Hi Ralph, You have the honour of being my first subscribed channel on RUclips - keep doing what you're doing your videos are great! Anyway I'm on the scrounge. I have a 3 requests :- 1) Could you please take a look at the PCA9622 and do a couple of your excellent videos on them and help me understand the data sheet. I just want to know how to turn on an LED non of the fancy stuff. 2) Could you do your own (not from a library) 1wire Search algorithm. 3) Could you sometimes distance yourself from the crappy Arduino IDE and teach some programming without a lot of the work being done for you. I would like to know techniques that could also be used in other languages. Many thanks
Welcome, Ray, glad to have you part of my Arduinite community! Regarding your other requests, I'll certainly add them to my list of things. In the meantime, you might want to watch video #71 which describes creating a (simple) library from scratch and even encompasses some object-oriented programming, although I am careful not to highlight this as it just puts newcomers off! In several of my videos, I do create stuff from scratch before then using a mature library that does more. In this way, Arduinites understand what the purpose of the library is, and why, perhaps, it is sometimes useful to use a library that has been developed over the years but several people, and is generally bug-free and feature-rich, something that would take many months of dedicated time to try and replicate. From your final comment, do I take it that you don't like the Arduino IDE? There are alternatives, such as Sublime Text (video #69) or Eclipse which is what I use in my demos (usually), on which I've not a video as it would take far too long - and there are probably videos out there, but it is aimed at the more experienced developer community. Anyway, I'll put your requests on my list, so keep tuned and in the meantime do watch the videos that take your fancy. Some are definitely aimed at beginners, some at those with more experience - but they are all a learning exercise! Thanks for posting, great to hear from you.
In the first half of the vid, the 10K PU resistor should go to the reset pin directly. It looks like you have it on the wrong side of the capacitor - although it accepts the uploaded program fine. The rest is good :)
So the Eagle Eyes award this week goes to... sorry, it was already claimed by an earlier post. The fact of the matter is, I filmed this in chunks (and in reverse, but not backwards) so I had to rebuild the circuit after I had filmed the full thing which is how mistakes creep in. Well spotted, both of you!
Once again a handy idea laid out plainly before our eyes. Thank you. As you probably know you can skip the bootloader and have more space for programs, at the cost of the simplifications arduino brings. A future video idea?
Shhh, for goodness sake, Kent, how many more people are going to tell me this and steal my ideas for future videos? Ha ha! Yes, this will be covered when I do the video on my bootloader shield. Until then, mum's the word. But good of you to post here, great to hear from you.
Hi Ralph, I'm in the process of sourcing parts to build my own uno versions (barebones) and up pops your Video on my subs. Great minds think alike or fools seldom differ? I appreciate the links you put up viz your uploads it is a real time saver. I'm usually working on half a dozen projects at a time, and being able to take your recommendations at face value works for me. Thanks for being so timely.... ;)
You are most welcome IbnBahtuta, I'm glad you like the video. And yes, great minds think alike. I'm doing an update on the bare bones Arduino in a future video (two/three weeks, maybe) so you _may_ want to hang on, or at least not commit to one particular way of doing it. Just suggestin'. Nice to hear from you.
Ralph, you do not need the FTDI Serial converter. Continue with the process you used to put the boot loader on the chip with the ArduinoISP. Put your sketch in the IDE and use the option to Upload Using Programmer under Sketch. This way you can start your project while waiting for China Mail. Also, if you are uploading a sketch using the SPI you overwrite the bootloader anyway. (It is only required if you are using the IDE directly through the USB/Serial intrface) The sketch will still work. Hint: if your Arduino/Nano will not program using USB, flash the bootloader using this method with a working Arduino and SPI. It may bring it back to life. I use a USBasp on a lot of my projects. That connects directly to an ISCP (which is SPI used to load the bootloader) header on my project boards. It is just convenient as it is on a ribbon cable, just plug it in and of you go. Good video as always.
Indeed, Paul, there are several programmers with just a ribbon cable that plugs into the ICSP plug - but that is a subject for a different video, not that I hold a grudge against anyone stealing my thunder (or ideas) for future videos. Really. I'm cool. Yes, really. (Note to self: must work on sincerity) Anyway, all joking apart, that's a great tip about bringing things back to life using this method, I shall have to look at your USBasp (and others) but I do believe I have one of these, although I might be confusing it with the PicKit 2 I used for programming PICs. Thanks for posting, Paul, great to hear from you.
The USBasp was more secondary to your main method. Apologies for jumping the gun. (Note to self: keep on main topic and don't talk too much). I started using the SPI hookup with Dupont cables on my naked Arduino chip before I had a dedicated programmer. Just offering another method to get your viewers going faster.. :) Besides, you will be able to provide a much more informative, and maybe amusing, video on this subject.
No need for curtailing your input here, Paul, even if (as might be expected) other makers have experience of other ways of doing things. It's all good (and proves, to me at least) that I'm on the right track! And keep tuned for that video, no idea when I'll do it but within the next 2-3 weeks I suppose. Thanks for your continued input, it's all very much appreciated.
I am new subscriber. I hope to learn arduino. Until about 2 years ago. I had never even heard of them !!! There are so many things I want to build using them! This was a great video!!.. Maybe I can realize my projects..
Welcome, James, to my channel. This channel was created especially for people like you, enthusiastic beginners. The best advice I would give you right now, it *not* to try and design a whole house automation project using an Arduino Nano and no real experience! Start small, which means get that Blink LED sketch working, and, more importantly, understand *why* it does what it does. You could do worse than start at video #3 in my channel and work your way up to video #100+ as that will cover everything you might need! Beginners fail because they try and run before they can walk. They then get disillusioned and give up. Don't let that happen to you, I need all the subscribers I can get! Start small, ask questions in the comments section, and experiment until your family is sick of you talking about your new found skills! Great to have you along for the Arduinite journey, great to hear from you.
Ralph S Bacon thanks alot. Your reply means alot. and that you offer to answer questions. That is just great! There is no one around her that is into electronics. That I know of. It is one of the many things I got into when I was younger. I been in the electrical side of things since for ever! I worked as an electrician for years. I'm not that computer savvy. I have built a couple . and couldn't figure out how to turn it on! Ha-ha Nah I'm a little more knowledgeable than that. Im not into whole house automation . I'm more of an off gridder. I power my home with solar. Except I'm not completely moved in there. I'm in-between. I am interested in arduino battery management and balancing. It's over my head. I would like to. Build a system and battery monitoring device. To use Bluetooth or something to keep it wireless. That is likely years away. Unless I get help. And I live in the US! Where ppl don't usually have a hobby where you must use your brain... Anyway thanks again. And I will take your advice.
I believe there is an error (bug) in the "Circuit Diagram.jpg". You drew the circuit with the 10K pull-up resistor on pin 1 to ground. You meant to +5v, right? Thanks for the tutorial, I love your teachings.
The phantom COM port in the device manager is likely a unused serial header on the motherboard. Disabling it in the BIOS will get rid of it and also save you some system resources.
Hmm, I'll have a look at my BIOS settings but I'm not really sure where I would find something to disable in order to stop this appearing. It could be just about anything, couldn't it? Thanks for the suggestion, though, I'll see if I can nobble it.
I wasn't looking at the screen for the moment your device manager was showing (my comment was based on audio only). I've just had a proper look at the video again, and COM3 (in this case) is related to Intel's "Active Management Technology". It can be a bit trickier to disable than a normal COM port, but it's certainly worth disabling it if you can as it's a potential security risk (it's also listening to the network and open for attack). Useful info on the subject. mattermedia.com/blog/disabling-intel-amt/ downloadcenter.intel.com/download/26755?v=t
I've just rebooted in my BIOS and there was an undescribed option to disable the AMT (Active Management Technology, perhaps). Anyway, I disabled it and guess what? No more COM3 sitting there. So thanks for putting me on the right track, Cray Ze Ape, I now have freed up resources (and it really annoyed me, that COM3) and I'm safer too, apparently.
Cool, I had sort of fallen away from the Arduino when I began playing with the ESP devices, whilst still using the Arduino software to upload sketches the devices now lay in a case put away for future use, perhaps by my grand children who knows. At any rate I dug them out recently just for "old times sake" and discovered that I have several ATMEGA 8 chips that, if memory serves, I pulled from old digital clock kits that my son tried to build when he was a bit younger and had not yet wed and reproduced. Do you, perhaps have some info on how to, say put a modern bootloader on these chips and program them using the device you do in your next set of videos?
The ATMEGA8 chips, Jerry, were the original chips used in the Arduino UNO when they first came out. If you lod the MiniCore board descriptions (see my video #168) you can select the ATMega8 chip, upload a bootloader via the ICSP method and flash it with a sketch in the usual way. That said, unless you have a board with a built-in UART for the USB you might has well just flash them via the ICSP socket, no bootloader required. They are pretty much Arduino compatible, code wise, just fewer timers and PWM capable pins, IIRC.
2,78V is minimum to run on 16MHz... I measure it one year ago, and it is working with Li-bat to today... as BMS-temp-hum-sensor sender, ( i have 10 of them ) with central unit taking all data with UART ... no problem at all ;-)
Hmm, interesting Marcin, just today I had to wind it up to 3.45v to get it to run at 8Mhz, but I think that was more to do with the fact I was driving an LED which requires a couple of volts (at least, it's one of the high brightness ones). So the current consumption indicated the µcontroller was running but the LED was not flashing. I'll have to check this out! Interesting post, thank you.
Are you recording from two mics in one of your views? At around 7:05 there is an echo, when you say "let's go back to the monitor" the sound is normal again.
Yes, the mics got out of sync (computers are so picky about a paltry 25mS) but I haven't got time to fix it right now so I'm back to just the one mic for now. Well spotted!
Yes, indeed Martin, the ICSP method of programming is my preferred choice, but I am surprised that you burn a bootloader on an ATTiny85. For a start, it uses precious memory, which means any sketch (now uploadable via a USB-to-Serial adapter) will have to accommodate that. I don't see the advantage of doing that for such a small chip. I program real project ATMega328P µC (and the like) via ICSP except when I'm just experimenting when the USB port is quicker. But, it it works for you, keep doing it!
@@RalphBacon Oh ok, so the bootloader is just for getting the Programm In to memory in another way. I thought it is needed so the arduino Ide's code is useble for the chip. Always wonderr why it's Calle boot"loader" 🙄 As a electrician in trade, and just a hobbyist in electronics I always refused to learn more about the software side of this field because it seems alway a bit overwhelming. But maybe i should go down the rabbit hole a little bit further. Thank you Ralph!
The FTDI connects to the ATmega328P's TX and RX lines - controlled by the bootloader. You can probably already work out that trying to update the bootloader from the bootloader that is already running is going to be difficult. That's why we use another Arduino running a programmer sketch (which then sends the data via SPI) or the bootloader shield (see video #119) which does the same but is just a neat way of doing it. I hope that clears things up, John.
It must be ISP (in system programmer) not SPI (serial peripheral interface) I think... I may be wrong but, while burning a bootlader, serial RX and TX pins of the Atmega 328 is not used, so it can't be SPI. Also capacitor marking 104, is as you said 10+ 4 zeros, but you have written 10+000 which is 10nF, not 100nF. Sorry for being the smartypants here... :-)
ICSP in-circuit system programmer uses the SPI bus. The bootloader is NOT loaded onto a target Arduino using RX/TX. The ArduinoISP sketch IS loaded onto the Arduino-to-be-used-as-a-programmer using standard serial uploading using RX/TX. Hope this makes things clearer.
Bora, you're not the first to point out my (cough, cough) *deliberate* mistake of not adding enough zeros (I wanted to see who might win the coveted Eagle Eyes award this week) so well done for spotting that. As others have pointed out, ICSP just breaks out the SPI pins for direct uploading of code to the ATmeag328P - usually a bootloader but could be the entire sketch without a bootloader, thus giving more room for the code, but I'll cover that in a future video. Thanks for posting, good to hear from you.
This is really good Ralph, sometimes you need a system to go quite, I'm thinking like a remote time lapse camera or something spy related hahaha. Going to the not picking up a flash, it might be the fps your recording in, either not picking up the delay in between the flash or not picking up the first or second??
I don't know why it doesn't always pick up that (short, 10mS) flash but I'm not going to lose any sleep over it. I'm recording at a fairly standard 25fps so that's probably not it but I don't know what it is! One day it will all become clear, I'm sure. Thanks for posting, ifell3, always good to hear from you.
A great video Ralph and thanks for sharing- I would like to suggest a topic for a future video: How to reconfigure the boards.txt file to allow for the use of the 2 clock pins that will become free when running the atmega328P on a breadboard from the 8mhz internal clock at 3.3V. I really could use those 2 extra pins and I'm uncertain how to do it.
Just to answer my own question.....after a bit of research, the MINICORE bootloader gives you the 2 free clock pins as 21 and 22. Still think you should do an upcoming video on this topic! Great work Ralph and I hope you're feeling better.
Hmm. In the pins_arduino.h definition file for AVR we have: #define PIN_A6 (20) #define PIN_A7 (21) As the standard 328P does not have the A6 and A7 I'm wondering what these are meant for. But the file is so old it refers to the ATMega8 chip! Strictly speaking we should name those pins like : #define PIN_XTAL1 (21) #define PIN_XTAL2 (22) Let us know if you hit a "not recognised" or some other error on those pins!
Question: what exactly does it do when it COMPILES? Clears out all commented stuff, but does the code then tern into machine code? Just curious. And like a JPG, how much space savings is it when it is compiled.
Ooh, a great, fundamental question that I can actually answer, thanks for asking, FilmFactry! Compiling involves parsing (translating) the English-like syntax that we use (eg Serial.print) into actual assembly language (symbolic code) that is the (sort of) human-readable version of actual machine code that computer chips can understand. So, Serial.print might turn into 100 or more actual assembly instructions, each of which instructs the chip to move read or store something in memory, add or subtract, or most importantly of all, make a decision depending on a condition. That, in turn, is turned into machine code (noughts and ones, but stored as hexadecimal numbers in an 8-bit number) and sent to the chip. In *very* broad terms that what compiling does. There's a lot more going on but that is the nub of it. In space-saving terms, there is no real correlation between the source code that you write and the final machine code stored on the chip, other than the more you write the more that has to get compiled and stored on the chip - but the sizes are not comparable. A 1 Mb source program might compile down to 20Kb. This could be a whole discussion but I hope this sort of gives you the gist of what happens.
Hi Ralph. So here's the thing.... Playing with the ATmega328P chip on a breadboard and was messing around with different clock speeds with the minicore bootloaders and your recent deep sleep code. At first using an avr isp shield on an UNO. All working fine. Then the shield started throwing an error and nothing would upload. Basically the error light on the shield comes on. Any ideas? So then connected the chip to the UNO using the ICSP connections and everything sweet. Bootloaders no problem, programs no problem... So switched to my FTDI adapter, which I have used before on the same breadboard setup and that wouldn't upload. Tried a bunch of the minicore settings both external and internal crystal but nope. Nuffin!! I'd uploaded the Bootloaders using the UNO ICSP and was trying to upload the code with the Ftdi but no luck. Quickly whipped out a pro mini, stuffed the FTDI pins into the holes on the Pro mini and all worked fine. Hmmmmm Quite confused as to why the FTDI won't upload a program. The wiring is correct. Checked it 10 times. Don't supposed you have any bright ideas? The plan is to control my solar panels. I have the code working perfectly to track the sun and I have incorporated you deep sleep code so that it just wakes every 10 mins, moves the panels and goes back to sleep. But at the mo I just Ave a nano plugged onto a breadboard and I want to make it permanent using an ATmega328P chip but wanted to also have header pins to plug in the FTDI should I decide to change something. I guess I could just bring out the ICSP pins, but that's not the point really. Sorry for the very long message! Cheers Matt.
TL;DR Just kidding, Matt! It sounds as though your experiments with uploading bootloaders (and the associated fuses) may have confused it (the FTDI device) as to which speed and which oscillator it is running on. Either that or you're trying to upload code using an FTDI onto a chip that does not have a bootloader. Your fuses to allow an UNO (or Nano or Mini) to run on the _internal_ clock at 8MHz with no brownout detection and SPI programming enabled (no bootloader) should be: LOW: 0xE2 HIGH: 0xD9 EXT: 0xFF This is the same for many chips fresh from the factory. Probably the same as my breadboard version. You can't upload code using an FTDI with this, only via SPI from another Arduino or the upload shield. For an 8MHz internal oscillator device with an Optiboot bootloader: LOW: 0xE2 HIGH: 0xDE EXT: FF If you have a "good" UNO or mini it should display the fuse settings when you upload a program. If that chip is all working as expected just use the same settings.
@@RalphBacon thanks for the reply Ralph. I was burning the minicore or run of the mill arduino bootloader every time I changed something. Uploading code using SPI was a success everytime, but not so with the FTDI. Thanks for the fuse info. I'll take a look at that and see what it says. Probably just me doing something wrong. Good news is that your sleep code and my solar tracker code are working perfectly together. The solar panels are driven by 12V rams and home in on the sun perfectly, and then the ATmega328P gets 10 minutes kip while drawing something silly like 5uA, and then it wakes up and runs the function again. It's cool!! Cheers Matt
Hi Ralph. Figured it out. The simple answer is that I'm an idiot LOL. I was loading the bootloader. Then uploading a Blink sketch just to check but "uploading using programmer" so of course it was over writing the bootloader. Hence why the FTDI wouldn't work. Made a new avr isp programmer on a PCB and everything works as intended when one does things correctly.
I can't believe I didn't share that info, Steve, I will update my GitHub, but in the meantime here's the link the AliExpress seller www.aliexpress.com/item/ESP32-ESP32S-For-Wemos-For-Raspberry-Pi-18650-Battery-Charge-Shield-Board-V3-Micro-USB-Port/32870411748.html I bought it for £1.65 plus 47p shipping, so £2.12 in total (I actually bought two for £3.27 with 57p shipping) which I thought was pretty good, and I'm quite impressed with it so far. Glad you liked the video too!
Thanks Ralph, not sure I would have found that otherwise. If you’re looking to further reduce power, I found, and have also tried the details from ruclips.net/video/urLSDi7SD8M/видео.html, that has some additional tips. Cheers
You can program it with an Arduino Uno or Nano running the "Arduino-as-ISP" sketch that is included in the Examples drop down menu, under Tools. FTDI is simpler though (and only $2-3).
Oh I forgot, have you done a vid on using the internal oscillator dear boy?...……..I looked on your site couldn't find one (I can save 3 components as my project doesn't need to gallop along a steady trot will do)
Not yet, as I was waiting for a (semi-secret) component to do this - and it arrived today, but that doesn't mean the video will be out tomorrow! Expect to wait a couple (or more) weeks before I do that one. But it takes simplicity to a whole new level (which could be a good thing, what do you think, Andy)?
I think it will be a good thing Ralph, this sort of thinking gets the old grey matter going. I like the "work smarter not harder " train of thought and I eagerly await the next chapter ! When I started out with the whole Arduino thing I thought the point was to develop your project on an UNO then buy the bits and build it, then as time went on and I learned about NANO's and PRO MINI's priced at a couple of quid I started just putting them on the project as they were but now I'm kind of enjoying myself thinking about power and trying to be a minimalist even to the point of speed, most of my stuff to date doesn't need to be 5v 16 mega whatnots anyway !...…...This has really come about because EasyEDA has all fallen into place for me (not before time I might add, I am slow study) and its great to use, its my first time with any sort of CAD...…………….Now off to the pub, line up the Guinness and watch England play (something I only do every four years )……….thanks for your input...….... cheer's
As an academic exercise only, I'm considering running my fridge alarm (see video #41 & #42) which runs on a Nano (£1.42) but uses a wall-wart to power it (all at 16Mhz)! Ridiculous in some ways. (This configuration replaced a PIC module running at 4Mhz but also plugged in.) Now I'm thinking replacing it with a custom ATmega328P chip (£1.12) running on the internal 8Mhz oscillator and in sleep mode until the door opening triggers an interrupt - and all powered from a single 3.7v 18650 battery. Should last a while. Be interesting to see exactly _how_ long in a Real World environment! I hope England's 2-0 win over Sweden made the Guinness slide down even more smoothly than usual!
yeah Ralph they did go down well, I'm typing really quietly with dark glasses on !...………..I cant wait for your tutorials on all this stuff we have been talking about
Hi Ralph. Please disregard my comment on video 119. I appear to have been able to burn the bootloader to a 324P without that particular breadboard324 definition. The shield beeped twice. I took a genuine bootloader 324P off my Arduino board and swapped in the burned one. It was able to upload and run a sketch. However, I've wired up my 324p on the breadboard exactly as you specify i your hand drawn diagram. 0.1uF ceramic capacitor across the gnd and 5v. and I have an LED with a 200R resistor on in 19. Nothing happens. I take the chip off, put it back on the genuine arduino board and the LED blinks happily. Any thoughts? I am getting 5V at pins 7 and 8 from my FTDI programmer. Thank you Ralph. I feel I'm 98% of the way there. Gord
Hi...…...I have a project that I built years ago and it works just fine and I used a 328p DIL chip, now I want to make an all surface mount version of it ( just for the sheer fun of it and another string to the old bow) so is an ISCP header on my new PCB all I'm gonna need ? or should I break out SCL and SDA as well...….I'm thinking worse case, my Atmega chip (SMD) will come with no bootloader...…...What would you do on a new SMD PCB project old chap?
Good luck with your soldering using an SMD (TQFP package) Andy; you'll need steady hands and probably a fixed magnifying glass too. Not to mention a very fine soldering bit. But thousands have soldered such chips and I don't see why you can't do this. Regarding the ICSP header, this basically breaks out the SPI connections to the ATmega328P as we use that to load the bootloader via another Arduino. Once that is in, we use the TX and RX pins of a USB-to-Serial FTDI converter to upload the sketch (along with the DTR to give it a reset pulse - on loading up, the Arduino's bootloader checks whether a program is waiting to be uploaded and either does that or just runs the current program). The principle is no different to what I showed you here, really, except that it's a bit more fiddly. You can buy an SMD breakout board for the ATmega328P either to plug back into the standard DIL socket or to build the whole thing on. Sounds interesting, which is always a bad thing for me.
Which bootloader is now standard? I used Optiboot in the past to squeeze in a few more bytes of program. Also, a bootloader is "optional". You can flash in a whole program with ISCP, setting fuses at the same time to run with no bootloader at all. It's what you would do with an ATtiny anyway... Most of the time.
You guys really are ahead of the curve here. All correct, Bernd, of course, but remember that a true beginner has to learn these steps one by one. I'll cover the "no bootloader" option in a future video, and how that gets us almost 2K space back. A new toy arrived yesterday that might assist in that quest. Thanks for posting.
Hi Ralph, I got an Arduino Attiny from China and when i plug it into my computer it does not see it. Maybe because there is no Bootloader? sooo can i use your setup here to put that Bootloader on my Attiny? Great video, ......... Cheers And quit muckin about we want more videos :)
Attiny does not have hardware serial support, so you can not program it same way you program an Arduino. SparkFun came up with a Windows driver as a workaround solution and they have their own ATTiny board with a PCB USB connection for this. I think they have different fuse settings on the ATTiny's they use, so that this driver "sees" the board when you plug it, uploads your code, and then disconnects...
Ralph S Bacon Congrats Ralph on growing the arduinnite community. You have 10k because of your informative, well made videos (when there's no echo :p ). Hope you keep making videos and the arduinnites grow in number. Thanks for sharing.
Great Video, I like them all :) you do a great job and we learn a lot! Thank you!!!! I have an off-topic question - hopefully you will be able to answer me,An LCR - T4 Transistor Tester ESR Meter Mega328 Transistor Tester, Should I get one like that? do you own one? I am almost sure that it will ease my DIY projects a bit - Should I get one? thank you.
My earliest videos, Arye, do go through some of the useful things you can/should get (like a soldering iron!) but I have not touched on an item like this tester. (here's a link in case others are wondering what you are referring to: bit.ly/2m265xc ) The question you need to ask yourself is: what do I hope this item will do for me? It will, of course, test the items it says it will, but I can't remember the last time I tested a transistor! Very occasionally I might have to measure a capacitor or inductor but these days it is cheap to get a selection box from the Far East (all marked up) and you never need to measure again. See here: www.banggood.com/search/capacitor-kit.html?sbc=1 for an example of the various capacitor kits you can get. That said, my multimeter also measures capacitance, transistor hFE, frequency - but that's still not the reason I bought it. They were "nice to have" not a reason for buying. One inexpensive kit I did cover was a tiny oscilloscope from JYE (see video #92) which not only required assembly but has proved very useful since then. It would be a good introduction into what an oscilloscope can do for you and whether it would ever be worth spending £300 on a "proper" one, like my Rigol. At the end of the day, the item you mention is only about £10 - not exactly going to break the bank, just make sure you need it or whether that £10 could be put towards something more useful (like a kit of parts - capacitors, resistors, transistors - as I mentioned above). Any of these ideas any good, Arye?
Hi Ralph- Great video as always. I learned a lot. You were wondering why the led seems to blink only once sometimes in the video. This is because your camera's shutter speed is probably 1/60 second, and your video displays 30 frames per second. So for half the time, you are not capturing video. If you're curious about this, more info here: www.videomaker.com/videonews/2013/07/4-steps-to-understanding-shutter-speed While on the topic of photographing led's, I remember in a previous video you mentioned that the color of the led's looks washed out on the video compared to how it looked in real life. This is easily rectified by manually closing the aperture on your camera so you're exposing the bright led's correctly.
I like the first bit of your reply, John, explaining why my video camera misses the super fast 10mS blink. Makes sense, if a bit odd! Regarding the second part of your reply, regarding why I struggle to video LEDs in their proper colour (rather than mostly white with a halo of their true colour) I'm afraid my video camera does not let me alter the aperture (or shutter speed, come to that); it was designed for "point and shoot" users, regardless of the mode you put it in! I have noticed that just about everyone else has this problem too. I either need a more sophisticated video camera (pretty unlikely) or another means of achieving my goal of filming them in their true colours. I've tried coloured filters, polarising filters, neutral (grey) filters - none of which made the slightest difference. Sigh. But great responses, so thanks for that, always good to hear from you.
Actually, a little piece of ND filter on the led should do the trick. (Not a lens filter, but a piece of lighting gel.) Then it’s just a matter of finding the correct density. Here’s a link to a company that makes lighting gel, which, coincidentally, is the English company I happen to work for in the USA. www.leefilters.com
A little more information for you- start with #211, which is a 3 stop neutral density filter. That should get you pretty close, but if it’s still too light you can go to a 4-stop nd #299, or if it’s too dark you can go to a 2 stop ND #210. Contact the company through the website and ask to be sent a complimentary swatch book. That’s all you need. Tell them John Adler recommended them to you. :)
Interesting and successful, and I did look at "your" website, but I must admit to feeling a little dishonest asking for a swatch booklet knowing that I have no intent to actually purchasing a sheet (and at several pounds a sheet it seems unlikely I ever will, who knew this stuff was so expensive). I will have to gather my courage to contact them... but it does seem to be the (only) answer. Thanks for the video link, says it all.
Hello Ralph, this is the most informative channel, thanks for sharing your knowledge with us. I am using a Sparkfun usb to serial converter which it does work out of the box with linux no drivers needed, unlike the windows7 spying software. I need to get one of those converters myself as the one i have is @5v only, thanks for the info. Vasilis K
If you ONLY want to program 5v devices, Vasilis, then you're good to go; but you won't be able to program any 3.3v device so yes, I suggest you get a dual voltage one, they are only a couple of dollars / pounds. Glad you like the channel and this video, good to hear from you.
Not sure if this has already been mentioned, but I’d thoroughly recommend reading Nick Gammons website on the minimal board and low power There’s also a ton over over really useful stuff Arduino related also Minimal Board gammon.com.au/breadboard Low power (very....) gammon.com.au/power Other general very useful info gammon.com.au/forum/bbshowpost.php?bbtopic_id=123 I found this stuff a godsend in developing low power minimal Arduino related stuff
One alterative i've been using for breadboarding Arduino projects is the "Ardweeny" which has all the components on a tiny pcb that sits on top of the dil ATMEGA328P chip. Its not cheap by modern standards (£11) but you only need 1 while your breadboarding and it means you can avoid all the problems of loose connections and stray capacitances etc. When you moe your design to pcb or stripboard you just replace it with the chip + components as you did here. www.active-robots.com/solarbotics-ardweeny.html
That quite a neat idea, Ian, and should work well. Pity about the cost but, as you say, you only need one. I'll be showing an alternative, cheaper idea in a future video so stay tuned!
Great Video Ralph, only just found your youtube channel and have subscribed, really clear and concise, I will be catching up on all your other videos.
Glad to have you here, Christopher. Now, you're only 251 videos late so get cracking 😆😁😜
Super useful & timely as I plan to port a project from a uno to standalone 328p chip. Thanks for sharing!
I knew you were thinking of doing this, Springwood Cottage, which is why I made this video, obviously. 🤥
Hi Ralph,
You have the honour of being my first subscribed channel on RUclips - keep doing what you're doing your videos are great!
Anyway I'm on the scrounge. I have a 3 requests :-
1) Could you please take a look at the PCA9622 and do a couple of your excellent videos on them and help me understand the data sheet. I just want to know how to turn on an LED non of the fancy stuff.
2) Could you do your own (not from a library) 1wire Search algorithm.
3) Could you sometimes distance yourself from the crappy Arduino IDE and teach some programming without a lot of the work being done for you. I would like to know techniques that could also be used in other languages.
Many thanks
Welcome, Ray, glad to have you part of my Arduinite community!
Regarding your other requests, I'll certainly add them to my list of things. In the meantime, you might want to watch video #71 which describes creating a (simple) library from scratch and even encompasses some object-oriented programming, although I am careful not to highlight this as it just puts newcomers off!
In several of my videos, I do create stuff from scratch before then using a mature library that does more. In this way, Arduinites understand what the purpose of the library is, and why, perhaps, it is sometimes useful to use a library that has been developed over the years but several people, and is generally bug-free and feature-rich, something that would take many months of dedicated time to try and replicate.
From your final comment, do I take it that you don't like the Arduino IDE? There are alternatives, such as Sublime Text (video #69) or Eclipse which is what I use in my demos (usually), on which I've not a video as it would take far too long - and there are probably videos out there, but it is aimed at the more experienced developer community.
Anyway, I'll put your requests on my list, so keep tuned and in the meantime do watch the videos that take your fancy. Some are definitely aimed at beginners, some at those with more experience - but they are all a learning exercise!
Thanks for posting, great to hear from you.
+Ralph S Bacon Hi Ralph thanks for the reply. I use Flowcode
@12:40, the conversion is off by ten in places. Should be "10 + 0 000" and then "100,000 pF". The rest is good.
In the first half of the vid, the 10K PU resistor should go to the reset pin directly. It looks like you have it on the wrong side of the capacitor - although it accepts the uploaded program fine. The rest is good :)
So the Eagle Eyes award this week goes to... sorry, it was already claimed by an earlier post. The fact of the matter is, I filmed this in chunks (and in reverse, but not backwards) so I had to rebuild the circuit after I had filmed the full thing which is how mistakes creep in. Well spotted, both of you!
Once again a handy idea laid out plainly before our eyes. Thank you. As you probably know you can skip the bootloader and have more space for programs, at the cost of the simplifications arduino brings. A future video idea?
Shhh, for goodness sake, Kent, how many more people are going to tell me this and steal my ideas for future videos? Ha ha! Yes, this will be covered when I do the video on my bootloader shield. Until then, mum's the word. But good of you to post here, great to hear from you.
Hi Ralph, I'm in the process of sourcing parts to build my own uno versions (barebones) and up pops your Video on my subs. Great minds think alike or fools seldom differ? I appreciate the links you put up viz your uploads it is a real time saver. I'm usually working on half a dozen projects at a time, and being able to take your recommendations at face value works for me. Thanks for being so timely.... ;)
You are most welcome IbnBahtuta, I'm glad you like the video. And yes, great minds think alike. I'm doing an update on the bare bones Arduino in a future video (two/three weeks, maybe) so you _may_ want to hang on, or at least not commit to one particular way of doing it. Just suggestin'. Nice to hear from you.
Ralph, you do not need the FTDI Serial converter. Continue with the process you used to put the boot loader on the chip with the ArduinoISP. Put your sketch in the IDE and use the option to Upload Using Programmer under Sketch. This way you can start your project while waiting for China Mail.
Also, if you are uploading a sketch using the SPI you overwrite the bootloader anyway. (It is only required if you are using the IDE directly through the USB/Serial intrface) The sketch will still work.
Hint: if your Arduino/Nano will not program using USB, flash the bootloader using this method with a working Arduino and SPI. It may bring it back to life.
I use a USBasp on a lot of my projects. That connects directly to an ISCP (which is SPI used to load the bootloader) header on my project boards. It is just convenient as it is on a ribbon cable, just plug it in and of you go.
Good video as always.
Indeed, Paul, there are several programmers with just a ribbon cable that plugs into the ICSP plug - but that is a subject for a different video, not that I hold a grudge against anyone stealing my thunder (or ideas) for future videos. Really. I'm cool. Yes, really. (Note to self: must work on sincerity)
Anyway, all joking apart, that's a great tip about bringing things back to life using this method, I shall have to look at your USBasp (and others) but I do believe I have one of these, although I might be confusing it with the PicKit 2 I used for programming PICs. Thanks for posting, Paul, great to hear from you.
The USBasp was more secondary to your main method. Apologies for jumping the gun. (Note to self: keep on main topic and don't talk too much). I started using the SPI hookup with Dupont cables on my naked Arduino chip before I had a dedicated programmer.
Just offering another method to get your viewers going faster.. :)
Besides, you will be able to provide a much more informative, and maybe amusing, video on this subject.
No need for curtailing your input here, Paul, even if (as might be expected) other makers have experience of other ways of doing things. It's all good (and proves, to me at least) that I'm on the right track! And keep tuned for that video, no idea when I'll do it but within the next 2-3 weeks I suppose. Thanks for your continued input, it's all very much appreciated.
I am new subscriber. I hope to learn arduino. Until about 2 years ago. I had never even heard of them !!! There are so many things I want to build using them! This was a great video!!.. Maybe I can realize my projects..
Welcome, James, to my channel. This channel was created especially for people like you, enthusiastic beginners.
The best advice I would give you right now, it *not* to try and design a whole house automation project using an Arduino Nano and no real experience!
Start small, which means get that Blink LED sketch working, and, more importantly, understand *why* it does what it does. You could do worse than start at video #3 in my channel and work your way up to video #100+ as that will cover everything you might need!
Beginners fail because they try and run before they can walk. They then get disillusioned and give up. Don't let that happen to you, I need all the subscribers I can get! Start small, ask questions in the comments section, and experiment until your family is sick of you talking about your new found skills!
Great to have you along for the Arduinite journey, great to hear from you.
Ralph S Bacon thanks alot. Your reply means alot. and that you offer to answer questions. That is just great! There is no one around her that is into electronics. That I know of. It is one of the many things I got into when I was younger. I been in the electrical side of things since for ever! I worked as an electrician for years. I'm not that computer savvy. I have built a couple . and couldn't figure out how to turn it on! Ha-ha
Nah I'm a little more knowledgeable than that. Im not into whole house automation . I'm more of an off gridder. I power my home with solar. Except I'm not completely moved in there. I'm in-between. I am interested in arduino battery management and balancing. It's over my head. I would like to. Build a system and battery monitoring device. To use Bluetooth or something to keep it wireless. That is likely years away. Unless I get help. And I live in the US! Where ppl don't usually have a hobby where you must use your brain... Anyway thanks again. And I will take your advice.
Love your work Ralph
Thanks for that, glad you like my videos, thanks for posting.
That was great. Even if I never have use for it just the understanding of it is helpful.
Thanks
You are most welcome Ricky Bates, I'm glad you like the video, even if only as a reference. Nice to hear from you.
I believe there is an error (bug) in the "Circuit Diagram.jpg". You drew the circuit with the 10K pull-up resistor on pin 1 to ground. You meant to +5v, right? Thanks for the tutorial, I love your teachings.
Thanks, Dave, you are (were) correct, and I've now uploaded the corrected version. Thanks for pointing this out, appreciated.
The phantom COM port in the device manager is likely a unused serial header on the motherboard. Disabling it in the BIOS will get rid of it and also save you some system resources.
Hmm, I'll have a look at my BIOS settings but I'm not really sure where I would find something to disable in order to stop this appearing. It could be just about anything, couldn't it? Thanks for the suggestion, though, I'll see if I can nobble it.
I wasn't looking at the screen for the moment your device manager was showing (my comment was based on audio only). I've just had a proper look at the video again, and COM3 (in this case) is related to Intel's "Active Management Technology". It can be a bit trickier to disable than a normal COM port, but it's certainly worth disabling it if you can as it's a potential security risk (it's also listening to the network and open for attack).
Useful info on the subject.
mattermedia.com/blog/disabling-intel-amt/
downloadcenter.intel.com/download/26755?v=t
I've just rebooted in my BIOS and there was an undescribed option to disable the AMT (Active Management Technology, perhaps). Anyway, I disabled it and guess what? No more COM3 sitting there. So thanks for putting me on the right track, Cray Ze Ape, I now have freed up resources (and it really annoyed me, that COM3) and I'm safer too, apparently.
Good job. May the phantom rest in peace. :)
Cool, I had sort of fallen away from the Arduino when I began playing with the ESP devices, whilst still using the Arduino software to upload sketches the devices now lay in a case put away for future use, perhaps by my grand children who knows. At any rate I dug them out recently just for "old times sake" and discovered that I have several ATMEGA 8 chips that, if memory serves, I pulled from old digital clock kits that my son tried to build when he was a bit younger and had not yet wed and reproduced. Do you, perhaps have some info on how to, say put a modern bootloader on these chips and program them using the device you do in your next set of videos?
The ATMEGA8 chips, Jerry, were the original chips used in the Arduino UNO when they first came out. If you lod the MiniCore board descriptions (see my video #168) you can select the ATMega8 chip, upload a bootloader via the ICSP method and flash it with a sketch in the usual way. That said, unless you have a board with a built-in UART for the USB you might has well just flash them via the ICSP socket, no bootloader required. They are pretty much Arduino compatible, code wise, just fewer timers and PWM capable pins, IIRC.
2,78V is minimum to run on 16MHz...
I measure it one year ago, and it is working with Li-bat to today... as BMS-temp-hum-sensor sender, ( i have 10 of them ) with central unit taking all data with UART ...
no problem at all ;-)
Hmm, interesting Marcin, just today I had to wind it up to 3.45v to get it to run at 8Mhz, but I think that was more to do with the fact I was driving an LED which requires a couple of volts (at least, it's one of the high brightness ones). So the current consumption indicated the µcontroller was running but the LED was not flashing. I'll have to check this out! Interesting post, thank you.
I wonder if the reason why the camera isn't capturing each double pulse of the led flashing is a manifestation of the "rolling shutter" effect?
It's definitely down to a mismatch between shutter speed and flash rate, for sure.
Thank you for another great video!
Wondering what camera/lens you're using for filming boards close-up.
Thanks for your kind words, Georgij. I'm just using a standard video camera for close-ups, nothing special at all.
Are you recording from two mics in one of your views? At around 7:05 there is an echo, when you say "let's go back to the monitor" the sound is normal again.
Yes, the mics got out of sync (computers are so picky about a paltry 25mS) but I haven't got time to fix it right now so I'm back to just the one mic for now. Well spotted!
are the ATmega controllers not able to be programmed via ISP?
I always program my ATtiny´s over ISP as well burning the bootloader.
Yes, indeed Martin, the ICSP method of programming is my preferred choice, but I am surprised that you burn a bootloader on an ATTiny85. For a start, it uses precious memory, which means any sketch (now uploadable via a USB-to-Serial adapter) will have to accommodate that. I don't see the advantage of doing that for such a small chip. I program real project ATMega328P µC (and the like) via ICSP except when I'm just experimenting when the USB port is quicker. But, it it works for you, keep doing it!
@@RalphBacon
Oh ok, so the bootloader is just for getting the Programm In to memory in another way.
I thought it is needed so the arduino Ide's code is useble for the chip. Always wonderr why it's Calle boot"loader" 🙄
As a electrician in trade, and just a hobbyist in electronics I always refused to learn more about the software side of this field because it seems alway a bit overwhelming.
But maybe i should go down the rabbit hole a little bit further.
Thank you Ralph!
is there no way of using the FTDI to install the bootloader too?
The FTDI connects to the ATmega328P's TX and RX lines - controlled by the bootloader. You can probably already work out that trying to update the bootloader from the bootloader that is already running is going to be difficult. That's why we use another Arduino running a programmer sketch (which then sends the data via SPI) or the bootloader shield (see video #119) which does the same but is just a neat way of doing it. I hope that clears things up, John.
When you get that boot loader shield might be nice to do a quick video
Already on the case, Kendrick, as it has arrived! No more spoilers though! Thanks for posting.
It must be ISP (in system programmer) not SPI (serial peripheral interface) I think... I may be wrong but, while burning a bootlader, serial RX and TX pins of the Atmega 328 is not used, so it can't be SPI. Also capacitor marking 104, is as you said 10+ 4 zeros, but you have written 10+000 which is 10nF, not 100nF. Sorry for being the smartypants here... :-)
ICSP in-circuit system programmer uses the SPI bus. The bootloader is NOT loaded onto a target Arduino using RX/TX. The ArduinoISP sketch IS loaded onto the Arduino-to-be-used-as-a-programmer using standard serial uploading using RX/TX. Hope this makes things clearer.
Nick B It must be my terrible English that made you not understand what I was talking about. Sorry...
Bora, you're not the first to point out my (cough, cough) *deliberate* mistake of not adding enough zeros (I wanted to see who might win the coveted Eagle Eyes award this week) so well done for spotting that.
As others have pointed out, ICSP just breaks out the SPI pins for direct uploading of code to the ATmeag328P - usually a bootloader but could be the entire sketch without a bootloader, thus giving more room for the code, but I'll cover that in a future video.
Thanks for posting, good to hear from you.
This is really good Ralph, sometimes you need a system to go quite, I'm thinking like a remote time lapse camera or something spy related hahaha. Going to the not picking up a flash, it might be the fps your recording in, either not picking up the delay in between the flash or not picking up the first or second??
I don't know why it doesn't always pick up that (short, 10mS) flash but I'm not going to lose any sleep over it. I'm recording at a fairly standard 25fps so that's probably not it but I don't know what it is! One day it will all become clear, I'm sure. Thanks for posting, ifell3, always good to hear from you.
A great video Ralph and thanks for sharing- I would like to suggest a topic for a future video: How to reconfigure the boards.txt file to allow for the use of the 2 clock pins that will become free when running the atmega328P on a breadboard from the 8mhz internal clock at 3.3V. I really could use those 2 extra pins and I'm uncertain how to do it.
Just to answer my own question.....after a bit of research, the MINICORE bootloader gives you the 2 free clock pins as 21 and 22. Still think you should do an upcoming video on this topic! Great work Ralph and I hope you're feeling better.
Hmm. In the pins_arduino.h definition file for AVR we have:
#define PIN_A6 (20)
#define PIN_A7 (21)
As the standard 328P does not have the A6 and A7 I'm wondering what these are meant for. But the file is so old it refers to the ATMega8 chip!
Strictly speaking we should name those pins like :
#define PIN_XTAL1 (21)
#define PIN_XTAL2 (22)
Let us know if you hit a "not recognised" or some other error on those pins!
Question: what exactly does it do when it COMPILES? Clears out all commented stuff, but does the code then tern into machine code? Just curious. And like a JPG, how much space savings is it when it is compiled.
Ooh, a great, fundamental question that I can actually answer, thanks for asking, FilmFactry!
Compiling involves parsing (translating) the English-like syntax that we use (eg Serial.print) into actual assembly language (symbolic code) that is the (sort of) human-readable version of actual machine code that computer chips can understand. So, Serial.print might turn into 100 or more actual assembly instructions, each of which instructs the chip to move read or store something in memory, add or subtract, or most importantly of all, make a decision depending on a condition.
That, in turn, is turned into machine code (noughts and ones, but stored as hexadecimal numbers in an 8-bit number) and sent to the chip. In *very* broad terms that what compiling does. There's a lot more going on but that is the nub of it.
In space-saving terms, there is no real correlation between the source code that you write and the final machine code stored on the chip, other than the more you write the more that has to get compiled and stored on the chip - but the sizes are not comparable. A 1 Mb source program might compile down to 20Kb.
This could be a whole discussion but I hope this sort of gives you the gist of what happens.
Hi Ralph. So here's the thing....
Playing with the ATmega328P chip on a breadboard and was messing around with different clock speeds with the minicore bootloaders and your recent deep sleep code. At first using an avr isp shield on an UNO. All working fine. Then the shield started throwing an error and nothing would upload. Basically the error light on the shield comes on. Any ideas?
So then connected the chip to the UNO using the ICSP connections and everything sweet. Bootloaders no problem, programs no problem...
So switched to my FTDI adapter, which I have used before on the same breadboard setup and that wouldn't upload. Tried a bunch of the minicore settings both external and internal crystal but nope. Nuffin!! I'd uploaded the Bootloaders using the UNO ICSP and was trying to upload the code with the Ftdi but no luck.
Quickly whipped out a pro mini, stuffed the FTDI pins into the holes on the Pro mini and all worked fine. Hmmmmm
Quite confused as to why the FTDI won't upload a program. The wiring is correct. Checked it 10 times.
Don't supposed you have any bright ideas?
The plan is to control my solar panels. I have the code working perfectly to track the sun and I have incorporated you deep sleep code so that it just wakes every 10 mins, moves the panels and goes back to sleep. But at the mo I just Ave a nano plugged onto a breadboard and I want to make it permanent using an ATmega328P chip but wanted to also have header pins to plug in the FTDI should I decide to change something. I guess I could just bring out the ICSP pins, but that's not the point really.
Sorry for the very long message!
Cheers
Matt.
TL;DR
Just kidding, Matt! It sounds as though your experiments with uploading bootloaders (and the associated fuses) may have confused it (the FTDI device) as to which speed and which oscillator it is running on.
Either that or you're trying to upload code using an FTDI onto a chip that does not have a bootloader.
Your fuses to allow an UNO (or Nano or Mini) to run on the _internal_ clock at 8MHz with no brownout detection and SPI programming enabled (no bootloader) should be:
LOW: 0xE2
HIGH: 0xD9
EXT: 0xFF
This is the same for many chips fresh from the factory. Probably the same as my breadboard version. You can't upload code using an FTDI with this, only via SPI from another Arduino or the upload shield.
For an 8MHz internal oscillator device with an Optiboot bootloader:
LOW: 0xE2
HIGH: 0xDE
EXT: FF
If you have a "good" UNO or mini it should display the fuse settings when you upload a program. If that chip is all working as expected just use the same settings.
@@RalphBacon thanks for the reply Ralph.
I was burning the minicore or run of the mill arduino bootloader every time I changed something. Uploading code using SPI was a success everytime, but not so with the FTDI.
Thanks for the fuse info. I'll take a look at that and see what it says. Probably just me doing something wrong.
Good news is that your sleep code and my solar tracker code are working perfectly together. The solar panels are driven by 12V rams and home in on the sun perfectly, and then the ATmega328P gets 10 minutes kip while drawing something silly like 5uA, and then it wakes up and runs the function again. It's cool!!
Cheers
Matt
Hi Ralph. Figured it out. The simple answer is that I'm an idiot LOL. I was loading the bootloader. Then uploading a Blink sketch just to check but "uploading using programmer" so of course it was over writing the bootloader. Hence why the FTDI wouldn't work.
Made a new avr isp programmer on a PCB and everything works as intended when one does things correctly.
Great video thanks, one question, where did you get the usb battery from that you showed, that looks really hand
I can't believe I didn't share that info, Steve, I will update my GitHub, but in the meantime here's the link the AliExpress seller www.aliexpress.com/item/ESP32-ESP32S-For-Wemos-For-Raspberry-Pi-18650-Battery-Charge-Shield-Board-V3-Micro-USB-Port/32870411748.html
I bought it for £1.65 plus 47p shipping, so £2.12 in total (I actually bought two for £3.27 with 57p shipping) which I thought was pretty good, and I'm quite impressed with it so far.
Glad you liked the video too!
Thanks Ralph, not sure I would have found that otherwise. If you’re looking to further reduce power, I found, and have also tried the details from ruclips.net/video/urLSDi7SD8M/видео.html, that has some additional tips. Cheers
can we program it with arduino nano, or do we need to buy FTDI in any case?
You can program it with an Arduino Uno or Nano running the "Arduino-as-ISP" sketch that is included in the Examples drop down menu, under Tools. FTDI is simpler though (and only $2-3).
@@RalphBacon thank you very much, in our country it is expensive (1 dollar = 30 our country money)
Oh I forgot, have you done a vid on using the internal oscillator dear boy?...……..I looked on your site couldn't find one (I can save 3 components as my project doesn't need to gallop along a steady trot will do)
Not yet, as I was waiting for a (semi-secret) component to do this - and it arrived today, but that doesn't mean the video will be out tomorrow! Expect to wait a couple (or more) weeks before I do that one. But it takes simplicity to a whole new level (which could be a good thing, what do you think, Andy)?
I think it will be a good thing Ralph, this sort of thinking gets the old grey matter going. I like the "work smarter not harder " train of thought and I eagerly await the next chapter !
When I started out with the whole Arduino thing I thought the point was to develop your project on an UNO then buy the bits and build it, then as time went on and I learned about NANO's and PRO MINI's priced at a couple of quid I started just putting them on the project as they were but now I'm kind of enjoying myself thinking about power and trying to be a minimalist even to the point of speed, most of my stuff to date doesn't need to be 5v 16 mega whatnots anyway !...…...This has really come about because EasyEDA has all fallen into place for me (not before time I might add, I am slow study) and its great to use, its my first time with any sort of CAD...…………….Now off to the pub, line up the Guinness and watch England play (something I only do every four years )……….thanks for your input...….... cheer's
As an academic exercise only, I'm considering running my fridge alarm (see video #41 & #42) which runs on a Nano (£1.42) but uses a wall-wart to power it (all at 16Mhz)! Ridiculous in some ways. (This configuration replaced a PIC module running at 4Mhz but also plugged in.)
Now I'm thinking replacing it with a custom ATmega328P chip (£1.12) running on the internal 8Mhz oscillator and in sleep mode until the door opening triggers an interrupt - and all powered from a single 3.7v 18650 battery. Should last a while. Be interesting to see exactly _how_ long in a Real World environment!
I hope England's 2-0 win over Sweden made the Guinness slide down even more smoothly than usual!
yeah Ralph they did go down well, I'm typing really quietly with dark glasses on !...………..I cant wait for your tutorials on all this stuff we have been talking about
Hi Ralph. Please disregard my comment on video 119. I appear to have been able to burn the bootloader to a 324P without that particular breadboard324 definition. The shield beeped twice. I took a genuine bootloader 324P off my Arduino board and swapped in the burned one. It was able to upload and run a sketch.
However, I've wired up my 324p on the breadboard exactly as you specify i your hand drawn diagram. 0.1uF ceramic capacitor across the gnd and 5v. and I have an LED with a 200R resistor on in 19. Nothing happens. I take the chip off, put it back on the genuine arduino board and the LED blinks happily.
Any thoughts? I am getting 5V at pins 7 and 8 from my FTDI programmer.
Thank you Ralph. I feel I'm 98% of the way there.
Gord
Disregarded and responded to your most recent message!
Hi...…...I have a project that I built years ago and it works just fine and I used a 328p DIL chip, now I want to make an all surface mount version of it ( just for the sheer fun of it and another string to the old bow) so is an ISCP header on my new PCB all I'm gonna need ? or should I break out SCL and SDA as well...….I'm thinking worse case, my Atmega chip (SMD) will come with no bootloader...…...What would you do on a new SMD PCB project old chap?
Good luck with your soldering using an SMD (TQFP package) Andy; you'll need steady hands and probably a fixed magnifying glass too. Not to mention a very fine soldering bit. But thousands have soldered such chips and I don't see why you can't do this.
Regarding the ICSP header, this basically breaks out the SPI connections to the ATmega328P as we use that to load the bootloader via another Arduino. Once that is in, we use the TX and RX pins of a USB-to-Serial FTDI converter to upload the sketch (along with the DTR to give it a reset pulse - on loading up, the Arduino's bootloader checks whether a program is waiting to be uploaded and either does that or just runs the current program).
The principle is no different to what I showed you here, really, except that it's a bit more fiddly. You can buy an SMD breakout board for the ATmega328P either to plug back into the standard DIL socket or to build the whole thing on.
Sounds interesting, which is always a bad thing for me.
Which bootloader is now standard? I used Optiboot in the past to squeeze in a few more bytes of program.
Also, a bootloader is "optional". You can flash in a whole program with ISCP, setting fuses at the same time to run with no bootloader at all. It's what you would do with an ATtiny anyway... Most of the time.
Bernd Felsche optiboot has been the standard for quite a few years :)
You guys really are ahead of the curve here. All correct, Bernd, of course, but remember that a true beginner has to learn these steps one by one. I'll cover the "no bootloader" option in a future video, and how that gets us almost 2K space back. A new toy arrived yesterday that might assist in that quest. Thanks for posting.
Nice project
Thanks for sharing :-)
Glad you like the video, Asger, always good to hear from you.
Hi Ralph,
I got an Arduino Attiny from China and when i plug it into my computer it does not see it.
Maybe because there is no Bootloader? sooo can i use your setup here to put that Bootloader on my Attiny?
Great video, ......... Cheers
And quit muckin about we want more videos :)
what attiny do you have?
Attiny does not have hardware serial support, so you can not program it same way you program an Arduino. SparkFun came up with a Windows driver as a workaround solution and they have their own ATTiny board with a PCB USB connection for this. I think they have different fuse settings on the ATTiny's they use, so that this driver "sees" the board when you plug it, uploads your code, and then disconnects...
Look at my video #84 *Making the ATTiny85 easier to program* which might give you the information you need, Joe. Must dash, got more videos to make!
10k here we come.
And I do believe it's arrived, Peter. Finally. Phew. I'm exhausted. 😫 But what fun!
Ralph S Bacon
Congrats Ralph on growing the arduinnite community. You have 10k because of your informative, well made videos (when there's no echo :p ). Hope you keep making videos and the arduinnites grow in number. Thanks for sharing.
This is indeed the way to go if you want to have a real low energy 'arduino'
Thanks for your post, Ed19601, good to hear from you.
Great Video, I like them all :) you do a great job and we learn a lot! Thank you!!!!
I have an off-topic question - hopefully you will be able to answer me,An LCR - T4 Transistor Tester ESR Meter Mega328 Transistor Tester, Should I get one like that? do you own one? I am almost sure that it will ease my DIY projects a bit - Should I get one? thank you.
My earliest videos, Arye, do go through some of the useful things you can/should get (like a soldering iron!) but I have not touched on an item like this tester. (here's a link in case others are wondering what you are referring to: bit.ly/2m265xc )
The question you need to ask yourself is: what do I hope this item will do for me?
It will, of course, test the items it says it will, but I can't remember the last time I tested a transistor! Very occasionally I might have to measure a capacitor or inductor but these days it is cheap to get a selection box from the Far East (all marked up) and you never need to measure again. See here: www.banggood.com/search/capacitor-kit.html?sbc=1 for an example of the various capacitor kits you can get.
That said, my multimeter also measures capacitance, transistor hFE, frequency - but that's still not the reason I bought it. They were "nice to have" not a reason for buying.
One inexpensive kit I did cover was a tiny oscilloscope from JYE (see video #92) which not only required assembly but has proved very useful since then. It would be a good introduction into what an oscilloscope can do for you and whether it would ever be worth spending £300 on a "proper" one, like my Rigol.
At the end of the day, the item you mention is only about £10 - not exactly going to break the bank, just make sure you need it or whether that £10 could be put towards something more useful (like a kit of parts - capacitors, resistors, transistors - as I mentioned above).
Any of these ideas any good, Arye?
Hi Ralph- Great video as always. I learned a lot.
You were wondering why the led seems to blink only once sometimes in the video. This is because your camera's shutter speed is probably 1/60 second, and your video displays 30 frames per second. So for half the time, you are not capturing video.
If you're curious about this, more info here: www.videomaker.com/videonews/2013/07/4-steps-to-understanding-shutter-speed
While on the topic of photographing led's, I remember in a previous video you mentioned that the color of the led's looks washed out on the video compared to how it looked in real life. This is easily rectified by manually closing the aperture on your camera so you're exposing the bright led's correctly.
I like the first bit of your reply, John, explaining why my video camera misses the super fast 10mS blink. Makes sense, if a bit odd!
Regarding the second part of your reply, regarding why I struggle to video LEDs in their proper colour (rather than mostly white with a halo of their true colour) I'm afraid my video camera does not let me alter the aperture (or shutter speed, come to that); it was designed for "point and shoot" users, regardless of the mode you put it in!
I have noticed that just about everyone else has this problem too. I either need a more sophisticated video camera (pretty unlikely) or another means of achieving my goal of filming them in their true colours. I've tried coloured filters, polarising filters, neutral (grey) filters - none of which made the slightest difference. Sigh.
But great responses, so thanks for that, always good to hear from you.
Actually, a little piece of ND filter on the led should do the trick. (Not a lens filter, but a piece of lighting gel.) Then it’s just a matter of finding the correct density. Here’s a link to a company that makes lighting gel, which, coincidentally, is the English company I happen to work for in the USA. www.leefilters.com
A little more information for you- start with #211, which is a 3 stop neutral density filter. That should get you pretty close, but if it’s still too light you can go to a 4-stop nd #299, or if it’s too dark you can go to a 2 stop ND #210. Contact the company through the website and ask to be sent a complimentary swatch book. That’s all you need. Tell them John Adler recommended them to you. :)
Hi Ralph- Here’s a little video I made to show you what I’m talking about: ruclips.net/video/c_VqGVBKWVI/видео.html
Interesting and successful, and I did look at "your" website, but I must admit to feeling a little dishonest asking for a swatch booklet knowing that I have no intent to actually purchasing a sheet (and at several pounds a sheet it seems unlikely I ever will, who knew this stuff was so expensive). I will have to gather my courage to contact them... but it does seem to be the (only) answer. Thanks for the video link, says it all.
Hello Ralph, this is the most informative channel, thanks for sharing your knowledge with us. I am using a Sparkfun usb to serial converter which it does work out of the box with linux no drivers needed, unlike the windows7 spying software. I need to get one of those converters myself as the one i have is @5v only, thanks for the info.
Vasilis K
If you ONLY want to program 5v devices, Vasilis, then you're good to go; but you won't be able to program any 3.3v device so yes, I suggest you get a dual voltage one, they are only a couple of dollars / pounds. Glad you like the channel and this video, good to hear from you.
Not sure if this has already been mentioned, but I’d thoroughly recommend reading Nick Gammons website on the minimal board and low power
There’s also a ton over over really useful stuff Arduino related also
Minimal Board
gammon.com.au/breadboard
Low power (very....)
gammon.com.au/power
Other general very useful info
gammon.com.au/forum/bbshowpost.php?bbtopic_id=123
I found this stuff a godsend in developing low power minimal Arduino related stuff
Yes, Nick Gammon is definitely the guru of all things Arduino, and he's taught me many things over the years. Thanks for the links.
Handy to know.
Thanks for your post, Maxx B, handy is a good description! Good to hear from you.
One alterative i've been using for breadboarding Arduino projects is the "Ardweeny" which has all the components on a tiny pcb that sits on top of the dil ATMEGA328P chip. Its not cheap by modern standards (£11) but you only need 1 while your breadboarding and it means you can avoid all the problems of loose connections and stray capacitances etc. When you moe your design to pcb or stripboard you just replace it with the chip + components as you did here.
www.active-robots.com/solarbotics-ardweeny.html
That quite a neat idea, Ian, and should work well. Pity about the cost but, as you say, you only need one. I'll be showing an alternative, cheaper idea in a future video so stay tuned!
About 7min worth of info and 20min of rambling, I suggest you get rid of the PIP, no one cares what the speaker looks like...
The so called rambling is what gives Ralph's videos their charm!
How do you know what I care about?!
Old comment but I will keep it here!