Hi, I wasn't sure what place to post this, so it may be a little off topic, but it sort of has to do with CPU's. (If you know a better place to ask about this, please let me know.)
I'm looking for a free (or very cheap) embedded type evaluation board and CPU. It will eventually be used for gathering outdoor temperature data and will transfer to a desktop computer. Here's the jist of what I want.
CPU - anything over 2MHz, preferably RISC, but I don't really care, as most code will be done in C. (I've used the motorolla 68HC11 before, but I believe they cost $).
Memory on board - I may only need 8K, but over 16K would be great.
Input - I'll want to set up 2 or 3 buttons just to set a clock and various other things. I also want a place to hookup a temperature sensor.
Output - need 2 binary outputs to hook some wires to. need a small LCD screen, maybe 2 lines of 16 chars. It would be great if there was an easy way to hook the board up via serial to a desktop, but then I'll have to figure out how to get raw data from it (build a driver?). 2 or 3 LEDs would be nice too.
That's all I can think of now. Does anyone know where I can get something like this for fairly cheap? I've heard of companies giving out evaluation boards, but don't know who does this. I don't need high quality parts or anything, it's more of a self project (and a Birthday present once it's done.)
----- end question, begin ramblings ----
For those who are curious, I just want to collect temperature data, save the data with a time stamp in memory (possibly holding data for a few days at a time until upload.), then every once in awhile, upload the data to desktop, where I can parse the data and put it into a database with a nice interface for looking at temperature variations, maybe some nice graphs and such. So on the board, I will need to be able to set the time (thus some buttons), and then press a button when I want to upload and clear the memory. I may also have an option of how often to save the temperature data in memory.
I'm going to look for a temperature sensor that can be attached to a long (weatherproof) wire to go outside. For uploading, I hope to be able to get raw data from a serial line, but I don't know how to do that yet. Another idea I had (a dirty hack, just an idea, bear with me here), is to take apart a mouse, connect two wires from the board to where the mouse buttons attach to a wire, and simulate left and right mouse clicks (highjack the mouse driver, not sure about the voltages used though??). then I would just have a GUI in python or something to gather my unary encoded data from the clicks, and parse that for the info. I have reason to believe that won't work, but it may be worth a try
Thanks for any help or direction.
I'm looking for a free (or very cheap) embedded type evaluation board and CPU. It will eventually be used for gathering outdoor temperature data and will transfer to a desktop computer. Here's the jist of what I want.
CPU - anything over 2MHz, preferably RISC, but I don't really care, as most code will be done in C. (I've used the motorolla 68HC11 before, but I believe they cost $).
Memory on board - I may only need 8K, but over 16K would be great.
Input - I'll want to set up 2 or 3 buttons just to set a clock and various other things. I also want a place to hookup a temperature sensor.
Output - need 2 binary outputs to hook some wires to. need a small LCD screen, maybe 2 lines of 16 chars. It would be great if there was an easy way to hook the board up via serial to a desktop, but then I'll have to figure out how to get raw data from it (build a driver?). 2 or 3 LEDs would be nice too.
That's all I can think of now. Does anyone know where I can get something like this for fairly cheap? I've heard of companies giving out evaluation boards, but don't know who does this. I don't need high quality parts or anything, it's more of a self project (and a Birthday present once it's done.)
----- end question, begin ramblings ----
For those who are curious, I just want to collect temperature data, save the data with a time stamp in memory (possibly holding data for a few days at a time until upload.), then every once in awhile, upload the data to desktop, where I can parse the data and put it into a database with a nice interface for looking at temperature variations, maybe some nice graphs and such. So on the board, I will need to be able to set the time (thus some buttons), and then press a button when I want to upload and clear the memory. I may also have an option of how often to save the temperature data in memory.
I'm going to look for a temperature sensor that can be attached to a long (weatherproof) wire to go outside. For uploading, I hope to be able to get raw data from a serial line, but I don't know how to do that yet. Another idea I had (a dirty hack, just an idea, bear with me here), is to take apart a mouse, connect two wires from the board to where the mouse buttons attach to a wire, and simulate left and right mouse clicks (highjack the mouse driver, not sure about the voltages used though??). then I would just have a GUI in python or something to gather my unary encoded data from the clicks, and parse that for the info. I have reason to believe that won't work, but it may be worth a try
Thanks for any help or direction.