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Hi there! Neat project! Can you give us a rundown of some of its features? Which processor are you using? Do you intend to sell these or are you only creati

by maxk42 4y ago

Hi there! Neat project! Can you give us a rundown of some of its features? Which processor are you using? Do you intend to sell these or are you only creating a prototype?

reerdna 4y ago
Thank you! Not many features of note - it runs arbitrary lisp code, has a simple graphics interface. You can save and load code and data/text files to SD card. The processor is the Ambiq Apollo3 Blue, which is really what makes running arbitrary code with such low power consumption possible. 48/96MHz, 384k of RAM. https://ambiq.com/apollo3-blue/ https://ambiq.com/apollo3-blue/ There's an Apollo4 which is faster and has way more memory, but it's a tiny BGA chip which doesn't have an Arduino core and I don't have the skills to work with that (yet ...) I hope to create a PCB for it at least, it would make the device tiny and sleek and make it a lot easier for others to reproduce. But I haven't been able to learn PCB design yet.
- aidenn0 4y ago
  The Apollo4 can also attach QSPI SRAM which could allow adding more RAM and perhaps allow running common lisp...
  - kragen 4y ago
    Available QSPI SRAMs seem to consume a lot more power than the Apollo4 or Apollo3 itself, and because they're also slower, they increase the processor's duty cycle, which makes it use more power itself (except when the user is waiting on it, I guess, or you're running a background compute task).
- zrobotics 4y ago
  I'm not a professional, but have done some pcb layout for hobby projects. Are you looking for collaborators, or are you wanting to keep this a personal project? If so, I can be reached at my username@(googles mail platform). One other thing, I don't see the stl/cad files for the case anywhere, I assume you're still iterating on that. Very cool project!
  - reerdna 4y ago
    Yes, I'd love some help with it, or it would probably take me years. Schematics and stls (made in tinkercad) will be coming once I find the time. For now I'm spending too much time replying to comments but I'm enjoying the dopamine
    - zrobotics 4y ago
      No worries, enjoy the front page! If you can get me even napkin drawings of your hookups, I can do schematics. I work in kicad, and step 1 of a board layout is to do schematics, so it isn't much additional work to lay out the schematics nicely enough for publication.

by maxk42 4y ago

Hi there! Neat project! Can you give us a rundown of some of its features? Which processor are you using? Do you intend to sell these or are you only creating a prototype?

reerdna 4y ago

Thank you! Not many features of note - it runs arbitrary lisp code, has a simple graphics interface. You can save and load code and data/text files to SD card. The processor is the Ambiq Apollo3 Blue, which is really what makes running arbitrary code with such low power consumption possible. 48/96MHz, 384k of RAM. https://ambiq.com/apollo3-blue/ https://ambiq.com/apollo3-blue/ There's an Apollo4 which is faster and has way more memory, but it's a tiny BGA chip which doesn't have an Arduino core and I don't have the skills to work with that (yet ...) I hope to create a PCB for it at least, it would make the device tiny and sleek and make it a lot easier for others to reproduce. But I haven't been able to learn PCB design yet.

aidenn0 4y ago
The Apollo4 can also attach QSPI SRAM which could allow adding more RAM and perhaps allow running common lisp...
- kragen 4y ago
  Available QSPI SRAMs seem to consume a lot more power than the Apollo4 or Apollo3 itself, and because they're also slower, they increase the processor's duty cycle, which makes it use more power itself (except when the user is waiting on it, I guess, or you're running a background compute task).
zrobotics 4y ago
I'm not a professional, but have done some pcb layout for hobby projects. Are you looking for collaborators, or are you wanting to keep this a personal project? If so, I can be reached at my username@(googles mail platform). One other thing, I don't see the stl/cad files for the case anywhere, I assume you're still iterating on that. Very cool project!
- reerdna 4y ago
  Yes, I'd love some help with it, or it would probably take me years. Schematics and stls (made in tinkercad) will be coming once I find the time. For now I'm spending too much time replying to comments but I'm enjoying the dopamine
  - zrobotics 4y ago
    No worries, enjoy the front page! If you can get me even napkin drawings of your hookups, I can do schematics. I work in kicad, and step 1 of a board layout is to do schematics, so it isn't much additional work to lay out the schematics nicely enough for publication.