Posted by Martin Welford & filed under .NET Micro Framework.

.NET Micro Framework

There has been a lot of press regarding changes at Microsoft in the last few days.  Today, Colin Miller clarified what the changes mean for the Micro Framework: 

I need to correct a recent announcement of the demise of the Micro Framework.  There are changes taking place on the team but they are all for the good.

First, the product is moving into the Developer Division (Server and Tools).  This is a great fit for the technology and we are really looking forward to it.  The move means that we will be fully aligned with the rest of the .NET groups and tools in building the uniform programming model from the sensors to servers.

The announcement that we are moving to some form of community direction and development including code access is accurate.  We will investigate how to do that in the near term so stay tuned.  For now however, the current products are available and continue to be supported as before.

I am really excited about the potential of really accelerating the changes in the industry that we see coming.  I hope that you are as excited as I am.  Please let me know if you have any questions.

For those concerned about the level of support from Microsoft, I can confirm that we are still receiving support and that Microsoft is working on a number of issues we have reported (including the SD card corruption issue).

On a personal note, I understand some of the team will be looking for work.  I have enjoyed working with many members of the Micro Framework team over the last couple of years and wish them all the best for finding work.

Device Solutions is (of course) still committed to the .NET Micro Framework and as excited as Colin about being a part of it!

Posted by Martin Welford & filed under .NET Micro Framework.

Announcing Meridian/P

We are very pleased to be able to announce the Meridian/P Micro Dev Kit!

Meridian/P is a prototype-friendly version of the Meridian CPU.  Now you can create small prototypes without needing a surface mount line.

Meridian/P

Key features are:

  • Same i.MXS processor and memory (4MBytes Flash, 8MBytes RAM) as the Meridian CPU
  • USB connector for powering the board and application download and debug.
  • 0.1″ headers for expansion. Two of these have the same pin-out as the EXP connectors on Tahoe-II.
  • Kit includes USB cable and 0.1″ pin headers you can solder on as required
  • Schmartboard compatible form-factor for rapid prototyping with fine pitch surface mount components

All the details are available here, including data sheets and mechanical drawings. 

Meridian/P will be available from our web shop and shipping to distributors on May 18.

And the price: US$99.

Posted by Martin Welford & filed under .NET Micro Framework, Tahoe.

Announcing the Tahoe-II Development Kit!

We are very pleased to announce that we have a new dev kit coming in a few weeks time!

The Tahoe-II is a sequel to the very popular original kit.  It retains the Meridian CPU at the core, and still includes lots of way to prototype new devices.  There is of course, lots of new stuff on board too!  This version has a larger LCD screen (3.5″ with touch!), along with Ethernet and an Accelerometer on-board.  Other features include an SD card slot for memory cards and a socket for an XBee wireless module.  The product page has more details.

Expect to see this kit available at our distributors from early November.
If you live outside areas covered by our distributors, you can pre-order from our web shop now!
And the price – US$399.  Same as the original Tahoe!

Posted by Martin Welford & filed under .NET Micro Framework, Tahoe.

DPWS on Tahoe (and new features!)

We have just released new firmware for the TAHOE_NET and TAHOE-II boards.   Download it here.
The main reason for this release was to fix a networking bug that prevented DPWS working.  However, we also slipped in a couple of new features:

Access to the i.MXS registers
You can now read and write to the registers on the processor to setup features that we don’t directly support.   You need to install a new version of the SDK to gain access to this feature.

Debug Transport Selection
We have enabled serial and TCP/IP for the download/debug transport.  To select a new transport, hold down the following button and press reset:

  • SW2 for serial
  • SW3 for USB
  • SW4 for Ethernet (TCP/IP)

You only need to do this once.  The new settings are stored in flash.

There are a couple of limitations:
1. The Firmware Update application only supports USB, do you need to change back to that before you do an update.
2. TCP/IP is not supported for the bootloader (for security reasons). If you want to change anything that uses the bootloader (network settings or USB name for example), you need to switch to serial or USB first.

Posted by Martin Welford & filed under .NET Micro Framework, Tahoe.

Ball-in-Maze for Tahoe-II

If you have a Tahoe-II board, we have good news!  An updated version of the ball-in-maze game is available for download.  It includes a driver for the on-board Freescale MMA7455 accelerometer.   This driver makes use of the FusionWare SPOT library which you can download here.

Posted by Martin Welford & filed under .NET Micro Framework, Tahoe.

New Tahoe-II firmware

We have just updated the Tahoe-II firmware.    This release adds file system support and fixes a number of issues with the SPI bus.   

When using the file system, the key limitation to be aware of is that the SD card you use must be formatted with FAT32 and NOT contain a Master Boot Record (MBR).  You can re-format cards under Windows to FAT32, but Windows will not remove the MBR.  We have a utility that will do this (scroll to the bottom of the download page), but please use it with extreme care!  It’s early days for the Micro Framework file system and future releases will fix some of these issues.

Posted by Martin Welford & filed under Blog.

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