Adam Laurie (a/k/a/ Major Malfunction) is a white hat hacker from London, UK, who has presented at a number of conferences worldwide. He’s also the Director at Aperature Labs, Ltd. His latest explorations involve the world of RF remote control systems operating in the unlicensed ISM bands. He used the FunCube dongle to monitor the […]
Category Archives: MSP430
Bluetooth MSP430 tank
Here’s an interesting and fun use of the MSP430 and your Android phone: robotic tank control. This project by Mike adds a Bluetooth transceiver module MSP430 and mounts this along with a motor drive booster pack and battery on a toy tank from Pololu.com. He says, “All in all, a fun project where I learned […]
TI MCU BoosterPack Design Challenge
If you’ve ever thought of designing your own BoosterPack for the TI Launchpad, here’s your chance to build your own BoosterPack (BYOB). TI is conducting a TI BoosterPack Design Challenge for hobbyists and makers in the continental US. Prizes include a trip to Design West 2013. Judging criteria include originality and creativity, quality and marketability. […]
Dual motor driver LaunchPad booster pack
Parker designed a dual motor driver booster pack for the MSP430 LaunchPad. It’s based around the DRV8833 iterated motor driver capable of controlling voltages up to 10.8V and handling current up to 2A. You can download the Eagle source files from his site. This is a Low Voltage, 2A motor controller BoosterPack for the Ti […]
Sensorless Brushless DC Motor Drive with MSP430
A booster board for the MSP430 LaunchPad controls brushless DC motors with or without sensors. A bunch of double NPN transistor MBT2222AD ICs drive the motors: I thought that I would share my project on the forum. I call it BLDC Booster. It is a booster pack for the MSP430 LaunchPad that allows for sensored […]
Bitbang USB v1.1 on a MSP430
M-atthias was successful in running bitbang USB v1.1 on a MSP430G2452. It’s similar to the V-USB project that’s used on AVRs. It takes ~2kb of room on the microcontroller. Yes, this is similar to the efforts of V-USB for AVR, but in a very early stage. I am in contact with Christian Starkjohann who wrote […]
MSP430 board guest PCBs
Boseji from m8051 gave us these PCBs on the second day of the Bangalore geek tour. We added them to our free PCB drawer. The QFP package MSP430F5310 is a nice MSP430 chip that can be programmed and debugged using the MSP430 launchpad. They are presently under CC-BY-SA so you can go ahead if you […]
Turret430 office missile launcher
Adam writes: turret430 is a submission to the TI 2012 Co-op Design Challenge The goal was to design and build an office missile launcher that could be controlled by an analog joystick. As an added bonus, auto-mode was developed to target and track an object based on color. By the push of a button, the […]
TI previews MSP430FR59xx low power MCUs
TI has announced the preview of the MSP430FR58xx and MSP430FR59xx family of ultra-low-power microcontrollers. This group consists of several devices featuring embedded FRAM nonvolatile memory, an ultra-low-power 16-bit MSP430 CPU, and different sets of peripherals targeted for various applications. The architecture, FRAM, and peripherals, combined with seven low-power modes, are optimized to achieve extended battery […]
MSP430 LaunchPad 4 channel logic analyzer update
OPossum already designed a MSP430 LaunchPad logic analyzer based on our Logic Shrimp. In the latest update he decided to follow our lead in changing the 4 23K256 SRAM ICs for a single 23LC1024 IC. Preliminary design of a 4 channel version using the new 23LC1024 SPI RAM. Hope to find some time this weekend […]
Stellaris Launchpad hack adds LiPo capability
Philipp Stenkamp wanted to power his Stellaris Launchpad with a spare LiPo battery, but found as shipped this wasn’t a plug-and-play operation. “The Launchpad expects 4.75-5.25 VDC on VBUS, nothing that a single cell LiPo could provide. I know that the system voltage is 3.3 VDC and that the voltage regulator on the board has […]
BSP430 – board support package for MSP430 MCUs
Peter(pabigot), the maintainer for mspgcc, has released BPS430, a board support package for MSP430 MCUs. “BSP430 is a set of C language adaptation layers simplifying cross-MCU library and application development on Texas Instruments MSP430 microcontrollers. The target audience is experienced embedded systems developers who need full control over the microcontroller but are willing to trade […]
Control your window blinds via the MSP430 LaunchPad
Here is how to use your MSP430 LauncPad to open and close window blinds. Basically the MSP430 drives a small 8g servo, which in return rotates the blind’s blade pitch adjustment. Via Hacked Gadgets.
Internet Protocol v6 running on MSP430 with ENC28J60
XPG is developing an IPv6 stack for the MSP430 microcontrollers using the ENC28J60 Ethernet IC for MAC/PHY. He demonstrates his proof-of-concept by having the MSP430 send HTTP requests to a custom PHP server at a push of a button, as seen in the video above. Now, as the 2553 only has 512 bytes of RAM […]
embedXcode IDE covers multiple platforms
Rei Vilo has developed embedXcode, a Xcode 4 template for embedded computing boards, that supports Arduino, chipKIT, MSP430 LaunchPad, LeafLabs Maple and Wiring boards/platforms. “It relies on a set of modular makefiles, so adding support for a new board/platform is easy. The makefiles can also be used with any standard IDE, for example NetBeans. I […]
Energia: Arduino like IDE for MSP430 MCUs
Energia is a fork of Arduino’s Processing IDE for TI’s MSP430 microcontrollers. Support is also expected for the Olimexino-5510, a TMS430F5510 Arduino like development board. Via the contact form. Thanks Uwe!
TI announces C2000 Launchpad release
Trey German from TI write: “We just announced the C2000 LaunchPad today and I thought it might be a nice addition to your blog. Its a sister board to the MSP430 LaunchPad and is pin compatible so boosterpacks will work with any launchpad. The board costs $17 and includes an isolated high speed USB debugger […]
Measuring power with INA219 and an MSP430 Launchpad
INA219 is a cool IC that measures voltage and current trough a shunt resistor, and relays the information over I2C. It provides the multiple of the two values, thus enabling easy power measurement. Opossum used it along with a Nokia 5110 LCD and a MSP430 LaunchPad to build a nice power-meter. Via 43-oh.
MSP430 Launchpad GamingPack
Max, Brittany, and Kathleen designed a gaming console extension for the MSP430 LaunchPad. It’s called the GamingPack, and it’s based on the similar Arduino shield Gameduino. It features a Spartan 3A FPGA which handles both video VGA output, and input from two NES controllers. Based on the Gameduino, the GamingPack transforms your MSP430 LaunchPad into […]
MSP430 Launchpad Logic Analyzer based on the Logic Shrimp
oPossum built a 6 channel logic analyzer booster pack for the MSP430 Launchpad. His design is inspired by the Logic Shrimp and used SPI serial interface RAM chips to store samples. The MSP430 software is SUMP compatible and works with Jawi’s OLS client. This is a logic analyzer add-on for the TI MSP430 Launchpad. It […]