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The OpenM128 development board

The OpenM128 was one of my favourite AVR development boards but sadly it doesn’t seem to be made any more by Waveshare.

This board looked like this

OpenM128

OpenM128

It was a very useful board which had a few on board features and all of the ATMega128 ports went to external headers. you could connect your own sensors or there were various add-ons

It featured the ATmega128A-AU

Which in turn has

Core: AVR 8-bit RISC
Operating Frequency: 16MHz Max
Operating Voltage: 2.7-5.5V
Package: TQFP64
I/Os: 53
Memories: 128kB Flash, 4kB SRAM, 4kB EEPROM

Then there were the following

8 LEDs: convenient for indicating I/O status and/or program running state
5 push button switches : for I/O input test and/or program control
Joystick: which had  five positions
Headers for onewire, usart, i2c, lcds, ps2 keyboard, jtag and more

We have uploaded all the source code for various demos to the link below, we have tested a few out and you can import them into Microchip Studio 7, build them and using a programmer you can upload to the board.

We setup a USBTinyISP and that worked perfectly – the board has a 10 pin and a 6 pin ISP connection – either work.

Link

Uploaded the code examples and schematic here – just in case the waveshare link disappears

https://github.com/programmershelp/OpenM128

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Boards

An ATtiny13 development board

In this article we look at another development board, this time its a compact board aimed at the Attiny13

Features/Specs

lets look at the Attiny13 microcontroller first and some basic specs

The 8-bit AVR® RISC-based microcontroller features 1 KB of ISP Flash, 64B EEPROM, 64B SRAM, 32B register file, and 4-channel 10-bit A/D converter. The device achieves up to 20 MIPS throughput at 20 MHz at 1.8-5.5V operation.

Program Memory Type Flash
Program Memory Size (KB) 1
CPU Speed (MIPS/DMIPS) 20
Data EEPROM (bytes) 64
Capture/Compare/PWM (CCP) 0
Max 8 Bit Digital Timers 1
Number of ADCs 0
ADC Channels 4
Max ADC Resolution (bits) 10
Number of Comparators 1
Temp. Range Min. -40
Temp. Range Max. 125
Operation Voltage Max.(V) 5.5
Operation Voltage Min.(V) 1.8
Pin Count 8
Low Power Yes

 

Here is the pinout of ATtiny13

attiny13 pinout

attiny13 pinout

Now lets look at the development board we bought which contained this microcontroller

The ATtiny13 development board is a learning board designed specifically for the ATtiny13.

The working voltage of the board can be selected to either 3.3V or 5V through the jumper on the board.

All the pins of the chip are led out by pin headers

The board has the following resources and features .

Onboard resources:

  • Reset button
  • Two buttons
  • Three LEDs
  • ADC potentiometer
  • 5V or 3.3V working voltage selection via a jumper
  • Power button
  • ICSP 10 way header
  • DC power jack
attiny13 development

attiny13 development

 

 

Links

https://www.microchip.com/en-us/product/ATtiny13A

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Boards

Another ATmega Prototyping PCB in kit form

In this article we look at another very useful little self build kit for Atmegas from Rkeducation in the UK, this one is called the RKAT40 Prototype PCB for 40 pin Arduino

It looks like this – once you have assembled it

RKAT40 Prototype PCB

RKAT40 Prototype PCB

Specs/Features

  • The board ban be used with all 40 pin Arduino and Microcontrollers wuch as the Atmega16 and ATmega32
  • Incorporates a large prototype area with plated through holes for your own projects and experiments
  • There is an ICSP header for programming ATMEL MCUs
  • There is also a JTAG header
  • The Input and outputs are easily accessed via plated through holes around the MCU
  • The prototyping area has 0V 3.3V, 5V and 12V power rails with power indicator LEDs
  • You can power the board using a battery or DC mains supply, I recommend the latter option
  • The board includes a 7805 and a LD1117V33 3.3 volt voltage regulator
  • The unit has 2 surface mount SO8 footprints with plated through breakouts for each pin for prototyping

 

Schematic

The schematic is in the doc link below but as I like looking at schematics – here you go

rkat40 schematic

rkat40 schematic

Assembly

As stated this is a self build kit – you’ll need a soldering iron and some basic soldering skills.

This is an easy kit to assemble though as all the parts are through hole and no smd parts here – so ideal for beginners

As always when building kits like this it is recommended that you start with the resistors, capacitors, switches, leds and ic socket – then move onto the headers, barrel jack and voltage regulators.

If your are using an external power source you may want to add a heatsink to both of the regulators in particular depending on the input DC voltage. You can see in the schematic that both use the same DC supply.

I used a 12v regulated DC supply, always use a regulated supply.

I also soldered my own dual row headers for the output pins

Purchase

I found 2 links in the UK which include an ATmega – these are different from the Atmegas I tried – I tried an Atmega16 and Atmega32 from my collection, which just goes to show the flexibility of this board with the microcontrollers that can be fitted

Rk Education RKAT40 Prototype PCB with FREE ATMEL ATMega644p – Self Build Kit
Rk Education RKAT40 Prototype PCB with FREE ATMEL ATMega324p – Self Build Kit

 

Links

You can get the board directly from rkeducation below and a link to the docs

rkat40-prototype-pcb-for-40-pin-arduino

RKAT40 Component List and Instructions

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Boards

The RKAT40c Compact Project PCB for 40 pin Atmegas

This next board combines an Atmega chip which you have to supply and a easy to build minimal system board with parts.

The board is easy to assemble as it features only through hole parts and no smd parts

 

Features

  • Software is downloaded from a PC into the microcontroller from an Atmel AVR programmer or a FTDI USB cable
  • The clock reference can be either a ceramic resonator or crystal oscillator
  • All input and output pins are available via pin headers – you need to supply your own
  • Power supplied via either a DC socket or there is a 2 way header, the maximum input voltage is 5.5V DC max
  • Power can also be supplied from the FTDI cable connection, there is a 2 way header plug to select USB power
  • Power switch and LED power indicator

 

There are 2 methods of programming using this board

1) Software can be downloaded using a USB FTDI cable that connects from one of your PC USB port and to header J3.
2) Using an AVR programmer or equivalent, connect this to the ICSP 2×3 way header.

I soldered the resistors first, then the capacitors, switch, led, headers and then the socket

I have used an Atmega16 and an ATmega32 with this board

Schematic

rkat40c schematic

rkat40c schematic

Purchase

Rk Education RKAT40c mcc Compact Project PCB : from Amazon UK – £5.99

Links

You can get the board for only £3.99 from Rkeducation directly in the UK

Rkeducation link
RKAT40c MCC Component List and Instructions
RKAT40 Component List and Instructions

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Boards

An AT90USB162 development board from Olimex

This was another development board that I purchased a long time ago, its a board for the AT90USB162 from Olimex and its a good, solid option

Specs

Lets look at the specs of the AT90USB162

The microcontroller combines 16KB ISP flash memory with read-while-write capabilities, 512B EEPROM, 512 bytes SRAM, 22 general purpose I/O lines, 32 general purpose working registers, two flexible timer/counters with compare modes and PWM, USART, programmable watchdog timer with internal oscillator, SPI serial port, debugWIRE interface for on-chip debugging and programming, and five software selectable power saving modes.

The device operates between 2.7-5.5 volts.

Program Memory Type Flash
Program Memory Size (KB) 16
CPU Speed (MIPS/DMIPS) 16
Data EEPROM (bytes) 512
Capture/Compare/PWM (CCP) 1
Max 8 Bit Digital Timers 0
Number of ADCs 0
ADC Channels 0
Max ADC Resolution (bits) 0
Number of Comparators 1
Temp. Range Min. -40
Temp. Range Max. 85
Operation Voltage Max.(V) 5.5
Operation Voltage Min.(V) 2.7
Pin Count 32
Low Power No

 

Now lets add in the AVR-USB-162 development board from Olimex

You have the microcontroller above and you also get the following on the board

 

  • ICSP 5×2 pin connector for in-circuit programming with AVR-ISP-MK2 (you generally don’t need to use ICSP as you can program via USB)
  • Debug Wire could be performed by 3 wires connected to ICSP (AT-JTAGICE-MK2 have such lose wire connector which to be used, you need VCC, GND, RST signals only)
  • USB 2.0 connection
  • User button BUT (can be used to enter bootloader mode after reset)
  • Reset button RST
  • Takes power from USB so there is no need for external adapter
  • You can use an external power supply and voltage regulator if USB can’t provide enough power. I always recommend this option to be honest.
  • Quartz crystal oscillator circuit 8Mhz
  • Extension pin headers for each uC pin

 

Summary

A decent development board for a fairly capable microcontroller. When you factor in that the cost of the board is only 8 Euros its a very good price. The board is good quality and there is a substantial prototyping area, if you need it.

The board will work with Microchip (used to be Atmel) Studio and you do not need to buy an external programmer, if you need a debugger thats a different story but this is quite often the case anyway

Olimex supplies a couple of examples, as you can see in the links below, these are fairly standard examples but at least you are not on your own.

Using this a mouse, keyboard seems to be a fairly interesting use case

Links

DOCUMENTS

HARDWARE

SOFTWARE

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Boards

Atmel ATmega168 Xplained basic example

In this example we will look at the Atmel ATmega168 Xplained Mini board and will show you a simple code example – blink an LED.

The Atmel ATmega168 Xplained Mini evalutation kit is a hardware platform for evaluating the Atmel ATmega168 microcontroller. The evaluation kit comes with a fully integrated debugger that provides seamless integration with Atmel Studio 6.2 or later. The kit provides access to the features of the ATmega168 enabling easy integration of the device in a custom design

Key Features

  • On-board debugger with full source-level debugging support in Atmel Studio.
  • Auto-ID for board identification in Atmel Studio 6.2
  • Access to all signals on target MCU.
  • One green status LED
  • One mechanical user pushbutton
  • Virtual COM port (CDC)
  • 16MHz target clk
  • USB powered
  • Arduino shield compatible foot prints
  • Target SPI bus header foot print
  • Xplained Pro extension headers can easily be strapped in
  • Supported with application examples published on Atmel Spaces

 

Schematic

This is a representation of the Atmega168 and the led atatche dto PB0

 

Code

The following code was written in Atmel Studio, it will flash an LED connected to B0. There is an onboard LED connected to B5 you could use as well

[codesyntax lang=”cpp”]

/*
 * Blinky.c
 * Flash the LED on the Atmega Explained board
 * Created: 27/12/2016 23:43:59
 * Author : AVRlearning
 */ 


#define F_CPU 16000000UL
#include <avr/io.h>
#include <util/delay.h>

int main(void)
{
 DDRB |= (1<<DDB0); //Set PB5 to output
 while(1)
 {
  PINB |= (1<<PINB0);
  _delay_ms(1000);        //Delay for 1 sec
 }
}

[/codesyntax]

 

Links

AVR Xplained Mini Eval kit

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Boards

AT90USB162 development board

The AVR-USB-STK board is a nice development board allowing you to explore the AT90USB162  . This board has a USB connector, a Joystick, a RS232, a SD-MMC card, an Audio output, an ICSP connector and an extension connector.

The AT90USB162 comes  pre-programmed with a bootloader which allows code to be programmed inside the chip without any external programmer, atmel supplies a piece of software that you can use to load your hex code to the device.

The AT90USB162 is a high-performance, low-power Atmel 8-bit AVR RISC-based microcontroller combines 16KB ISP flash memory with read-while-write capabilities, 512B EEPROM, 512 bytes SRAM, 22 general purpose I/O lines, 32 general purpose working registers, two flexible timer/counters with compare modes and PWM, USART, programmable watchdog timer with internal oscillator, SPI serial port, debugWIRE interface for on-chip debugging and programming, and five software selectable power saving modes. The device operates between 2.7-5.5 volts.

A nice easy board to get up and running, olimex supply schematics, a manual and a few code examples and you will see from later I was able to use a low cost USBASP programmer  to program the device using the 10 pin header that you can see in the picture below. There are enough on board features to play with and the pins from the microcontroller come out to a header which is handily located on the side of the board, easy to make your own adaptor board if you wanted.

avr usb stk

avr usb stk

I used a USBAsp with no issues and the khazama AVr programmer. The code was written in MikroC pro for AVR

 

Code

In this example we simply toggle the entire PORTD on and off, there is an onboard LED which will flash on and off, you can also connect another LED as well if you like to test.

[codesyntax lang=”cpp”]

void main() {


  DDRD = 0xFF;           // Set direction to be output
  
  do {

    PORTD = 0x00;        // Turn OFF diodes on PORTD
    Delay_ms(1000);      // 1 second delay
    
    PORTD = 0xFF;        // Turn ON diodes on PORTD
    Delay_ms(1000);      // 1 second delay
  } while(1);            // Endless loop
}

[/codesyntax]

 

Links
AVR-USB-STK Atmel AT90USB162 USB Development Board – UK

USB ASP USB ISP 5V AVR SCM Programmer Adapter 10 Pin Cable & Case ATMEGA8 ATMEGA128 For Arduino Support Win 7 64Bit

OLIMEX AVR-USB-STK AT90USB162, USB, ICSP, SD/MMC CARD, DEV BOARD – US

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Boards

RKP40c development board kit

I was looking for a basic development board for the ATmega16/32 microcontrollers, I did not want one of the boards that has masses of components on the board such as LEDs, switches and LCD headers but just a bare bones board that is more like a breakout type.

Here is a picture of the board I found, it has an ISP and the ARduino RX and TX type connection (FTDI and other devices as well). There is a reset switch, oscillator and a couple of LEDs but other than that and a few other components its as basic and bare bones as you can get, key thing is that all of the ports are connected to headers and clearly labelled.

The board comes as a kit and when assembled should look a bit like this

RKAT40cMCC4

Once built we’ll connect some LEDs and flash them on and off

 

 

Code

Similar to before, written in MikroC Pro for AVR

[codesyntax lang=”cpp”]

void main() 
{
DDRD = 0xFF;     // set direction to be output

while(1)
{
PORTD = 0x00;
delay_ms(1000); // Wait for 1s
PORTD = 0xFF;
delay_ms(1000); // Wait for 1s
}
}

[/codesyntax]

Testing

I connected a USBAsp to the board and tried to see if I could detect the microcontroller type.

atmega32_avrdudess

As you could see no problems here, so I then connected a couple of LEDs to PORTD and programmed the device. The LEDs flashed on and off as expected

 

Links

More details from http://rkeducation.co.uk/RKAT40c-mcc.php, kit comes in at £3.99 from their online store

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Boards

RKAT28 development board kit

The RKAT28 is a development board from rkeducation that is aimed at the 28 pin Atmel devices such as the ATmega328p which was commonly used in Arduino boards, this means of course you can take the chip from the Arduino and put it on this development board. The board has the standard ISP connection (6 pin version) and also an Arduino connection in which you can connect the TX and RX lines and use your Arduino as an ISP as well.

Here is a picture of the board

RKAT28www.rkeducation.co.uk

There is a prototyping area on board which has horizontal and vertical rails as well as a set of power rails.

On board there is a 5v regulator and a 3.3v regulator, you can quite easily power this from a 9v / 12v power source. There are 3 LEDs on board for the various power voltages.

The board comes as a kit, this means you will need some basic soldering skills to assemble it but its an easy enough build and there are no really tricky parts to solder as they are all through hole components. The earlier picture shows what you assemble, I added headers for ports and also the power rails as well

To test the board out I decided to toggle PORTC on and off (high and low) and connect some leds.

Code example

Code example was written in MikroC Pro for AVR, later on we will be showing how to connect an Arduino and program using that and also burning a bootloader on the chip, in case you want to do that as well. Arduino IDE does simplify development greatly but this can come at a cost, again we’ll explain how later.

[codesyntax lang=”cpp”]

void main() 
{
DDRC = 0xFF;     // set direction to be output

while(1)
{
PORTC = 0x00;
delay_ms(1000); // Wait for 1s
PORTC = 0xFF;
delay_ms(1000); // Wait for 1s
}
}

[/codesyntax]

 

Testing

After compiling and building I connected a USBAsp to the ISP connector and used AVRDUDESS to first try and detect the device. In the screenshot below you can see the microcontroller was detected

atmega328p_avrdudess

 

Link

The kit is available from the following site at £7.99

http://rkeducation.co.uk/RKAT28.php

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