Parallax Basic Stamp

Investigate the main characteristics, specifications, diagrams, cost and applications of microcontroller boards other than the Arduino boards.

Microcontrollers are usually small computers that are based on a single jointed circuit. They are usually made up of processor cores together with programmable output/input peripherals and a memory.

Microcontrollers are generally designed for embedded applications, in comparison with the microprocessors which are used in common purpose uses or personal computers comprising of various discrete chips (Peatman, 2012).

The specifications of the microcontroller boards are; processor type, Bus type, number of ports, memory, operating system and port type. The microcontroller are used to measure the programs which are used for embedded devices like different  home appliances, controllers point of scale terminals, robots and information appliances (Singh, 2016).

There are diverse types of microcontroller platforms that are accessible for physical calculations such as; Net media’s BX-24, MIT’s Handy board and Parallax Basic Stamp (Peatman, 2012). The above examples are discussed in details below.

The parallax basic stamp is usually programmed in a variation of the Basic language, which is referred to as PBASIC. The PBASIC language includes regular microcontroller roles, Including PWM, serial communication, communication with regular LCD driver circuits, pseudo-sine wave frequency, hobby servo trains and the ability to time the RC circuit that can be used to detect an analog value.

When the program has been written in a ‘stamp Editor’ a combined development environment in windows ,it is possible to check the syntax, then tokenize and send it to the chip via USB or serial mini-B cable , where it be made to run.

The parallax Basic Stamp microcontroller is used to learn programming and electronics side by side. It is a small on-board computer which is like the ones that are found in most electronic devices. The figure below show parallax Basic Stamp.

Fig 1: parallax Basic Stamp microcontroller

Main characteristics

• Creates a simple circuits with wiring and schematic diagrams.
• Signals are sent by blinking LEDs
• Programs are written in PBASIC in order to control the circuit
• The bush buttons are used to sense contact
• Data in this microcontroller platform is displayed on a 7-segment LED.
• A servo motor is used to control motion
• A potentiometer is used to a dial(Crisp, 2011).

Specifications

The parallax Basic Stamp microcontroller has the following specifications:

Attribute	value
Family name	parallax Basic Stamp
Type of package	PDIP
Type of mounting	Through hole
Number of Pins	24
Type of core	Basic Stamp 2
Size of programming memory	2kB
Highest Frequency	20MHz
Size of RAM	32B
Supply voltage	5 to 15V
Dimensions	30 by 16 by 3.81mm
Highest operating temperature	+ 85oc
UART channels	1
Lowest operating temperature	-40oc
Type of programming memory	EEPROM

The parallax Basic Stamp microcontroller is mainly applied in technology education because it has quickly to implement, easy to program solutions in many industries including; processing control, manufacturing and robotics (Crisp, 2011).

An automatic parking system is one of the fruitful projects which made of the parallax stamp controller. The main purpose of the parking system is to find out the best available parking location and then display the data at the entrance to the parking so as to guide the drive an empty parking lot.

Netmedia’s BX-24

This is achieved by the execution of a priority algorithm that utilises the application of the infrared sensor signals from each of the parking location. The counting of the number of vehicle which enters and leaves the parking is also done by the sensors. When the parking is full the display area at the gate will notify the drives and the gate will remain closed until when there is an empty parking space (Kamal, 2013).

The other project which makes application of the parallax Basic Stamp microcontroller is the design of the electronic soccer board. The score board to be designed has to connect to two basketball rims.in the electronic soccer one player is able to shoot the baskets and play alone or they can be toe plays to compete each other. After the time that was set has elapsed the inning player and the scores are displayed (Peatman, 2012). 

The cost of parallax Basic Stamp USD $ 12.99

NETMEDIA’S BX-24

Netmedia’s BX-24 is the greatest commanding programmable microcontroller in Basic on the market. This circuit is all you essentially require in order to start up any robotics project. The Netmedia’s BX-24 brings together in a circuit the size of a 24-pin chip, a voltage regulator, an Atmel microcontroller, a 32Kbytes EEPROM and an RS232 port, so that it is sufficient to write the programs in Basic on the PC and then dump them to the module, so that it executes them totally separately (Peatman, 2012).

 It can be power-driven from any voltage between 5 to 24 V using the internal regulator, or a regulated source between 3 and 5.5V. The new current Netmedia’s BX-24 model also has a range of stretched working temperatures from -40 to +85 ° C. Furthermore, the Netmedia’s BX-24 has a series of extra circuits such as development systems and starter kits that tolerates developing  and testing programs without problems and at low cost, making them perfect for professionals, as well as for students at universities and schools (Crisp, 2011).

 One of the key benefit of the Netmedia’s BX-24 microprocessor is that it is well-matched with Visual Basic, which means that if you know how to program in Visual Basic, you can program the Basic X24 without difficulties.

Netmedia’s BX-24 is considered to be the most powerful programmable microcontroller in the world. Its all-in-one design offers a power-packed module which is able to fit in the smallest applications (Jeebananda, 2016). The figure below shows Netmedia’s BX-24

MIT’s Handy board

Why the Netmedia’s BX-24 is preferred.

• It is portable due to its small size
• It is cheap
• It user friendly and that is why it is preferred by students in collages and universities
• It is usually runs on a 9v battery
• It usually suited for mobile and remote applications
• It has no moving parts and it can be removed from power

Fig2: Netmedia’s BX-24

The Netmedia’s BX-24 has powerful characteristics and low costs which makes it the best choice for any project or application (Zappa, 2017). The Netmedia’s BX-24 has a single chip which contains all the features that one will need, the characteristics of Netmedia’s BX-24 include:

• 16 total I/O lines (8 ADCs and more 8 TTL and  TTL)
• Pin-for-pin well-matched with the BS2SX and BS2  
• 1500-19200 Baud cushioned serial in/out
• 1 safeguarded high speed serial port
• SPI interface(Zappa, 2017)
• RAM  of 400 bytes
• user program storage of 32 KB EEPROM
• Serial or Parallel downloadable
• On-chip controller of voltage
• Multitasking
• 2 operator manageable on-chip exterior mount LEDs, green/red
• Calendar/Scheme clock
• Serial border abilities
• Full IEEE fluctuating point math(Singh, 2016).

Speed	83,000intructions per second
Maximum length of a programme	Passible more than 8000 lines of basic code
EEPROM	Data storage and  user program 32kB
Size of RAM	400bytes
I/O pins available	21(2 serial only+ 16 standard +3 accessed outside standard dip pin area
Analog Inputs	8 (8 of 16 standard I/O pins can separately  Task as 10bit ADCs or standard digital I/Os
Serial I/O speed	1500 to 460.8k Baud
Fluctuating fact math	32bit x 32bit free point math fitted (Peatman, 2012).

The Netmedia’s BX-24 has a wide application in many devices such as;

It is widely used in reading the 4*4 matrix keypad

It is applied in the hobby servos controlling

Measuring the resistance by use of ADC

It is used to add timeout to input capture

It is applied in the programming time 1 as stopwatch

Determining resistance by use of the RC time

(Kamal, 2013).

Other uses include; the wide application in many devices such as: temperature data loggers, real time weather posts, analog joystick interfaces, essential reality gear, data terminals and smart car structures

The cost of Netmedia’s BX-24 VAT inclusive is £ 65.74.

MIT’S Handy board is a common handheld controller for robotics. The first Handy Board controller was established by Fred G. Martin at MIT and it was strictly related to the earlier designed controller by Randy Sargent and Martin for the MIT LEGO Robot contents. The Handy Board controller design is licensed free without any charge, due to that many manufacturers have opted to the development Handy Boards (Jeebananda, 2016) The figures below shows the MIT’S Handy board (Deshmukh, 2015).

The Handy Board microcontroller has the following characteristics;

• It uses Motorola 6811 microprocessor
• Circuit for operating 4 DC motors
• It has a RAM of 32k and it is battery protected(Deshmukh, 2015).

The figures bellows shows some features of MIT’S Handy board that ware aimed for a very particular target use (Deshmukh, 2015).

Start Button. The witch knob is used to govern the implementation of Collaborating C programs. Likewise, its state may be read under operator program regulator.
Stop Button (Crisp, 2011). The Stop knob is used to put the Handy Board into an unusual bootstrap download manner. Similarly, its state may be read under user program regulator (Deshmukh, 2015).

Specifications

The Handy board has the following specifications.

• SRAM with a battery-backed of 32KB
• character presentation of 2×16 LCD
• Provision for four 1A motors
• 6 Servo motor regulators(Deshmukh, 2015)
• 9 Analog inputs and 7 Digital
• 16 Analog and 8 Digital productions
• Infrared I/O competences
• Serial border abilities
• Superficial production
• 11 cm BY 8.5 cm BY 5.25 cm (development board, lcd screen and lxwxh – with battery)(Jeebananda, 2016).

The handy Board microcontroller has a wide application in hobbyist, industrial and education robotics projects.

The Handy Board was aimed for a very particular target use. To build small mobile robots in a classroom situation. It consist of a detailed feature set for this use on-board DC motor drivers , a built-in rechargeable battery pack, individual connectors for sensors,  non-volatile program memory, a beeper, an LCD screen for state messages and user buttons (Singh, 2016).

The cost of Handy board microcontroller with VAT inclusive is $ 16 (.P.Godse, 2017).

References

.P.Godse, G. (2017). Microcontrollers. Texas: Technical Publications.

Crisp, J. (2011). Introduction to Microprocessors and Microcontrollers. Berlin: Elsevier.

Deshmukh, A. V. (2015). Microcontrollers: Theory and Applications. Auckland: Tata McGraw-Hill Education.

Jeebananda, P. (2016). MICROPROCESSORS AND MICROCONTROLLERS. Chicago: PHI Learning Pvt. Ltd.

Kamal, R. (2013). Microcontrollers: Architecture, Programming, Interfacing and System Design. Chicago: Pearson Education India.

Peatman, J. B. (2012). Design with PIC Microcontrollers. London: Prentice Hall.

Singh, R. (2016). Advanced Microprocessors and Microcontrollers. Sydney: New Age International.

Zappa, F. (2017). Microcontrollers. Hardware and Firmware for 8-bit and 32-bit devices. Paris: Società Editrice Esculapio.