that they have separate SKUs. Also Genuino seems to have poor B2B/reseller
support.

Is this post really that petty or am I missing something?

~~~
ploxiln
Engineers don't like needless restrictions.

Can't sell "Arduino" in the EU because of underhanded legal reasons? Ok, fine,
that's life.

Can't sell "Genuino" in the US? I thought this painful brand switch was to fix
stupid legal problems?! But Genuino did this to itself?!! screw it

~~~
commandar
I get the impression that they're probably trying to avoid further diluting
the Arduino brand in the US with the expectation that they'll eventually
prevail in the trademark dispute.

------
herbst
Cool. Now i can buy the cheap offbrand clones from Aliexpress without thinking
i should have supported the actual creators.

~~~
VMG
Any recommendations?

~~~
soapdog
My recommendation is a bit different, instead of that, try looking for a local
manufacturer and support them.

Here in Brazil, people go for the cheap aliexpress clones to the point where
some of our own manufacturers are closing shop. In these cases, strengthening
the local ecosystem might be interesting and wiser in the long run.

~~~
elcct
Why? Your manufacturers could focus on something more profitable. What's the
point in making another Arduino like board? Supporting non innovative shops is
not good in short and long run.

~~~
soapdog
It is like China and the shanzai spirit, first you clone then and make it
sustainable then you innovate... (this is my personal opinion, I may be
wrong).

I believe that supporting local non innovative shops is better than having no
local shops at all.

~~~
elcct
But this is a result of that country politics. You should rather press
government to make it possible to compete with Chinese (by for example
lowering taxes, lessening the amount of bureaucracy - I heard this is a
nightmare in Brazil). Throwing money at economy that is full of flaws will
just delay the agony and not solve anything.

------
antoniuschan99
So basically the Arduino the Software Company (IDE), and Arduino the hardware
supplier broke ties?

I use the ESP8266 which I do believe is an Arduino (Hardware) Killer. However,
the Arduino IDE has amazing support for the ESP8266 among other hardware
components.

This isn't a bad thing, at least for consumers, since I feel like Arduino (the
hardware) is a few cycles behind (eg. Particle, CHIP, bbc micro, pi zero,
nodemcu/esp8266... etc)

~~~
Vexs
I dunno about the ESP8266 being a Arduino killer- it doesn't handle analog
very well last I checked.

But as for details over what happened, check this [1]hackaday article.

[1][http://hackaday.com/2015/02/25/arduino-v-
arduino/](http://hackaday.com/2015/02/25/arduino-v-arduino/)

~~~
dekhn
It has one analog pin, it seems to be very limited, I agree. But you can get
an ADC breakout and talk to it via SPI.

------
Marazan
My conclusion in all of this is to buy Teensy instead. Lovely thing.

~~~
funkaster
Agree 100%. Paul provides incredible support and he's a real engineer. Teensy
family are amazing little machines, and I've used them for many small side
projects. The latest one was a custom fight stick. Paul even provides support
you if you want to make your own version of teensy, once you're out of the
prototype phase.

Link: [https://www.pjrc.com/teensy/](https://www.pjrc.com/teensy/)

~~~
paulofisch
Dealing with PJRC, by contrast, has been basically frictionless :-)

Lovely fella too when I bumped into him at BAMF.

------
triplesec
It appears that greed and control issues were present right from the beginning
of the Arduino project, given the experiences of Wiring's developer, Hernando
Barragan, upon whose work it seems most of Arduino was branded, without
recognition or recompense. I therefore would have very little sympathy for
Arduino LLC.

[http://arduinohistory.github.io/](http://arduinohistory.github.io/) and HN:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11212021](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11212021)

------
crumpled
This article acknowledges over and over that Arduino/Genuino is following
common business practices. They are complaining that arduino has become too
big, and it's not nice for them, because pomoroni is also big. Kind of ironic,
really.

Yes, they want to cultivate a new brand while defending the old brand. It's
awkward and I'm sure they aren't happy about it either.

------
falcolas
Dear Pimoroni,

Please add a link to your store from your blog.

Sincerely, everyone who might actually want to buy from you.

~~~
ghostly_s
Almost universally, these company blogs are on a subdomain and have no obvious
link back to the actual site. I don't get it.

~~~
herbst
Pssshh. Dont tell them, we can use the SEO benefit for ourself if nobody
knows.

------
emptybits
So... asking on behalf of a friend ;-)... my local dealer stocks both Arduino
and Genuino brand boards. Is this unusual or about to change?

I feel like a curtain of innocence has been torn away for me. Ignorance of the
politics in the Arduino scene was bliss.

------
qz_
I have a Teensy board, which is much cheaper and works pretty much exactly the
same as Arduino and Genuino. The Teensy LC is great for small projects and is
about 15 bucks IIRC. Never understood why you would stick to a more expensive
brand just because of the name.

------
markhahn
Good response, and indeed the "maker vibe" seems to have been poisoned by
commercial concerns...

Real makers tend to buy unbranded stuff from Chinese free-shipping places
anyway. Branded Arduino is mostly a historic artifact...

~~~
TeMPOraL
Indeed, and I've heard of similar stories happening around Polish 3D printer
scene few years back. Basically, it seems that when an open source project
becomes popular, somebody wants to make money off it, and eventually shit like
this happens.

------
rplnt
> Everyone sells worldwide now.

Yeah.. no. Not even close.

------
nfriedly
As far as cheap Arduino clones go, I've been pretty happy with the EDArduino
ones from Electrodragon: [http://www.electrodragon.com/product-
category/arduino-2/ardu...](http://www.electrodragon.com/product-
category/arduino-2/arduino-main/)

------
erichocean
Anyone know of any small, low-cost, battery powered programmable boards for
Bluetooth LE? I've got the Pi 3 and CHIP is ordered, but I'd love something
smaller if possible. Thanks!

~~~
sandyjmacdonald
BBC micro:bit?

~~~
erichocean
Nice! Hadn't seen that one before...

------
dotBen
It's really not that unusual for resellers to be given geographical
territories within which they can/can't sell. Try looking up your favorite
electronics on Amazon.com and see if they will ship to Europe - most times the
page will say 'for US delivery only'.

It is a shame that the Arduino guys split up but I would argue the situation
would be even more of a mess if both new companies were able to sell into the
same territories with the same name + similar product.

------
st3v3r
I'm sorry, but I don't buy it. Other stores, like Sparkfun, are quite able to
do this.

~~~
detaro
You don't buy what? They didn't claim that it's impossible to deal with it,
just that they won't.

And looking at Sparkfun's site, I see how stupid this is. For one model, both
are available: 2 SKUs for technically the same board, one is out of stock. And
a notice that buying either might be delayed for a few days due to address
verification. Very consumer-friendly.

All others they sell as Ardunios only, and they either make them themselves
(and license the US trademark) or buy from the european company, so they
mostly sidestep the issue.

------
xchip
Why do you want an Arduino when the ESP8266 is half the price and has WIFI?

~~~
michaelt
For applications that need Wifi, the ESP8266 is indeed a good and very
competitively priced product.

However, all the wifi magic on the chip is closed source, and the datasheets /
documentation are much less complete than chips like the ATmega328 (which the
Arduino Uno is based on). The ATmega328 has a 660-page datasheet, whereas the
ESP8266 has a 30-page datasheet.

~~~
Radiant
People who can read data sheets tend not to use Arduino.

~~~
michaelt
I can read datasheets perfectly well, and Arduino seems pretty good by the low
standards of microprocessor programming tooling.

I mean, you can program in C rather than assembly language! And you don't have
to pay £300 a seat for the compiler! It works on windows, linux and mac
instead of being windows-only! If you open source your project, other people
can contribute and they don't even need a £150 tool to download the program to
the chip! Other people can compile your code and have it work without needing
to know the details of 'linker scripts' and 'codesourcery toolchains' and all
that stuff!

------
dingo_bat
Bah! Arduino is way overpriced for the specs anyway. Raspberry pi and others
are where it's at now. But I do think there is a massive power usage
difference.

~~~
lightbyte
You're comparing a microcontroller (Arudino) with a computer (pi). They aren't
the same thing.

~~~
azdle
Sure they are.

I mean, sure, you and I know the difference between an 8-bit micro with some
friendly libraries and a 64-bit ARM SOC running a full OS. But for a lot of
stuff they accomplish the exact same thing. So why not compare them by what
most people do with them rather than their raw technical specs.

~~~
snerbles
This is like saying a farm tractor and a pickup truck are the same thing
because they both have internal combustion engines and wheels.

~~~
azdle
Yeah, but if the farm tractor was cheaper, faster, and could carry more cargo
than the truck, why wouldn't you just use the tractor?

~~~
mrob
AVRs have much better sleep modes (single digit microamps) and predictable
performance (to the exact clock cycle) by default. If you need long battery
life or hard real-time performance then they're probably a better choice than
the Raspberry Pi.

~~~
j1vms
All reasonable responses in this thread to GP, but parent hits the nail on the
head.

For non-hobbyist problems where you really need a microcontroller, it is
selected by spec (in terms of performance, operational predictability,
physical/material properties, power consumption), and then purchased in volume
(~ millions). Employing a general-purpose CPU for said problem, while
potentially alright when prototyping, would not be satisfactory.

------
_pmf_
> It's a real shame that Arduino LLC seem to have lost any of the Maker-vibe
> it had

What "vibe" would that be? Supply shortage with undependable lead time? Having
to piece together documentation from malware infected wikis that may or may
not still exist 10 days from now?

~~~
tomswartz07
Besides the obvious trolling occurring here, I'll answer your question on
behalf of OP.

Arduino was (at one time) considered the holy grail of Makers. They had open
source schematics[1] and were very easy to use while quickly prototyping
something.

For Makers, once the prototype phase had finished and it was time to move to
'production', the ATMega and ATTiny chips were very easy to buy in bulk and
use directly in the product, with the guarantee that the code written on the
Arduino would (for all intents and purposes) work on the embedded chip.

Long story short, before they shot themselves in the foot by infighting, they
had a respectable standing among tinkerers and makers.

[1]
[https://www.arduino.cc/en/uploads/Main/Arduino_Uno_Rev3-sche...](https://www.arduino.cc/en/uploads/Main/Arduino_Uno_Rev3-schematic.pdf)

