Development Boards

Disclaimer: The information about the development boards is completely taken from their corresponding websites. Please check the websites for the updated versions (if any available). This section is only meant to share the information of some of the development boards, I have either used or found good for the project development purpose.

1. Raspberry Pi 3 Model B

It is small computer on single board which can run multiple type of OS like Linux, Windows, etc. As working with ROS (Robot operating system) needs Linux OS, Raspberry pi 3 is one of the handy solutions for such applications. The specifications are given below.

  • Quad Core 1.2GHz Broadcom BCM2837 64bit CPU
  • 1GB RAM
  • BCM43438 wireless LAN and Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) on board
  • 100 Base Ethernet
  • 40-pin extended GPIO
  • 4 USB 2 ports
  • 4 Pole stereo output and composite video port
  • Full size HDMI
  • CSI camera port for connecting a Raspberry Pi camera
  • DSI display port for connecting a Raspberry Pi touchscreen display
  • Micro SD port for loading your operating system and storing data
  • Upgraded switched Micro USB power source up to 2.5A

2. Arduino Mega2560

The Arduino MEGA 2560 is designed for projects that require more I/O lines, more sketch memory and more RAM. It is the recommended board for 3D printers and robotics projects. It gives the projects plenty of room and opportunities maintaining the simplicity and effectiveness of the Arduino platform

  • Atmega 2560 Microcontroller
  • 5V operating voltage
  • 7-12V input voltage
  • 54 Digital input/output pins of which 14 has PWM output
  • 16 Analog input pins
  • 256 KB of flash Memory
  • 8 KB SRAM, 4KB EEPROM
  • @ 16 MHz
  • On board Led for testing
  • USB connectivity

3. STM32F407VG

STM32F407 is based on the high-performance ARM®Cortex®-M4 32-bit RISC core operating at a frequency of up to 168 MHz. The Cortex-M4 core features a Floating point unit (FPU) single precision which supports all ARM single-precision data-processing instructions and data types. It also implements a full set of DSP instructions and a memory protection unit (MPU) which enhances application security. It can be used for advanced applications. During on of my Team projects during Masters, this board is used in the research project of development of e-Bike. (Electronic Motorcycle). Some of the specifications are given below.

  • Up to 1 Mbyte of Flash memory
  • Up to 192+4 Kbytes of SRAM including 64-Kbyte of CCM (core coupled memory) data RAM
  • 1.8 V to 3.6 V application supply and I/Os
  • 3×12-bit, 2.4 MSPS A/D converters: up to 24 channels and 7.2 MSPS in triple interleaved mode
  • 2×12-bit D/A converters
  • Up to 140 I/O ports with interrupt capability
  • Up to 15 communication interfaces (I2C, USART, SPI, CAN)
  • USB 2.0 high-speed/full-speed device/host/OTG controller with dedicated DMA
  • 10/100 Ethernet MAC with dedicated DMA
  • 8- to 14-bit parallel camera interface up to 54 Mbytes/s

4. TI MSP430 Launch Pad

This development board is good for rapid prototyping. One can quickly add features like wireless connectivity, graphical displays, environmental sensing,and much more..The Launch Pad development kit features an integrated DIP target socket that supports up to 20 pins,allowing MSP430 Value Line devices to be plugged into the Launch Pad development kit. The MSP-EXP430G2 Launch Pad development kit comes with an MSP430G2553 Microcontroller by default.

  • 16 bit onboard MSP430G2553 microcontroller
  • 16KB of flash, 512 bytes of RAM
  • up to 16 MHz CPU speed
  • 10 bit ADC
  • capacitive touch enabled I/Os
  • USB debugging and programming driverless interface
  • Supports PDIP14 and PDIP20 packages
  • 2 general purpose Led and one push button
  • 20 pin socket to plug in or out the microcontroller device