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Post by emzed on Aug 29, 2006 21:28:04 GMT 10
Has anyone looked into DSP's?
Texas Intruments have a new system on chip that incoporates an ARM processor and DSP.
donburch, i reckon you might be able to benefit from one of these if your looking at video processing. DSP are much better at doing video processing type algorithms whereas microprocessors are better for behavioural/conditional control. having them both on the one chip means the DSP can look after the intensive video processing and the ARM would be free to do other stuff.
FPGA's are also becoming more available to hobbyists. You can find numerous development boards around. I'm acutally using one at work now and have incorporated a 32 bit processor into the FPGA. The good thing about making it in a FPGA is that i can add the peripherals that i want. If i want 5 uarts and 4 timers i can have it...
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Post by emzed on Aug 29, 2006 21:29:28 GMT 10
Well, its not actualy that new, its been out for a year. But still cool none the less. If only some of the software development environments were more affordable...  |
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Post by donburch on Aug 30, 2006 22:33:56 GMT 10
donburch, i reckon you might be able to benefit from one of these if your looking at video processing... Yes, it's a great idea, and kept my mind racing for hours when I should have been going to sleep ;D Links to TI's DaVinci are here or here. It certainly looks to be a great device! ARM9 is a powerful CPU, and having the DSP to do most of the video processing in the same chip has got to be much more efficient. But as you mentioned, most of the development tools seem pricey - which is very bad for a one-off hobby project. I am already thinking of using multiple processors (see discussion of Propellor chip in another thread), and maybe I'd be better off sticking to older less powerful DSP or FPGA for which program source code is freely available. Anyway, I reckon I've got a couple of intermediate projects to get under my belt first (for which I'll allow 6-12 months)  Curiously, quite a while ago I came across an article at Seattle Robotics Society which uses a FPGA for "A Hardware Based Color Vision System for Embedded Robotics Applications". I still don't understand it, but I've got it bookmarked for later ;-) |
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Post by emzed on Aug 31, 2006 21:38:42 GMT 10
If you do want to get into FPGA's, i've got a book on VHDL that i'd be happy for you to borrow. Not sure if you've had any experience with VHDL, its quite different programming to C or Basic.
That FPGA used on the seattle robotics site (very interesting project that one btw!) is very close to one that we have used at work. The Xilinx ISE Webpack is free and supports most of the FPGAs that would be in the price range of the hobbyist.
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Post by donburch on Sept 3, 2006 8:49:18 GMT 10
Thanks Emzed, but I have a fair bit more learning to do before going down that route.
For the moment I think I will be better off trying to stick with standard modules for which there is plenty of support (and self-training course materials) and software.
Unfortunately most of the standard modules with training courses available seem to be at the very low end of the market (4MHz 8-bit procesors with 2KB RAM). Manufacturers of the high end products seem to assume that their customers are all experienced engineers who want the challenge of another custom development :-( I still haven't managed to work out PICAXE or AVR - I guess I'll have to take another look.
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Post by Dingo on Sept 3, 2006 17:01:53 GMT 10
A great intro to the ARM7 architecture is this free book: www.hitex.co.uk/arm/lpc2000book/If you are really cheap like me then have a look at Futurlec's ARM7 offerings (lpc2000 series) www.futurlec.com/ET-ARM_Stamp.shtmlIf you've not played with microcontrollers before, order a couple of the picaxes (18X are pretty good for starting) and then download their free pdfs to get up and running and control a few LEDs, motors etc, great way to get your hands dirty without too steep a learning curve. |
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Post by SDFSD on Aug 14, 2008 17:59:23 GMT 10
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Post by SDFSDF on Aug 14, 2008 18:00:51 GMT 10
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Post by SDFSD on Aug 14, 2008 18:02:40 GMT 10
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