Dangerous Prototypes Open Source Hardware

Re: Buspirate v3 VS v4

Reply #30 – August 31, 2014, 01:25:09 pm

You can change PPS on the fly, no problem. No reset needed. I never wanted to do a USB on-chip version, but tons of people pushed for it and I was stupid enough to follow the crowd instead of being the dictator of my project.

Its more these problems with v4 (all suck vs suck):
1. USB stack unstable, unmaintained open version vs closed unworkable undistributable microchip version
2. Speed sensitive things (SPI/I2C sniffing) take a huge hit on v4 due to USB overhead and lots of support questions about these
3. Development with active USB is a PITA, impossible to single step problems with any reliability
4. The extra flash in the PIC is (as i recall) not that easy to work with. You start to need stupid compiler tricks and stuff to address the top of it

We have a v5 with an ARM chip, but its so much more expensive - and - once we get enough flash to be useful, super more expensive (plus no PPS) :)

Currently, we are done with a redesign of the v3 using the cheaper, smaller FTDI x chip. It fits in a 5x5, and we're making a milled aluminum case for it. Slick, anodized black square with 1x10 pinout and laser etched labels on the pins.

I do like your idea of using a cheaper PIC instead of USB and making a parallel interface, that might get us somewhere, especially with a bigger, cheaper arm sans USB.

Re: Buspirate v3 VS v4

Reply #31 – August 31, 2014, 01:55:54 pm

yup, usb on mcp sucks big time :( .. didn't know you managed to solve the pps restart issues .. cool
arm is too expensive unless you go cm0 with some prc manufacturer but then you have to purchase gzilion chips and support is zero so really not sure if that's the way to go ..

as for the usb part, mcp is shooting their usb2serial that's 18f something .. you can get usb capable pic for peanuts, way cheaper then ftdi and since you control firmware (even if you go with semiclosed mcp usb lib) you can get waaaaaaaaay more out of it then from ftdi ... I'd go with parallel communication, 8bit or 4bit depends on the chips .. for e.g. PIC16F1454 is ~1$, has USB and enough pins .. even if you go with SPI it can do 12MHz SPI!!! that's 1.4 megabytes per second (11mbps so basically just as fast as usb)!!! I doubt you need faster then that :D .. and for 1$ :) it's imo way better then any ftdi .. on the business side of the device .. well, that you have more experience for bus pirate then I do .. depends on what you want to achieve .. I'd personally go with XMOS just for kicks of it, it's great and interesting chip :D .. I would not go with arm .. I'd go either with XMOS + external flash or some pic with enough flash to put a lot of code in I can call from scripts.. it's really all about how you want to improve on 3b and what additional features you want .. XMOS is faster and more versatile then most of chips you can put there... it's on the other hand not nearly as easy to use as pic

Re: Buspirate v3 VS v4

Reply #32 – September 02, 2014, 12:05:33 pm

I did play with the 16f1454 recently and it is a great bang for buck. There is a great bootloader for it: https://code.google.com/p/pic16f1454-bootloader/

Re: Buspirate v3 VS v4

Reply #33 – December 18, 2014, 06:31:43 am

[quote author="ian"]Currently, we are done with a redesign of the v3 using the cheaper, smaller FTDI x chip. It fits in a 5x5, and we're making a milled aluminum case for it. Slick, anodized black square with 1x10 pinout and laser etched labels on the pins.[/quote]

Any idea when these might be available?

Re: Buspirate v3 VS v4

Reply #34 – April 11, 2015, 02:07:11 am

[quote author="s7726"][quote author="ian"]Currently, we are done with a redesign of the v3 using the cheaper, smaller FTDI x chip. It fits in a 5x5, and we're making a milled aluminum case for it. Slick, anodized black square with 1x10 pinout and laser etched labels on the pins.[/quote]

Any idea when these might be available?[/quote]

Wondering the same.

Re: Buspirate v3 VS v4

Reply #35 – June 09, 2015, 03:36:53 pm

So is the v4 a dead project at this point?  It is the only BP I have and it works fine for most things I've tried on it.  What does not work on it/is there a bug list for it?  Sometimes I'm tempted to get a v3 BP just so I've got the more stable version to work with...

Re: Buspirate v3 VS v4

Reply #36 – July 08, 2016, 11:26:25 pm

I was wondering the same thing as well if I should hold off or not. Thanks for the advice.

Re: Buspirate v3 VS v4

Reply #37 – September 09, 2016, 04:13:00 pm

[quote author="alank2"]So is the v4 a dead project at this point?  It is the only BP I have and it works fine for most things I've tried on it.  What does not work on it/is there a bug list for it?  Sometimes I'm tempted to get a v3 BP just so I've got the more stable version to work with...[/quote]
[quote author="dsummerbell10"]I was wondering the same thing as well if I should hold off or not. Thanks for the advice.[/quote]
No, it is not dead anymore! There is a new community project to make a good working stable firmware for BP v4
Firmware v7.0 is already available! ;) Please look - http://http://dangerousprototypes.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=28&t=8498

Re: Buspirate v3 VS v4

Reply #38 – May 26, 2019, 08:59:43 pm

[quote author="dgche8"]Hello all!!

This is my 1st post and i am a complete noob to this wonderful world! I would like to purchase v4 of the BP but wanted to know if I should still wait? Thank you all in advance!![/quote]
Is there any features in the v4 design that'll be present that wasn't in the v3? I've been told by someone to not buy the v3 since the v4 was coming out soon-ish... But if the v3 design has all the same features(it seems it can be updated to the v4 bootloader&firmware from what I read), then it wouldn't be a problem buying a v3 now, would it?

Re: Buspirate v3 VS v4

Reply #39 – July 29, 2019, 04:24:22 pm

Can i replace the PIC24FJ256GB106  to  PIC24FJ512GB610 ?
Does anybody use GB610 in v4 instead GB106?