For those that are already the au fait cognoscenti, which
is a good starter kit to go with for amateur radio dabbling?

I'd be especially interested in lots of digital and analogue I/O

My background is that I've always been happiest with naked machines
so have not investigated the world of built-in OS and language before.

On 25/02/2016 08:47, gareth G4SDW GQRP #3339 wrote:
For those that are already the au fait cognoscenti, which
is a good starter kit to go with for amateur radio dabbling?

I'd be especially interested in lots of digital and analogue I/O

My background is that I've always been happiest with naked machines
so have not investigated the world of built-in OS and language before.

I prefer the raspberry pi to arduino as it has IMO a lot more ready made
projects.
Arduino is good if you are happy with C and C++, the Pi gives you Java,
python... in fact just about any language you can name.
Arduino wins out on peripherals, the 'shields' provide a lot in
connectivity with the real world.

If you buy a pi then within a few minutes of taking it out of the box
you can have a wspr beacon up and running (a bit longer if you want a
nice clean sinusoidal signal). Great for testing your antenna and the
propagation.


Andy

On 02/26/2016 09:18 AM, AndyW wrote:
On 25/02/2016 08:47, gareth G4SDW GQRP #3339 wrote:
For those that are already the au fait cognoscenti, which
is a good starter kit to go with for amateur radio dabbling?

I'd be especially interested in lots of digital and analogue I/O

My background is that I've always been happiest with naked machines
so have not investigated the world of built-in OS and language before.

I prefer the raspberry pi to arduino as it has IMO a lot more ready made
projects.
Arduino is good if you are happy with C and C++, the Pi gives you Java,
python... in fact just about any language you can name.
Arduino wins out on peripherals, the 'shields' provide a lot in
connectivity with the real world.

If you buy a pi then within a few minutes of taking it out of the box
you can have a wspr beacon up and running (a bit longer if you want a
nice clean sinusoidal signal). Great for testing your antenna and the
propagation.


Andy
===========
1) The Arduino is a microcontroller circuit board with input and output
pins ,but cannot be loaded with an Operating System .

2) The Raspberry Pi is a computer capable of being loaded with an
Operating System . It also has a number of I/O pins.

NB ; The Pi version 3 ,model B ,recently launched ,has an ARM quad
processor 64 bit and 1 GB RAM .........a lot of computing power for
GBP 30.- ,.....fantastic !

Frank GM0CSZ / KN6WH in IO87AT

On 3/3/2016 4:28 PM, highlandham wrote:
On 02/26/2016 09:18 AM, AndyW wrote:
On 25/02/2016 08:47, gareth G4SDW GQRP #3339 wrote:
For those that are already the au fait cognoscenti, which
is a good starter kit to go with for amateur radio dabbling?

I'd be especially interested in lots of digital and analogue I/O

My background is that I've always been happiest with naked machines
so have not investigated the world of built-in OS and language before.

I prefer the raspberry pi to arduino as it has IMO a lot more ready made
projects.
Arduino is good if you are happy with C and C++, the Pi gives you Java,
python... in fact just about any language you can name.
Arduino wins out on peripherals, the 'shields' provide a lot in
connectivity with the real world.

If you buy a pi then within a few minutes of taking it out of the box
you can have a wspr beacon up and running (a bit longer if you want a
nice clean sinusoidal signal). Great for testing your antenna and the
propagation.


Andy
===========
1) The Arduino is a microcontroller circuit board with input and output
pins ,but cannot be loaded with an Operating System .

2) The Raspberry Pi is a computer capable of being loaded with an
Operating System . It also has a number of I/O pins.

NB ; The Pi version 3 ,model B ,recently launched ,has an ARM quad
processor 64 bit and 1 GB RAM .........a lot of computing power for
GBP 30.- ,.....fantastic !

Given the OP's request, I would recommend a TI Launchpad (~$15) using an
ARM Cortex-M4. They are good processors, much more capable than the
AVRs on the Arduinos. Of course that is not the only issue. Likely
more important than the details of the board or chip is the development
environment. I've not Arduinoed myself, but my understanding is that
line of MCU boards has a lot of software and there is no shortage of web
based info and references.

I don't use C or Python myself. I use Forth which is available for the
Launchpads. I find it much more interactive and tuned to the needs of
hardware oriented users.

If you like the rPi, the 2 or 3 are good development platforms and the
zero would be a great embedded board for only $5. I haven't been able
to buy one yet. I don't want to pay $7 shipping for a $5 board and the
local (to a friend, not me) store is always out of stock. Seems they
aren't making a lot of them. I expect I'll have a 3 before I can get a
zero. There is a group for the rPi, comp.sys.raspberry-pi

--

Rick

On 03/03/2016 21:49, rickman wrote:

I don't use C or Python myself. I use Forth which is available for the
Launchpads. I find it much more interactive and tuned to the needs of
hardware oriented users.

Forth... I have not used that since the 80s although I was quite
impressed by the speed and being an HP calculator user RPN was quite
familiar. I started using it on the ZX Spectrum and it was my first
Non-basic high level language. It may be time to dig out a forth pakage
and see what I can still remember.
IIRC it was originally developed for radio telescopes so there is a nice
radio link.

Andy

On 3/4/2016 7:15 AM, AndyW wrote:
On 03/03/2016 21:49, rickman wrote:

I don't use C or Python myself. I use Forth which is available for the
Launchpads. I find it much more interactive and tuned to the needs of
hardware oriented users.

Forth... I have not used that since the 80s although I was quite
impressed by the speed and being an HP calculator user RPN was quite
familiar. I started using it on the ZX Spectrum and it was my first
Non-basic high level language. It may be time to dig out a forth pakage
and see what I can still remember.
IIRC it was originally developed for radio telescopes so there is a nice
radio link.

I would recommend Mecrisp if you wish to work on embedded platforms. I
think the radio telescope thing is long past. I don't recall there
being any trace of telescope control or radio left in the language.

--

Rick

For maximum i/o pins, then the Arduino/Genuino (outside US name) Mega is the best. Upto 54 digital i/o pins and upto 16 analogue inputs. It's not the cheapest to get started with, but it all depends on what you want to do with it. Clones are available, but I've had some cheap ones from China which don't do all they should. Getting them from a UK source seems to be the best middle road option.

Although not as capable as a Pi, they work as soon as power is supplied and are much less power hungry. There are always alternatives to anything, but the arduino user base is huge as is the number of webpages devoted to them..