Hello "nedelcu bogdan".
I've been meaning to stay out of this discussion as my opinion would be obviously biased, but when you started getting a bit too defensive, I thought it would be a good time to step in.
So let's take a look at what you are offering with your (made in China I presume) but still expensive hardware.
> The micro used is STM32F103C8T6, it has 72MHz, 64Kb Flash, 20Kb RAM, also on the same board can be used
the STM32F103CBT6 128Kb Flash!
Yes, we know. 5 year old MCU with great set of peripherals that I still use in many (including commercial) projects/products.
By now, everyone who wanted to program for one of these either got a STM32-Discovery ($9.90) or similar cheap evalboard from ST and has used it.
> The price of this micro is lower than any ATMEL or Freescale micros with the same speed/flash ammount.
Everyone who hasn't been living under a Tarduino rock for the last decade has been aware of that, too.
> Most of the pins are 5V enabled.
Actually, about 3/4. Not most. And sending 5V to those that are not will instantly fry the MCU. Don't ask me how I know.
> The bootloader helps updating the software in an easy maner.
Bootloader on 64k device? How big is it? It has to be in multiple of flash pages, so let's say you wrote half the USB stack in assembly and its 4kbytes.
> We will publish free the Eagle files for the board, and the bootloader source. It's a must now to still keep these closed until
kickstarter project ends.
What does your bootloader do? DFU? ST publishes DFU bootloader sample source code. When I wanted to use it, it took about 5 minutes to get it running on a STM32F1 evalboard. Is it maple-like serial which listens to a certain pattern of bytes + modem control line that will require using your USB implementation in order to reboot it from userspace? Or maybe its something like mbed that shows up as USB-MSC masstorage and lets you "drag and drop" the firmware? In that case I kind of doubt you've got it fit int 4K of flash. Which brings me to the next point,
The main reason why I won't touch AVR or similar trash MCU is because of lack of on-chip debugging. Uploading code and debugging with printf is so fucking 2 decades ago. But you will say, AVR has JTAG and you can sorta debug over PDI and and and and AVR Dragon has some debugging capabilities or something like that, but then you'll notice how AVR Dragon takes 30 seconds to flash 256k device and you'll be like: NO THANKS. If it takes that long to program I don't wanna find out how shitslow the debugging is. Not to mention that JTAG pins aren't dedicated on AVR, so if you wanna debug a small-pin count package, better not use those for GPIO. And it requires full JTAG, so you're wasting like 5 or 6 pins for this shit. No thanks, again.
So, where does your board fit in this picture? It's a breakout for 48pin STM32F103CB. The same shit I have in my shop for $10, not for $63. Instead of wasting time w/developing some proprietary bootloader, I just use ROM-based STM32 USART bootloader that comes free w/any STM32 and threw in a USB>serial chip on the board for that purpose. Firmware for printf debugging can be loaded using ST's FlashLoader or stm32flash if you're a Lunix dweeb, etc. So, no flash is stolen for bootloader. But wait, there's more. On the bottom, there's actually SWD debug connector, which lets me hookup STLink or Jlink or BlackMagicProbe or any other SWD-compatible debugger and ACTUALLY DEBUG/STEP THROUGH THE CODE ON THE HARDWARE. I guess when your project does something more than blink a couple leds, you might find this feature kind of useful.
When I first saw your stuff on dickstarter, I pasted it on irc in the channels I hang out in and laughed.
"What a bunch of idiots, why the fuck are they selling a STM32F103C8 breakout for 22GBP." That was more or less exactly what I said. You're bringing absolutely no innovation to ARM development. Hardware is piss-easy to make. Breakoutboards even more so. Any idiot with a freetard copy of Eagle (that's because this is what all opensores dudes seem to use, completely ignoring the fact that its filthy commercial software) can make a breakout board for $MCUX in half a day, even if he has never done anything electronic in his entire life.
Then I saw you talk shit about teensy3 in dickstarter comments (which deserves a whole LOT of shittalking, but I'll save that for another rant). You know, unlike YOUR shit, teensy3 actually HAS a on-board debugger. Which your shitty board lacks. So given a choice between wanting to do serious development (that would most likely require onchip debugging) and your board and teensy, guess which one I would pick?
So here's my suggestion: Take your dickstarter and shove it somewhere. I hope you will fail (which you probably will), and meanwhile I'll be selling my hand-assembled $10 stm32 breakout boards that cost me more in assembly time (you know, which isn't worthless) than I have them in the shop for.
> The board from abusemark page it's not easy to get, they are in Japan or someting. We are in England, in europe.
Airmail (which costs like $4) from Japan to "England, Europe" arrives in 4 days.
> Also we give software examples for most of the pheriperals. That one from abusemark came with ZERO examples. Also to programm abusemark board you need flash loader demonstrator tool from ST. The MatchboxARM doesn't need any software/ hardware. So, again the MatchboxARM it's way better.
I'm not targeting my hardware at idiots. If you are incapable of reading datasheets, and want to use tarduino-like environment to code shit in, just stay with tarduino. Running same shit code on "72MHz" hardware isn't gonna change anything. So why bother. See my previous comments re: bootloader.
> Also before posting lies on the forum check the afrodevices and crius both with the same STM32F103C8T6 just like the MatchboxARM. Both have enough memory on 64k to have the multiwii port for arm working great.
Please stop telling lies.
C8T6 has 64K by FLASH_SIZE register but hardware actually has 128K usable. Also, please link me to "STM32-based Crius" because all I've seen them push out is tarduino garbage.
nedelcu bogdan wrote:Listen "brm" men, the Naze32 is 64 bucks. The MatchboxARM is only 22 bucks, and if you know the aliexpress site (coz you know better to buy things from China) you can get the MPU6050 for 4 bucks. So 22+4=26. The Naze32 can only be used for flying devices, not as a tool to learn programming. So you don't have any arguments. MatchboxARM it's way better.
I price my hardware exactly how I want to price it, because I am involved in every step of its production, instead of sending shit off to China and declaring victory. When you can price small-volume production at near cost, let me know, and I'll be sure to use you for next batch I'm making.
Also, it's not "$63 bucks".
https://www.google.com/search?q=5500+JPY+to+USDOr you can try "GBP" or your favorite currency.
> Best regards!
> Bogdan from MatchboxARM team.
It's nice that google will index this post quickly, and people searching for your shit will see how much of an asshole you are
Have fun failing.