username 198 Posted March 6, 2013 Share Posted March 6, 2013 Larissa, thanks for taking the time to explain some of the background info to us. Communication effort on the part of the manufacture is greatly appreciated and shows us your listening! I could only accomplish by getting good partners-->and the only way to get good partners... was frankly-- help them make money I'd say 43oh.com & its awesome members are quite decent partners to have for making the 430 ecosystem grow & even in the educational realm. Do note that the majority of us have no interest in making mega bucks off the msp430 and we all were certainly okay with that. Were all in this simply because its fun. Many of us enjoy working on a MCU development platform that was sub par to none in terms of price point. The price point of this platform inspired us to teach other members, write documentation for it, and create boosterpacks...ect. While you may gain some members with this move you will certainly lose others. Because as many members have already mentioned, more than doubling the price simply isn't competitive with what already exists out there. Don't forget your original member base! There was something significantly novel about you and your friends being able to develop on micro controllers for just $4.30. RobG, cde, LariSan and 1 other 4 Quote Link to post Share on other sites
roadrunner84 466 Posted March 6, 2013 Share Posted March 6, 2013 I do understand TI's standpoint; if there is no way for a company to make profit reselling launchpads, why would they bother supporting it. Educational programmes are very important for eny technology to get foot on the ground, it there is no way for schools/universities to get a discount because the launchpad is already at the lowest price it can get, there is no point in building educational kits. As a hobby engineer I'm disappointed that the price is going up, but I understand that there must be a price rise to enable companies to develop kits. It's still a shame though. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
yyrkoon 250 Posted March 6, 2013 Share Posted March 6, 2013 Yeah, as I said there are multiple aspects to look at this from. I do still think there is value in the platform, at this cost. And I do tend to be super critical on bad points( you should hear me criticize myself sometimes ), but in reality, the launchpad is capable of so much. Just the point where the launchpad can be used to program other chips even outside of the value line is not to be understated. Hell, people have even used the launchpad to program AVR chips( maybe others too, but this is the only one i have noticed yet ), which may be considered ironic, but is *very* cool in concept. Now concerning the price versus the Stellaris launchpad . . . to me this is a non issue. They're both relatively inexpensive, and they're two totally different platforms used for totally different things. The "SPAD" just takes things to a whole new level, and from my own perspective, is also much more complex to deal with in return. The same could be said for many of the other brand name "cheap" experimenter's kits. Plus some of these other branded kits, the overall cost is much higher than just the kit its self. To get started. On the other hand, some of these other kits also have a lot to offer in of themselves. But usually at a much higher total cost ( programmer / debugger, compiler options, less easy to use ect). On a personal level though, the only thing that worries me, is how the community as a whole feels. $4.30 might have got my foot in the door, but the community is the only reason why I have stayed. By this, I mean *this* community. Here and on IRC. And I have checked out other platforms, only to be totally turned off by the community, so I just "bailed". Anyway . . . Quote Link to post Share on other sites
kenyee 5 Posted March 7, 2013 Share Posted March 7, 2013 I've always thought TI's MSP430 Launchpad came out of the "marketing" budget. Do you guys seriously think they're making money on it even if it's at the "horrible" $10? I ordered it last year and was surprised I got free shipping. I was doubly surprised I got free Fedex 3 day shipping! That's crazy. There's no way they're making money on this, so the only thing that made sense was it was written off as "marketing"...so if people experiment on it and find it to be useful, they'd use it in real-life high-volume commercial projects (and I have recommended it on a few I was on after comparing it's interrupt response and power usage w/ the PIC chips)....the commercial projects are how they make their real money... I'd actually like to see slightly higher cost Launchpads for the wireless MSP430 controllers...Bluetooth LE, Zigbee sensors, etc. would be interesting to prototype with... I do understand TI's standpoint; if there is no way for a company to make profit reselling launchpads, why would they bother supporting it Quote Link to post Share on other sites
RobG 1,892 Posted March 7, 2013 Share Posted March 7, 2013 How about this, split LP board in two, MSP430G-EV debugger board and MSP430G-TB target board. Sell EV + TB for $10 and additional TBs for $4.30. energia, GeekDoc, adrianF and 1 other 4 Quote Link to post Share on other sites
cde 334 Posted March 7, 2013 Share Posted March 7, 2013 How about this, split LP board in two, MSP430G-EV debugger board and MSP430G-TB target board. Sell EV + TB for $10 and additional TBs for $4.30. 250px-LP.jpg So basically do what they did for the abandoned ez430? Quote Link to post Share on other sites
roadrunner84 466 Posted March 7, 2013 Share Posted March 7, 2013 As an alternative approach: leave the LP board as is and develop 3rd party target boards with LP-like layout. The target part is just a breakout board (plus two LEDs, two buttons, power connector and crystal pads), so a cheap PCB fab board or even experimenter print would work just fine. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
CorB 64 Posted March 7, 2013 Share Posted March 7, 2013 If I am not wrong (not too much of an hardware person) we only need a 5 pin connection between the programmer section of a launchpad and the board to be programmed. A simple PCB with a location for a DIP socket with all pins expanded to the same locations as on the normal launchpad (for existing boosterpacks) and a female connector for the 5 pins to the programmer is all we need. If the free space on the board would be set up as a protoboard it would allow easy programming and easy prototyping and still have all functionality we are used to. If people want to power through USB a usb connector would help ... But maybe I am seeing this too simplistic as I am more a software person. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
oPossum 1,083 Posted March 7, 2013 Share Posted March 7, 2013 http://forum.43oh.com/topic/2481-launchpad-mini-revision-3/ http://forum.43oh.com/topic/2482-3-way-50x50mm-proto-board/ Have been working on a low cost FET for use with those. Couldn't touch the $4.30 price point, but that has ended. CorB 1 Quote Link to post Share on other sites
cde 334 Posted March 7, 2013 Share Posted March 7, 2013 If I am not wrong (not too much of an hardware person) we only need a 5 pin connection between the programmer section of a launchpad and the board to be programmed. A simple PCB with a location for a DIP socket with all pins expanded to the same locations as on the normal launchpad (for existing boosterpacks) and a female connector for the 5 pins to the programmer is all we need. If the free space on the board would be set up as a protoboard it would allow easy programming and easy prototyping and still have all functionality we are used to. If people want to power through USB a usb connector would help ... But maybe I am seeing this too simplistic as I am more a software person. 6 pins actually (well 4 (or 3) to program). The Launchpad does not have all 6. It has Rx/Tx, Vcc, Test, and Reset. The needed ones are VCC, Test, Reset, and Ground, and even VCC is optional if you have on board power. It lacks a ground pin on the connection header. The mini unpopulated header for ez430 compatibility does have it though. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
CorB 64 Posted March 7, 2013 Share Posted March 7, 2013 http://forum.43oh.com/topic/2481-launchpad-mini-revision-3/ http://forum.43oh.com/topic/2482-3-way-50x50mm-proto-board/ Have been working on a low cost FET for use with those. Couldn't touch the $4.30 price point, but that has ended. THANKS I was looking for a crossover of these. So with a direct connection to the programming pins as in the mini-revision but with a lot of space for prototyping. But maybe I should finally also starting thinking hardware Quote Link to post Share on other sites
roadrunner84 466 Posted March 7, 2013 Share Posted March 7, 2013 If we go on that track; use the fine pitch connector on the side. That's the old connector from the ez430, but at least that doesn't change from revision to revision (as does the jumper header between the emulation and the target part). Still, I'd like to quote cde: So basically do what they did for the abandoned ez430? I don't know what the reason is for abandoning the ez430, I kinda liked it (in the pre-lauchpad era), a full programmer and uart interface the size of a (hefty) USB thumb drive. And somehow I think it could be cheaper than the emulation part of the launchpad. It carries the exact same hardware as the launchpad. The schematics are identical for the launchpad and the ez430. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
oPossum 1,083 Posted March 7, 2013 Share Posted March 7, 2013 Abandoned eZ430? All four versions are still available, and a fifth target board will be soon. http://www.ti.com/lsds/ti/microcontroller/16-bit_msp430/hardware_and_software.page?DCMP=MSP430&HQS=Tools+OT+ez430#eZ430 Quote Link to post Share on other sites
cde 334 Posted March 7, 2013 Share Posted March 7, 2013 Abandoned eZ430? All four versions are still available, and a fifth target board will be soon. http://www.ti.com/lsds/ti/microcontroller/16-bit_msp430/hardware_and_software.page?DCMP=MSP430&HQS=Tools+OT+ez430#eZ430 According to the information I found on the ti wiki (and website, and digikey), the ez430 sticks only supports a very limited number of 430's, not including the valueline chips. eZ430 debugging and programming interface Supports development with all 2xx Spy Bi-Wire devices (MSP430F20xx, F21x2, F22xx) Supports eZ430-T2012 and eZ430-RF2500T target boards It only supports devices released before it was, as far as the ez430u r2.0 stick is concerned. There has never been an update to add new chips to it's emulator/programmer. Effectively cuts out all the value line updates. I call that abandoned, pretty much in favor of the launchpad. And while the ez430u has the uart tx/rx pins (the target board doesn't use them), no idea if they actually work (Though I suppose I could loop them to test. Todo list.) Oh, and it seems that the price for the ez430 might be going up to !40! and the f2012 target boards to 15? According to the same page that we first saw the Launchpad go up to 9.99. (Short link, www.ti.com/ez430 ) Quote Link to post Share on other sites
oPossum 1,083 Posted March 7, 2013 Share Posted March 7, 2013 Yes, device support is limited. I am working on a fix for that. The price for the F2013 kit is $24 on the order page. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
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