/diy/ - Do It Yourself

>>11560
Yep. Also: profile your code, set registers on the fly, etc.

>>11520
Electrical Engineering degree with a focus on embedded.

>>11561
CE, fo sho,

>>11444
No, I've only used commercial printers, sorry. If you only have one or two ideas for using them, it's probably not worth the time/money/effort.

>>11463
>1. I want to make my own tech, stuff like iPads and robotics and shit, am I a delusional beginner?
For an iPad: yes. Robotics: definitely no.

>2. What are the sort of things I should look into/learn about, and how long would it take to become proficient?
The usual first steps is to blink an LED with an Arduino. From there, get a clear, defined project goal. Make it something cool, but not too difficult -- my first project was to hook up an NES controller to an Arduino. Then, expand your knowledge a little more by using the NES controller to control a motor, whatever!

Pretty much all the information you could need is out on the interbutt, you just need to define a good goal. Lady Ada is a good resource for tutorials and hardware.

>>11508
oh god

get a real debugger

>>11477
How have you been handling debugging?

> Can they be programmed with the AVR Dragon?
Yes, see: http://www.atmel.com/dyn/products/tools_devices.asp?category_id=163&family_id=607&subfamily_
id=760&tool_id=3891

>Also, do third-party, cheaper, alternative programmers exist?
Just programmers yes, I don't know about ones with on-chip debugging. Also: you want on-chip debugging.

>>11392
Oh man, that's dope. I stand corrected.

>>11263
I really haven't made use of any books. There are incredible number of tutorials out there for starting points, and then plenty of technical papers for the more advanced stuff.

>>11227
Most likely you're going to want to get a motor controller like this: http://www.sparkfun.com/products/9457, as it makes life much easier.

http://www.arduino.cc/en/Tutorial/PWM describes a little on how PWM works and how to use it on an Arduino.

>>11250
Do you have $10k? Then no.

>>11246
>GUESS WHAT THEY COME WITH? NO GPIO PINS.
Dude, every SoC I've ever worked with muxes their inputs into GPIO/Function 1/Function 2/etc. What the fuck are you talking about?

>>11101
That's out of my area, but I don't think that's really something you can do as a hobbyist.

>>11059
No that's Arduino ( ￣3￣)

These boards are tools. BASIC STAMPs are much less powerful than other options, but if they get the job done then who cares?

>>11153
And they connect to the Broadcom SoC.

>>11005
Again: Broadcom does not make any reference manuals for their uCs available to the public. If it's different this time, great, but it's entirely possible that GPIO header is just going to be stripped out of the final board.

>>10807
I'm gonna guess you're doing some image processing then, and would want to take a look at micros with a DSP in them. It doesn't look like either of those boards do, but I only took a quick glance. I know the Beagle/Pandaboards do, so that may be worth a look.

Also http://hackaday.com/?s=uav may be helpful.

>>10861
>GPIO
>not even a part of the Broadcom SoC.
ಠ_ಠ

That wouldn't make much sense, but let's say it's an SPI IO extender. Without the uC manual, how do I know what registers to write to setup SPI on the chip?

>>10760
Peripherals? Pin outs?

Have you worked with uCs before?

>>10678
>potential for robotics
Broadcom doesn't publish datasheets without an NDA, so yeah.

>>10602
There are plenty of 3D printers with crazy print areas and resolution, they just cost a fuckton of money.

>>10132
There's been an explosion in cheap 32-bit dev boards, what's the project for?

>>6536
Unless you've got a BGA chip, yep. It's really not that difficult, just takes practice.

You should absolutely breadboard your design before that step though.

>>6452
I can't read Spanish, but from poking around he's using a JDM programmer like this: http://www.instructables.com/id/Simple-JDM-PIC-Programmer/

>>6487
>>6500
Yeah, I've used the GNU ARM toolchain. LLVM has some ARM support as well.

>>6168
Sorry, I got banned for a legit URL. I'm too lazy to go ask on IRC to remove it so I'll just hope the mods don't feel like giving me a perma for dodging.

>>5972
Pretty much all EDA software is going to have an awful interface. Eagle is your best bet if you don't feel like spending crazy amounts of money, I'd just stick at it.

That said, circuitapp looks promising.

>>5985
The first question is: do you actually need that type of speed?

I personally haven't, so I'm not too certain of what the preferred method is. You may want to take a look at V-USB?

>>6302
All C, I work on some 16-bit applications and there's little to no C++ compiler support there.

Questions about microcontrollers, prototyping, PCB layout, software, and the like? I'm an embedded software engineer and have done hardware design in the past, so ask away!