Hi Zoot -

First, thanks for taking the time to carefully read and understand my question. I appreciate it. I just have couple points I need to clarify:

When you refer to a USB to serial adapter, are you referring to a cable? (USB to 24-pin serial physical adapter?) Can't I just do this with my USB cable? (If not, I will probably scratch this feature.)
 

When the Netduino is connected by USB, I DO see the Netduino device under USB devices. But I am unable to configure any COM port for it. (I believe other USB evaluation boards allow you to config a COM port in Dev Mgr under the USB device, but I may be wrong.)

Also, I have worked with other eval board (TI MSP430 and Stellaris) on this both of my machines and the used Putty via COM port (#?) to connect Putty to their UART (serial text buffer). All via USB cables. Now I cannot find those COM ports ... this puzzles me but is, perhaps, a distraction.

THANKS a ton!

    - Dave Ferreira

Hi all -

I apologize in advance if this question is mis-categorized or redundent.

HOW can I add a COM port to Windows 7 / Windows 8 to do serial communication with my Netduino Go!?

I have implemented serial communications on my Netduino GO! and it seems to be working. (COM1, 2400, 8N1)

On the host machine I am trying to use Putty.exe to receive and send serial text to the Netduino. (I have used Putty.exe for hundreds of hours at work so I know how to configure it.)

When I try to open COM1 in Putty, it tells me that if unable to connect to COM1. In short, there are no COM ports available to connect to. Changing the COM port specification in Netduino doesn't help ... other selections produce a runtime exception. Those that don't are not found on my computer.

On my host laptop, there are no COM ports visible in Device Manager. (Yes, I've enabled Show Hidden Devices.)

I have used Putty on both my laptops to communication with other microprocessors ... I'm surprised I'm having this problem with Netduino.

Can someone tell me how to config / enable / add a COM port to my laptop to facilitate serial communications with my Netduino Go!?

Thank you!

    - Dave Ferreira

Chris -

I have the exact same problem: My Go! appears to be dead. (Perhaps also my ShieldBase, no way to tell.)

When I plug in my Go! none of the port lights illuminate, only the main white LED by the micro USB port.

It is not recognized by MFDeploy nor the STDFU tools.

Yes, I've tried putting it in bootloader mode by holding down the button while plugging it in.

The last thing I was doing was I had the LadyAda Motor Shield attached to the ShieldBase. I was attempting to use a MotorShield.cs port that I had gotten from this forum. I had made some changes to make it compatible with my Netduino Go!

First attempt to deploy my project failed and that's when I realized it's dead.

I bought my Netduino Go! around last Christmas. Can't remember where I bought it from.

Please tell me I don't have to buy a new one.

Should we not be using the LadyAda Motor Shield with our ShieldBase? It has a PWR jumper near its external power block ... I had the jumper OFF so as not to damage the Netduino components.

Thank you!

    - Dave Ferreira

Hi Olaf. Thanks for your comments. 

The motor I was attempting to use is a tiny water pump ... something that might be used for a desktop water feature. It fits in the palm of my hand ... I could close my hand around it and you wouldn't see it. But it DOES draw over 0.5A. 

I will figure out the exact draw later tonight when I replace the 10A fuse in my multimeter.

In the mean time, the vendor saw that I bought 2 of these things from him many months ago and is shipping me a better board right away. I thought that was really good of him.

I would find it especially valuable if someone could tell me that I did something wrong PRIOR to letting the smoke out of 1/2 of my motor driver. (I also have another identical 1 that is still intact. So I still have 1.5 of these boards.)

If someone could tell me something like, "Well, you need to connect IB to ..." or some other solution.

Thanks for your help.

Hi all -

(Wow ... just as a warning for everyone here:  COPY YOUR WORK before posting in this forum. I just spent about 1/2 researching and writing a post, only to have it be sacrificed to the database gods on posting.)

I'm not sure where else to post this item. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

I am trying to use this motor driver board:

https://www.bananaro...r-Driver-Module

I've attached a picture of the page with documentation on it if that's easier for you.

I have a 9V battery across the motor driver VCC and GND.

I have verified that I have PWM running at 100% duty cycle on ShieldBase port 6. I have connected this to IA on the motor driver board. I have tried leaving IB disconnected. Tried connecting IB to Shieldbase GND. Tried connecting IB to an unused Shieldbase digital port. Tried IB to a Shieldbase unused analog port.

EXPECTED RESULT:  Motor goes ACTUAL RESULT:  Nothing

I have tried everything I could think of with no luck. The only think I was successful at was to connect IA directly to the batter GND. RESULT:  The motor whined for a second and then the smoke when out of Channel B of my motor driver board.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you.

   - DaveFer

Thanks, Mike. Yeah, that's the info I needed.

So, I'm not going to be able to create any kind of radio signal by toggling a port on the Netduino ... at least not in the amateur bands (2 meter band). That would require about 145 MHz.

I would have to create some dedicated tank circuit and then perhaps manipulate it using the Netduino.

   - DF

Sure. Of course it's unanswerable if there are other processes taking up cycles. Thanks.

I'd like to get a ballpark idea of the maximum frequency I can toggle the port with NOTHING else going on. A theoretical limit if nothing else.

Hi all. I apologize in advance if this topic has already been exhausted. I DID search prior to posting but I'm pressed for time.

What is the maximum frequency at which I can toggle a port on the Shield Base?

Please note:  This isn't a PWM quesiton. I'm not asking the minimum period or duty cycle or anything related to PWM.

The question is simply looking for the highest frequency that a port can be toggled steadily (turned on and off / high and low). 500 KHz? 100 MHz? 2GHz?

Thank you. Again, sorry if this has already been discussed and exhausted.

- Dave Ferreira

Hi all -

I wonder if anyone has any suggestions for brand / gauge of wire to use in the arena of these small scale electronics projects.

I've bought wire at Radio Shack and online of different gauges and I'm often disappointed in how it behaves.

The wire that I buy 18-20 gauge, both multi strand and single strand often fights me and doesn't want to cooperate. Neither had is been very economical (I'm usually buying urgently -- my fault).

So I want to stock up on several different colors of a really friendly wire for use in 3VDC - 9VDC projects. (200mA - 2.0A)

I'm looking for wire that is insulated, yet supple (doesn't have a mind of its own or hold a grudge). Sources appreciated.

THANKS!  

First, thanks to Aaron Chapman for his contributions to the public good with his Adafruit Motor Driver. Nice work.

Tried using it and quickly found that, because I'm using a NetduinoGo w/ ShieldBase, this driver would need to be modified for me to use it. Started that last night and quickly ran into some "NotImplemented" exceptions. 

In the mean time, I can't help but wonder if the Adafruit Motor Driver could be access directly (without a driver) by using the ShieldBase pins and existing PWM channels.

This code allowed me to control a motor via the LCTech driver board. Couldn't I just modify this to use the Adafruit board? Isn't it just a matter of accessing different pins?

BTW, I'm simply trying to drive 2 tiny page motors and a laser diode.  

Ok, so GutWorks had the winning respones, But pulling the constructor from his sample code ... well, it took me quite a while to figure out why it behaved in an unpredictable manner:  The period and duration from his sample were something like 20000 and 1500 respectively (microseconds).

I found that until I brought those values down into 2000 and 150 range there was completely random behavior. (Motors not running until after I quit debugging, starting and then stopping after 1 change to the duty cycle.) There still remains 1 seemingly random misbehavior ... I'm successfully adjusting the DutyCycle to affect changes in motor speed ... but stepping thru the code, the DutyCycle behaves as if it is Read Only. For example: 

PWM0.DutyCycle = 0.99;  // DutyCycle reads 5000.0 after executing this line. And other other similar lines.

So, in short, Thank you GutWorks for getting me up and running! Much obliged. PS -- Another reason it took so long to debug had to do with a tiny motor that was drawing 0.380 ma because it was sticky (old and gunked?) My motor driver board kept heating up dramatically within a few seconds.

I see ... so that explains why the Microsoft.SPOT.Hardware.OutputPort.Write() method takes a bool ... it only on or off.

Well, that's a bummer.

Ok, back to work trying to get the PWM to work. Trying to isolate the problem(s) and rule out my motors, driver module, wiring mistakes.

Thanks! PS - Chris, not sure you ever saw the mail I sent you here ... first time sending a message, not sure it actually went.

Thanks for the great response, GutWorks. Looks like it will be very helpful. (Even though I wasn't able to immediately make it work.)

In the mean time, I'm also curious to learn to use the Analog ports to drive a motor.

Isn't there an analog method to drive a motor (with varying power) thru an analog port?

Thanks.

Hey all -

Last night I connected my LC Tech dual motor driver board to my Netduino Go w/ Shield Base.

I first connected it to an analog port and use .WriteRaw(int) to make 1 motor go. It worked.

But then I had trouble modulating the speed ... it seemed to only have 1 speed. (I should go back and verify that I had the right wire in the right port and wasn't trying to modulate the forward/reverse connection. )

So I switched it to a Digital Port and tried to use PWM -- no results. Nothing happened. The motor never budged.

Here's ONE of the code snips I used. I also used another style which I did myself without looking at a sample. Sorry I don't have that very intuitive code handy now.

var pwm0 = new PWM(sBase.PWMChannels.PWM_PIN_D9, 60, 50.0, false);

...

pwm0.Start();

...

Alrighty ...

So apparently the use of the static keyword or trying to declare and instantiate in the same line was the problem.

I now have it working and I'm reading analog input from Channel 0.

(Interesting observations -- the only input "sensor" I had handy was a resistor of some unknown Ohms R. Reading from the open pin (no connection) yielded some raw number like 685 ... but it fluctuated quite a bit. With the resister between A0 and Gnd, It read a very consistent raw datum of 275 +/- 5. And I was able to push it down to nearly 0 when I shorted it with my dry fingers. I'm very surpised that the empty pin produced a more variable result than the R or my dry fingers. Seems strange.)

Now I can commit to buying the XBee Wifi solution.

BTW, where do I send my resume to become more involved in the Netduino project? Are you accepting new people onboard? Perhaps there are subgroups working on new modules?

Thanks for your help.

 - Dave F.

Thanks, Chris. Sorry if I've monopolized this thread. I didn't even realize I hadn't followed your suggestion until I saw your last response. My bad.

So I used the Update tool. Then I had to jump thru a bunch of hoops to get to test a few different configurations. Your instructions were great, but the device didn't come back to usable straight away. But I was finally able to test they key question:  Can I instantiate a Shieldbase object without an exception? No, I cannot.

Here's the line of code I'm trying to power thru:      static NetduinoGo.ShieldBase sBase = new NetduinoGo.ShieldBase((GoBus.GoSocket)5);

Here are the results:

Case 0: Shieldbase on Port 5, no other modules. Result: System.Exception

Case 1: Button on Port 1, RGB LED on Port 2, Shieldbase on Port 5. Result: System.Exception.

Case 2: Button on 1, RGB on 2, no other modules. Result: No errors. Able to instantiate other devices.

So what is next for me here ... I guess I should set up source code for SDK and/or firmware and try to step thru? I guess I'll do the SDK first and see what I find. Does that sound right?

Thanks,

    - Dave F.

Ok Chris - This is turning into some kind of rat's nest of problems. I looked at this thread that promised to show me how to update my Netduino Go firmware.

I began with the steps to detect my current firmware version. (Some deductions gave me that I should be looking at MFDeploy in GUI mode.) And, TO MY SURPRISE, MFDeploy reports that my Netduino Go firmware is v. 4.2.0. Ok, so I start the instructions to update the firmware and run into the following further problems:  A. The link in step 3 of the update instructions doesn't point to v3.0.1 as it says, but rather to v3.0.2. Ok, so I'll keep moving foward.

B. Using the STDFU Tester, it doesn't recognize my device. Yes, I followed the directions to enter bootloader mode and I repeated them umpteen times also trying WITHOUT that step. Still my device doesn't show up. I'll just move on to the flashing part.

C. There's nothing that is called ST DfuSe Demonstrator...exe (maybe they just meant DfuSeDemo.exe ... I'll try that. NO LUCK it doesn't recognize my device. So I'm kinda stuck at this point. Only MFDeploy recognizes my Netduino Go and Visual C# Express.

Neither of the tools for flashing seem to recognize it either i Booloader mode or normal mode.

Any suggestions? (Beside resorting to violent abuse of electronics devices?)

Thank you.

    - Dave Ferreira

Thanks for responding, Chris. I DID take note of the limitation, but I did NOT interpret that correctly -- I wrongly interpreted the restriction as [put all modules on either ports 1-4 or 5-8] My bad. I did indeed have the modules in port 1 & 2 + the Shieldbase on port 3.

SO, just to clarify, I CAN use other modules, but they cannot share the same channel with the Shieldbase in firmware version Beta7?

So I'll put Button module on port 1, RGB LED on port 2 and Shieldbase on port 5 ... and that should allow me to instantiate all 3 soft objects.

Result: Um ... I cannot get VC# Express to recognize the device at all. But MFDeploy /Erase recognizes it and reports success. Tried restarting VC# Express, tried switching USB ports, tried disconnecting Shieldbase from Netduino Go ... no luck. Port lights do not stay lit for connected modules. VC# Express executes programs but just skips over code. In short, this looks bad. But there's probably some simple answer. I'm going to go back to the second of the 2 laptops I successfully configured to manage the Netduino Go this week. More reports later.

- DF

Are those easier to use than an xbee and are they fairly easy to set-up?

 

Thanks for the quick response.

 

David

Hi DavidBev -

I'm also searching for an economical wifi solution to connect my brand new Netduino Go + Shieldbase.

Since you mentioned the XBee above. I was wondering if you could share your opinion of a device like this one:

https://www.sparkfun.../products/12571

Other's have suggested a device like this: http://www.junetradi...t&product_id=58

I would like to be able to create a Windows Phone app that would talk to my Netduino Go. Ideally, peer-to-peer, but that's not the priority.

For me, Value = Result / ($Cost + Effort).

What's a newbie to do? Comments?

I flashed my Shieldbase to firmware Beta 7 and the result is a slightly worse situation.

Prior to flashing the firmware I would get a System.Exception when trying to instantiate the Shieldbase object.

Now, with Beta 7 firmware, I get the same exception instantiating any module while the Shieldbase is plugged in. (I haven't tested every permutation, but that seems to be the general situation.)

Is there a release point where we can always go to try new firmware releases without having to bother you?

ALSO, the project that flashes the firmware has some code that is unreachable. (Project: STM32ReflashApp, File: Program.cs, Line: 136 & 138) Maybe line 136 can be moved up above line 119 and line 138 can be removed altogether?

Thank you!

I am having the same problem described in the first entry on this thread (same stack trace).

I get System.Exception when I try to instantiate a Shieldbase object. 

I haven't tried re-flashing my Shieldbase yet, but I DID move it to port 3 as per Chris' suggestion above -- with no success.

Should I try to flash my Shieldbase firmware to Beta 7?

Have there been any further developments on this issue? Any help would be greatly appreciated. 

Thank you,

     - Dave Ferreira