Review of the Propeller SchmartModule
Nick McClick
Posts: 1,003
At the expo, SchmartBoard / Parallax gave out the Propeller SchmartModule. I did a little writeup on it and took a few photos.
Here's the writeup
If anyone else has put it together, what were your thoughts?
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Here's the writeup
If anyone else has put it together, what were your thoughts?
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Comments
I was thinking as far as the breadboard connecting, you could solder male headers to the underside of the board instead of the female ones on top...and then just plug it in to the BB!
I haven't done this yet, and probably you would only be able to get one set of header pins to plug in, but thats how I'm going to give it a shot when I build it.
Rick
Thank you for the review.
My comments regarding the "great if" part of the review·- I actually don't think it's a great board for low-volume production. Building·15 of these·would put·us out of business.·I think it's a nice board if you really want to do SMT assembly (and I don't, especially without PhiPi's stencil solution!). SchmartBoard has made SMT feasible by hand with their pre-soldered pads. If you don't want to do SMT assembly then you really don't benefit by having this board - you should get a Prop Proto Board or something from the many suppliers on this forum. It is missing some handy connections like video and PS2 that many other pre-made and kit boards already include.
We will address the other issues you noted in the next revision:
- add labels to I/O pin sockets
You are correct about the reference to documention. This product was released out of order from our normal procedure. Because of UPEW and this week's activities (physical inventory count, building/office cleanup, year-end) we have not posted the for-sale SchmartBoard version and associated documentation on our web site yet but it will be available in a week or so after the smoke clears around here. The pre-release for UPEW attendees was exactly that - no documentation and just in time for UPEW! Brand new, just-in-time kitted part for the Prophead guests.
And a word to those who build P8X32A-Q44 SchmartBoards: don't expect it to program successfully upon completion. 9/10ths of the builds I've seen had various opens on them. Check all chip I/O to EEPROM, voltage regulator and programming pin connections and you'll find the problem.
Ken Gracey
Parallax
Personally, I was more intimidated by surface mount stuff than I should have been... This is a pretty good foot in the door for people wanting to try it. I think I would have gone with the larger EEPROM, which is as easy as the Prop to solder...
In reality, the Q44 is very easy to solder with any soldering iron and any board as long as you have some soldering wick to clean it up.
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My Prop Info&Apps: ·http://www.rayslogic.com/propeller/propeller.htm
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propmod_us and propmod_1x1 are in stock. Only $30. PCB available for $5
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The pcb must have extended pads on the outer edges to make hand soldering easy. Use a meter to check for adjacent pin shorts.
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Links to other interesting threads:
· Home of the MultiBladeProps: TriBladeProp, RamBlade, TwinBlade,·SixBlade, website
· Single Board Computer:·3 Propeller ICs·and a·TriBladeProp board (ZiCog Z80 Emulator)
· Prop Tools under Development or Completed (Index)
· Emulators: Micros eg Altair, and Terminals eg VT100 (Index) ZiCog (Z80), MoCog (6809)
· Search the Propeller forums (via Google)
My cruising website is: ·www.bluemagic.biz·· MultiBladeProp is: www.bluemagic.biz/cluso.htm
This was my first attempt at SM soldering - I was using a regular tip, but it worked out fine. I did short a few pins, but they were no problem fixing with the solder sucker. Mine fired up first time and I programmed the singing demo to test it.
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Just read that thread.
You'd better stay away from solder paste. Except you have a stenchil, an oven ...
Solder paste only has a shelf time of 1/2 year. Also, there's the risk of having zillions of small tin-balls on your bord. The problem is applying it in the right amount. And you'll almost certainly fail when you do that by hand.
SMD soldering by hand is *really* easy. A good regulated soldering iron with a fine tip (I prefer the chisel form, 0.6mm wdide) and some flux felt-pen (is "Fluxi" a known brand in the USofA?) and a thin (0,5 mm) soldering tin.
Pre-tin one pad, grab the part (get good tweezers like the Belzer-brand) and *slide* the part into the molten solder. Don't put it atop and press it down, you'll get splash that might short-circuit under the SMD (for Cs and Rs).
Parts like the Prop, I pre-tin one pad, put the IC onto its pads, and melt the tin. No need to press it down, just re-melt the tin. solder the opposing edge and go on.
In the meantime, I'm faster with SMD (0603) than with trough-hole parts.
You'll find videos on YouTube about how to solder the Prop in Q44 or ICs like these. It's no miracle, that method works like a charm. I didn't believe it first.
Edit: Here's one of the videos <
And here an easier way <
And here, for ICs with bigger spacing: <
Nick
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Never use force, just go for a bigger hammer!
The DIY Digital-Readout for mills, lathes etc.:
YADRO
Post Edited (Nick Mueller) : 7/1/2009 10:32:46 PM GMT
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propmod_us and propmod_1x1 are in stock. Only $30. PCB available for $5
Want to make projects and have Gadget Gangster sell them for you? propmod-us_ps_sd and propmod-1x1 are now available for use in your Gadget Gangster Projects.
Need to upload large images or movies for use in the forum. you can do so at uploader.propmodule.com for free.
- Some SMT parts are gratuitously small.· For a board of this density, there's no reason to use 0603 parts - they should all be 0805 or larger.
- There's no thermal relief on any of the pads that connect to the heavy power/ground traces/planes, making it more difficult than necessary to solder the tiny passives (nearly every two-pin part connects to power or ground on one or both ends).
- Parts are unnecessarily close to the edge of the board.
- I didn't find that the SchmartBoard Ez concept made it any easier to solder than an ordinary board.· As Ken reported, I found that after soldering the QFP according to the Schmartboard directions (from the website), that 3 of the 44 pins were not soldered.
- Having the board layed out to use SMT or THT parts is cool.· Including both sets of parts in the kit seemed more confusing than helpful, but I imagine that'll be much improved when there's more documentation, etc.
Personally, I wouldn't recommend building this as an all SMT board.· Of course, the chips are all SMT, but use the THT parts for everything else.
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-cd
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I'm completed building my Schmartboard using the SMD parts.
(Those sillly thru-hole things are sooooo big!!!)
I've posted pics for reference and parts Identification at:
picasaweb.google.com/smmoraco/BuildingThePropellerSchmartBoard
Yes, I'm even using the faster crystal thanks to Bill Henning!
Mikronauts.com
I enjoyed meeting those of you at UPEW. It certainly was great fun!
Regards,
Stephen, KZ0Q
Oh yes. I used plenty of flux, working with a very fine (0.3mm tip) soldering iron under a stereo microscope and I still ended up with 3 pins that were non-connected. I imagine that those 3 pins were very slightly bent so they weren't making contact with the board, just hovering ever so slightly above it. Those were a cinch to fix, and I always check every pin on high pin-count parts as a matter of habit. That said, had this been an ordinary board with a standard QFP footprint, I guarantee I would have had a good connection to every pin the first time. Normally, I solder parts like this with 0.015" solder, using fine solder wick to clean up any excess, but this time I specifically wanted to try out the Schmartboard EZ technique and it didn't live up to the marketing in my opinion.
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-cd
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propmod_us and propmod_1x1 are in stock. Only $30. PCB available for $5
Want to make projects and have Gadget Gangster sell them for you? propmod-us_ps_sd and propmod-1x1 are now available for use in your Gadget Gangster Projects.
Need to upload large images or movies for use in the forum. you can do so at uploader.propmodule.com for free.
I put the male headers in on J7 and stuck that in the mini bread board.
Worked on the first try.
Rick
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Yes, but it was your schmart!
BTW:
Is that "schmart" intended to sound German? If yes, why (if that's a valid question)?
I'm asking that out of curiosity and not because I'm German.
Nick
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Never use force, just go for a bigger hammer!
The DIY Digital-Readout for mills, lathes etc.:
YADRO
Look at their LogoGuy - Einstein was a fairly S(ch)Mart fellow --- and Ulm, W
LOL - Schmall world [noparse]:)[/noparse] sounds like what we used to say in Colorado:
" Howdee There ! "
- H
" PS: And sorry for OT! "
Ah yes, some of us (like me) can't resist thread drifting [noparse]:)[/noparse]
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Sounds quite the same! Funny! The "hawideere" is in fact "Habe die Ehre" (I do have the honor).
And the Bavarian slang for foam is ... Foam. Pronounced exactyl the same way. But this word is getting more and more forgotten.
Edit:
Languages can be quite fun! Be they English (Oxford or US) German, C, SPIN, or Chinese.
OK, 'nuff! But then, it doesn't hurt to hear something about other cultures.
Nick
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Never use force, just go for a bigger hammer!
The DIY Digital-Readout for mills, lathes etc.:
YADRO
"... Es flackern die Flammen,
es gaukelt der Schein um bunte
Gestalten
um Laub und Gestein.
Da ist der Zigeuner bewegliche Schaar,
mit blitzendem Aug'
und mit wallendem Haar,
ges
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24 bit LCD Breakout Board now in. $21.99 has backlight driver and touch sensitive decoder.
This is mostly academic, since I'll probably just use the TH parts, but I am curious.
Edit: One more question—are surface mount caps always unpolarized?
Post Edited (mpark) : 12/24/2009 8:05:58 PM GMT
Leon
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Amateur radio callsign: G1HSM
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24 bit LCD Breakout Board now in. $21.99 has backlight driver and touch sensitive decoder.
My first SchmartProp came from a supplier·and was advertised to arrive with memory but no crystal or prop - it was missing the memory, but had two crystals(?).· The second one came from the factory and had no prop, crystal or memory.·· So, be prepared by ordering an extra crystal and memory just in case·the initial stock of kit parts is incorrect.· An extra crystal and memory is a lot cheaper than extra freight and the frustration of waiting for additional parts.
The one thing that's missing from this cute little board is a three pin header hole suitable for power switch or for adding a connector for a remote power switch.
Edit: Never mind. According to my micrometer, the large caps are 0805s and everything else is 0603 (non-metric).
Post Edited (mpark) : 12/25/2009 7:08:06 AM GMT
Now, I want to build a custom shields for the project. But I can not find the PIN layout for the Schmartboard. It appears to be a mix of Imperial (pin to pin) and maybe Metric (header-to-hearder). I have attempted to scale and measure the Photos but with non-optimum results.
Is the Schmartboard header and part layout documented?
Thanks
Eldon