7 ms·

Out of curiousity does anyone use any of these style devices? And if so what for?

RankingMember 13y ago
Yeah these sort of "look at how small this fully functional computer is" pieces always make me wonder if they have a real world appeal or if they're more a proof-of-concept or tech demo to pull people's attention to the company's other products.
em3rgent0rdr 13y ago
They say target use is internet of things. Makes for a great personal server too. I use a bunch of really small boards for fun, but not this small.
throwaway2048 13y ago
this would be fantastic for corporate espionage, snap one into an unused to drop somewhere and you have a beachhead inside the network. Combine it with a Micro SD card you have a great way to exfiltrate data via weekly/monthly data drops, without setting off external firewalls.
- joezydeco 13y ago
  I didn't see PoE on this device, you need to supply 3.3VDC to make it run. So do you want to attach a wall wart? I don't think it will run long off a lithium cell.
SwellJoe 13y ago
I immediately imagined adding web UIs, or simply network APIs, to various "dumb" hardware. Attach it to a ADC/DAC and suddenly a lot of things become computer controllable. It's small enough to stick it on most electronic device boards without major changes.
tlarkworthy 13y ago
Robotics, consolidate all your sensors and controllers onto Ethernet. Its quite hard finding a microcontroller with good Ethernet.
- joezydeco 13y ago
  I've had good success with the NXP LPC178x series. Cortex M3 with onboard Flash and SRAM. Ethernet is onboard and easy to attach with a simple PHY, also works well with extenral SDRAM and expanded Flash.
  - tlarkworthy 13y ago
    yeah I also used that a while ago, but I don't think I can fit an ethernet client for Robotic Operating System on it. Doesn't appear straight forward anyway:- http://mbed.org/forum/bugs-suggestions/topic/2662/?page=1#comment-13870 http://mbed.org/forum/bugs-suggestions/topic/2662/?page=1#co... Hmm, that Xport product is £50 from mouser. Not bad
    - joezydeco 13y ago
      I don't quite understand mbed. It seems...toylike. I've been using ucLinux for 1788-based stuff. You get the full stack with that. The other option is something like the TI CC3000, a serially driven wifi module. Adafruit just launched a cheap breakout module. http://www.adafruit.com/products/1469 http://www.adafruit.com/products/1469
      - tlarkworthy 13y ago
        everything we do is in volumes of 1. What is the dev board you use? Mbed is quite convenient for us doing random 1 offs. EDIT: also can't find evidence of a ROS client working on ucLinux :(
        joezydeco 13y ago
        For LPC I've prototyped on boards from Future Designs, like this one: http://www.teamfdi.com/development-tools-kits/products/1/DK-57VTS-LPC1788 http://www.teamfdi.com/development-tools-kits/products/1/DK-...
joe_bleau 13y ago
We use them to add ethernet and new comm protocols to regulated legacy embedded devices that only have serial ports.
pmorici 13y ago
I've used one of these before. They are useful for attaching serial devices to an Ethernet network. It's a lot cheaper and easier than trying to put a PC with enough serial ports near every device you need to talk to. The ones I worked with were part of a radio modem sold by MaxStream, now part of Digi International.
- csmuk 13y ago
  We used dedicated terminal servers for this function years ago. No PC required. DEC and Allied Telesis made them. Now I feel old.
  - pmorici 13y ago
    That is essentially what these are. The default Lantronix firmware allows you to connect to the device on a specific TCP port and talk to the serial device on the other side. You configure them over HTTP or Telnet.
bound008 13y ago
The pricing is on that page $39/each at qty 1000. I have seen the other models 2 years ago range from $50 to $70 at qty 1.
edwhitesell 13y ago
RIPE used these for the v1&2 versions of their Atlas measurement network. I've had a few running for about 3 years. https://atlas.ripe.net/ https://atlas.ripe.net/
analog31 13y ago
I use microcontrollers for prototyping and proof-of-concept work. Often I combine multiple devices into a system that I can control from a PC. It's been my experience that dropping in a something-to-serial converter is 100x easier than trying to install and understand a communication protocol "stack," even if the code and documentation is supplied by the chip vendor. I tend to use little USB-to-serial breakout boards, but I'd do the same with RJ45 if I needed that interface. Once something of mine is ready to commercialize, it gets handed over to professional developers who tend to prefer the built-in firmware based approach, but they end up spending a lot of time debugging those interfaces.

Yeah these sort of "look at how small this fully functional computer is" pieces always make me wonder if they have a real world appeal or if they're more a proof-of-concept or tech demo to pull people's attention to the company's other products.

em3rgent0rdr 13y ago

They say target use is internet of things. Makes for a great personal server too. I use a bunch of really small boards for fun, but not this small.

throwaway2048 13y ago

this would be fantastic for corporate espionage, snap one into an unused to drop somewhere and you have a beachhead inside the network. Combine it with a Micro SD card you have a great way to exfiltrate data via weekly/monthly data drops, without setting off external firewalls.

joezydeco 13y ago
I didn't see PoE on this device, you need to supply 3.3VDC to make it run. So do you want to attach a wall wart? I don't think it will run long off a lithium cell.

SwellJoe 13y ago

I immediately imagined adding web UIs, or simply network APIs, to various "dumb" hardware. Attach it to a ADC/DAC and suddenly a lot of things become computer controllable. It's small enough to stick it on most electronic device boards without major changes.

tlarkworthy 13y ago

Robotics, consolidate all your sensors and controllers onto Ethernet. Its quite hard finding a microcontroller with good Ethernet.

joezydeco 13y ago
I've had good success with the NXP LPC178x series. Cortex M3 with onboard Flash and SRAM. Ethernet is onboard and easy to attach with a simple PHY, also works well with extenral SDRAM and expanded Flash.
- tlarkworthy 13y ago
  yeah I also used that a while ago, but I don't think I can fit an ethernet client for Robotic Operating System on it. Doesn't appear straight forward anyway:- http://mbed.org/forum/bugs-suggestions/topic/2662/?page=1#comment-13870 http://mbed.org/forum/bugs-suggestions/topic/2662/?page=1#co... Hmm, that Xport product is £50 from mouser. Not bad
  - joezydeco 13y ago
    I don't quite understand mbed. It seems...toylike. I've been using ucLinux for 1788-based stuff. You get the full stack with that. The other option is something like the TI CC3000, a serially driven wifi module. Adafruit just launched a cheap breakout module. http://www.adafruit.com/products/1469 http://www.adafruit.com/products/1469
    - tlarkworthy 13y ago
      everything we do is in volumes of 1. What is the dev board you use? Mbed is quite convenient for us doing random 1 offs. EDIT: also can't find evidence of a ROS client working on ucLinux :(
      - joezydeco 13y ago
        For LPC I've prototyped on boards from Future Designs, like this one: http://www.teamfdi.com/development-tools-kits/products/1/DK-57VTS-LPC1788 http://www.teamfdi.com/development-tools-kits/products/1/DK-...

joe_bleau 13y ago

We use them to add ethernet and new comm protocols to regulated legacy embedded devices that only have serial ports.

pmorici 13y ago

I've used one of these before. They are useful for attaching serial devices to an Ethernet network. It's a lot cheaper and easier than trying to put a PC with enough serial ports near every device you need to talk to. The ones I worked with were part of a radio modem sold by MaxStream, now part of Digi International.

csmuk 13y ago
We used dedicated terminal servers for this function years ago. No PC required. DEC and Allied Telesis made them. Now I feel old.
- pmorici 13y ago
  That is essentially what these are. The default Lantronix firmware allows you to connect to the device on a specific TCP port and talk to the serial device on the other side. You configure them over HTTP or Telnet.

bound008 13y ago

The pricing is on that page $39/each at qty 1000. I have seen the other models 2 years ago range from $50 to $70 at qty 1.

edwhitesell 13y ago

RIPE used these for the v1&2 versions of their Atlas measurement network. I've had a few running for about 3 years. https://atlas.ripe.net/ https://atlas.ripe.net/

analog31 13y ago

I use microcontrollers for prototyping and proof-of-concept work. Often I combine multiple devices into a system that I can control from a PC. It's been my experience that dropping in a something-to-serial converter is 100x easier than trying to install and understand a communication protocol "stack," even if the code and documentation is supplied by the chip vendor. I tend to use little USB-to-serial breakout boards, but I'd do the same with RJ45 if I needed that interface. Once something of mine is ready to commercialize, it gets handed over to professional developers who tend to prefer the built-in firmware based approach, but they end up spending a lot of time debugging those interfaces.