Arduino Nano to Teensy 3.2 , simple ??

[Wp100]

Hi,

Am developing a project using a Nano board converted to 3v3 so it can drive the TFT etc direct without any level converters.

All is well, but to complete the project it will need a lot more program memory as the TFT and Touch screen and other libraries use a lot of space.

Need to keep the boards footprint small so a Mega2560 would be way too big.

Have heard of the Teensy boards but never really looked at them, though they do say you can run them from the Arduino IDE ( or Studio 7 ?)

Can I literally load my existing Nano code onto say a Teensy 3.2 and away we go, with perhaps just some port reallocation etc ?

Have seen the Teensy site and forum but first just looking for a simple yea or ney to guide me in the right direction.

 

[DrG]

I have used a Teensy-LC. With regard to your general question, my answer is a definite yea. To easily use the Arduino IDE, I loaded up Teensyduino one time and the rest was transparent. I have not used it extensively but did do a project with one and simply had no problems. At one time, I had planned on using their recommended and improved I2C library but ended up just using the old wire library. I also have used a U8g2 lib with a super cheap OLED and, again, no problems.

Hope this helps.

 

[Nigel Goodwin]

Various of the Arduino libraries include options for the Teensy, so there should be no problem - although you might need to make small changes for any specific Arduino hardware you might be using.

 

[Ian Rogers]

I have two systems up and running.... A pic32 ( chipkit ) and a mega2560.. One has a 320x240 and the other is a 480x272 the code to run each is virtually identical.. I can even have two sketches open connected to the relevant board and work side by side..

Even the hardware is taken out of the equation if you keep to the "Arduino" pin numbering system..

 

[Nigel Goodwin]

I have two systems up and running.... A pic32 ( chipkit ) and a mega2560.. One has a 320x240 and the other is a 480x272 the code to run each is virtually identical.. I can even have two sketches open connected to the relevant board and work side by side..

Even the hardware is taken out of the equation if you keep to the "Arduino" pin numbering system..

Again, the ChipKit is supported by many Arduino libraries - I bought a ChipKit a while back, but haven't had much time to play with it - apart from making sure it worked.

How do you find the speed comparison of the two boards?.

 

[Ian Rogers]

How do you find the speed comparison of the two boards?.

The chipkit32 max was on a different planet.. Screen updates from external flash, full screen 480x272, was instant... It made a great little system.

BUT!!!! The teensy 3.6 will be even faster... It has a full SD interface ( 4 bit ) and it runs at 180Mhz rather than pic32's 80Mhz..

I am awaiting its arrival!

 

[Nigel Goodwin]

The chipkit32 max was on a different planet.. Screen updates from external flash, full screen 480x272, was instant... It made a great little system.

BUT!!!! The teensy 3.6 will be even faster... It has a full SD interface ( 4 bit ) and it runs at 180Mhz rather than pic32's 80Mhz..

I am awaiting its arrival!

Nice - please let us know how it compares.

 

[DirtyLude]

If you want fast and in a smaller form factor than the mega, I have used the ESP32 with a TFT and the Arduino environment. It is also super fast and has a lot of memory to spare.

 

[Ian Rogers]

Nice - please let us know how it compares.

Well!!! It arrived.. I have to try and get the teensy core embedded into Arduino IDE.. It will only work with certain Arduino IDE versions..

I have now installed the latest IDE, but I think I've lost the chipkit core in the process...

The teensy 3.6 is sporting a 4 bit SD card interface... I have located SDfat on the GitHub and have copied the libraries in.

There is a guy on the PJR forum that has ported the UTFT library across.... It will be interesting to see how fast the SD access is...

Keep you posted..

 

[Pommie]

I can even have two sketches open connected to the relevant board and work side by side..

How do you manage this? Whichever board/com port I select in one IDE is also selected in the other.

Mike.

 

[Ian Rogers]

Yes! but you just switch when you are ready to program.... It only compiles the active window..

I use "side by side" so I can copy code from one to the other! I am developing two systems.. One pic32 based, one Mega based..
But they are identical in operation.... Now I am going to use the teensy as the 32 bit one as it has some eeprom... Pic 32 uses flash and its difficult to manage... I usually reserve a tiny bit of flash, but i use MikroE and they keep messing it up.. Hence Arduino...

 

[Wp100]

Hi,

Just an update on the boards I was looking at, decided to go for one of these Far East Mega2560 boards as it was the quicker and more compatible option.

Its just 38x54mm comes with double row header pins and ideal for where space is limited vs the full size ArduinoMega 2560.

A nice feature of this board is that it comes with a decent size AM1117 3v3 regulator as well as 5v, though also available with just a single 5v or 3v3 regulator on a slightly smaller board.
Their site also has full schematics, board layouts and pin out diagrams.

Not the fastest of boards, but my code does not need it.

For £7 or less seem a good buy if you can wait two weeks for delivery.

 

[Nigel Goodwin]

For £7 or less seem a good buy if you can wait two weeks for delivery.

Two weeks is probably a little optimistic - they usually quote 2-6 weeks for delivery from China.

 

[Wp100]

Two weeks is probably a little optimistic - they usually quote 2-6 weeks for delivery from China.

Yes, they do seem to say that or even longer, but generally find they arrive in two weeks, sometimes just ten days.

Mine , shown above, just arrived today, ordered 31/10 ; its ready to run with bootloader and blink example.

( should add I ordered it via a seller on ebay uk, not direct from Robotdyn)

 

[Nigel Goodwin]

( should add I ordered it via a seller on ebay uk, not direct from Robotdyn)

You mean you ordered it from China, via a link on ebay UK

 

[Wp100]

Hi Again,

Just an update to my earlier posts, decided to give the Teensy a try and ordered one of the LC boards from HobbyTronics, good quick service from them, and it comes with glossy printed pinout diagram, nice touch.

Tried testing my existing individual modules on it and with exception of the OneWire library everything works fine and now got my whole tft touch screen etc working well, and fast !

Still got a lot to find out about these boards but would appreciate any comment on these three points.

If I upgrade to the larger boards 3.2, 3.5 or 3.6 are there any software catches to watch out for or will my project run just the same ( though its very basic , standard code and libraries, but way too much for the 328s memory)

Have seen various comments in the Teensy forum about using the extra i/o pads on the underside of the bigger boards.
Most of my one off projects are hand (Kynar) wired ( soldered) using the though hole green prototype pcbs, so wondered what is the best way to connect the extra pads that folk have tried ?

Notice that the LC boards M0 chip datasheets says it has in internal 32k clock / RTC its there any way it can be readily used ? not seen any Teensy library for it other than the standard Ds1307 /3231.

thanks

 

[DrG]

with exception of the OneWire library

You didn't describe the I2C problem, but you may want to look into an alternative to the wire library, e.g., this one. The LC is the only one I have so I can't say much about the others (especially software), but they have a hardware comparison table here if you have not already seen it.

Hope it helps.

 

[Wp100]

You didn't describe the I2C problem, but you may want to look into an alternative to the wire library, e.g., this one. The LC is the only one I have so I can't say much about the others (especially software), but they have a hardware comparison table here if you have not already seen it.

Hope it helps.

Thanks, but it wasn't an I2c problem, it was the Dallas Temp ds1820 sensor library that uses the Arduino OneWire, changing it to the OneWire library thats included in the Teensy download cured the problem.

 

[DrG]

My bad, I didn't read carefully (read one wire as wire).