February 21, 2011 by Marco Zennaro | No comments
New Sun SPOT ‘rev8′ Development Kits are now available
A Sun SPOT Java Development Kit includes 2 full Sun SPOT devices and a base station, as well as development tools, tutorials, sample code and accessories. A Sun SPOT device is built by stacking a Sun SPOT processor board with a sensor board and battery.
The main SPOT processor board has been redesigned. New features include:
- RAM memory increased to 1 Mb.
- Flash memory increased to 8 Mb.
- Now based on the 400MHz (2.226 times faster then the rev 6 speed).
- Access to the radio (CC2420) is now on a second SPI bus.
Three serial lines are now available:
- RX1/TX1 go to pads on processor board,
- RX0/TX0 go to RX/TX pin on sensor board,
- RX2/TX2 go to the top connector.
Power Controller microcontroller now provides a Watchdog timer that is accessible to SPOT applications for increased reliability.
2.4 GHz IEEE 802.15.4 radio with integrated antenna
USB interface
3.7V rechargeable 770 mAh lithium-ion battery
65 uA deep sleep mode
General Purpose Sensor Board
The SPOT sensor board has been redesigned. New features include:
- No temperature sensor on eDemo (use temperature sensor on main processor board).
- Now only 4 digital GPIO pins: D0-D3 (no D4).
- Now only 4 analog in lines: A0-A3 (no A4+A5). Sampling takes longer as done via ATmega microcontroller.
- New tri-color light sensor replaces old simple light sensor.
- New MMA7455L accelerometer replaces LIS3L02AQ accelerometer. New accelerometer has three scale ranges: 2/4/8G.
- I2C from sensor board output available on AVR SCL & SDA pins.
- New lo-fi audio speaker lets the SPOT now make sounds.
- New IR receiver (on SW1 input line) & IR transmitter (on SW1 input line).
- By default sensor board ATmega microcontroller now stays awake when main processor board is powered down for deep sleep, and can generate interrupts to wake SPOT up on pin changes, switch presses, etc.
- No longer support hardware threshold interrupts on acceleration, temperature or analog input. Use software monitoring instead.
- Tricolor LEDs now controlled directly by main processor board.
- Serial line from main processor board now available on RX/TX pins. Can also be level switched via SW3.
- I2C from main processor board now available on SCL & SDA pins. Can also be level switched via SW3.
Software:
- Squawk Virtual Machine
- Fully capable J2ME CLDC 1.1 Java VM with OS functionality
- VM executes directly out of flash memory
- Device drivers written in Java
- Automatic battery management
More info here.
