Fred

@@abecedarian That does say it's for LC sensors but I'll definitely take a look.

That was quick! I suspect mine may spend a little while getting to the UK. I hope it doesn't get stuck in customs whilst they demand taxes, handling fees, etc. I've been enjoying reading up on the ESI. It seems quite difficult to start with and I was beginning to wonder if it was actually more complicated than one of the smaller MSP430s. The reference designs actually make things clearer than the datasheet. Well worth looking at.

Wlist waiting for my kit (Thanks, TI!) I've been doing some reading up on the ESI. It's quite a daunting peripheral to start with. I was starting to wonder if the ESI alone was more complicated than some of the simpler MSP430s. However, reading the datasheet along with the very helpful reference designs makes things much easier. Simplifying things greatly the ESI is designed to keep both your sensors and MCU powered down most of the time. It powers the sensors up periodically, takes readings and processes these without having to bother your processor. The reference designs are based round op

So....Temboo generates an Energia sketch, which generates some C code, which generates machine code, which actually runs on the device. It's all getting a little bit too meta code for me!

I saw that in an email I just received from ST and thought it sounded impressive. It didn't mention the price though! I guess if you really need (rather than just want) paper thin then you'd be happy to pay that.

There can be a lot of noise in automotive systems but I can't imagine ground will be a problem. I assume your MSP430's ground will already be connected to it anyway.

I must confess I started my career many years ago as an Access developer. It has its place. And I got a lot of work out of building something proper once something that had been created in Access or Excel had started to creak.

Oooooh. I'd slap him for that! ;-)

One thing lasers aren't great for is making PCBs. It's possible to use black spray paint on copper class board and laser it off before etching, but to be honest there are easier ways to do it. Laser cutting or drilling FR4 doesn't work that well either. You can use it to make Mylar solder stencils though.

My ESI project entry should be a fairly simple one. The first sentence describing the ESI is as follows: "The Extended Scan Interface (ESI) peripheral automatically scans sensors and measures linear or rotational motion." Luckily that's exactly what I'll be doing. I won't be pushing the ESI to its limits or bending it to some cool new purpose. However that should mean that I'll be able to get a clear idea of what the ESI does and how to use it properly. My project is to measure the flow and temperature of the coolant in my laser cutter. It's one of the cheap DC-K40 ones that you see all ove

Well now I'm confused!

The learning curve on the ESI looks steep. I'm currently in hospital after a hernia operation. (Actually typing this from my hospital bed.) Now may be a good time to get some reading done!

That's great. I had a feeling that with 7 entries they might do that rather than disappoint two.

I'm not sure I have any need for one of these, but will definitely be following your Kickstarter with interest. I'll probably back it anyway and wonder what to do with it later.

That's what I thought. Those LQFP ZIF socket boards are surprisingly expensive and seem to only be compatible with a few MSP430s (for the programming interface at least). The ESI does seem to be a peripheral that will be hard to get the best out of. I think we're supposed to be creating the ESI for dummies guide.

One of those "why didn't I think of it" simple things. I'm sure you can buy blades like that rather than modify them though.

I agree. I'm guessing it's not used much as nobody knows exactly what they could do with it. Probably why TI thought that a few sample project from 43oh members would be a good showcase. @@Foghorn @@chicken I'd agree when if your goal is getting something built then you'll pick the right tool for the job. However sometimes the goal is to get to know your way around a certain tool / device, in which case fitting the job round the tool is just fine.

Is there any practical green-wire fix you could apply to the board to work with the 62175? It looks a bit small for that but worth considering if you have a few of them.

If you can use the ESI to read from an accelerometer and gyro, and help to implement the Kalman filter to combine them and a PID controller to make use them then I'll be very impressed. That would be really useful for self balancers, quadcopters, etc.

Nice. Is imagined that the outer 12 LEDs would be used to display the hour, rather than being permanently on. I suppose then it wouldn't really look right when it's 5 to the hour for instance.

True - PCBs are not actually intended to be visible. Is just us that like to see what we've put all that effort into.

Mine project would be to monitor coolant flow and temperature for my laser cutter. The quickest way to destroy a laser is to run it without the coolant flowing and overheat the tube. Unfortunately the cheap Chinese 40W CO2 lasers you get on eBay have and entirely separate water pump that you have to remember to switch on manually. Forgetting to switch it on (or if it gets blocked / too hot) and your tube is quickly fried. I know this is well within the capabilities of a simpler MSP430 just counting pulses from a hall effect sensor, but the ESI sounds perfect for the job and would leave the res

Wow. That's quite a complicated peripheral - or at least it seems so from the datasheet. I've got a project that includes flow monitoring but it seems a little bit too simple to need ESI. I might write it up anyway. We just enter the idea in this thread now and write up in the projects section later, is that right?

I remember seeing your creepy eyes last year and thinking that I must do something similar. So much on at the moment that I'm worried I might be too late.

My initial thoughts (which may be way off): - GPS won't be accurate enough. It can typically gives position down to a few metres. If there's this much error for both the user and the drone then the video would be awful. - It's on Kickstarter. It probably doesn't work yet, and maybe never will.