Subject:
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Re: mindstorms NXT and memory
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.robotics
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Date:
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Mon, 9 Jan 2006 17:06:19 GMT
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Viewed:
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9448 times
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In lugnet.robotics, Ross Crawford wrote:
> In lugnet.robotics, steve <sjbaker1@airmail.net> wrote:
> >
> > The ARM has been around in different incarnations for maybe 15 to 20
> > years. The ARM7 used in the NXT is a couple of generations behind the
> > cutting edge (eg the Nintendo DS uses an ARM9 as it's main CPU). The
> > big thing that makes the ARM popular for embedded systems like this one
> > is that the ARM circuitry is fairly compact (because it's a RISC
> > machine and therefore runs very SIMPLE instructions very fast). This
> > allows system developers such as LEGO to put lots of other circuitry
> > onto the same chip and thereby save a ton of money. Given the small
> > amount of RAM, it's likely that the RAM is on the same chip as the
> > ARM. It's even possible that the 8 bit microprocessor is also on
> > that same chip.
>
> It's also possible (likely?) that LEGO are using an already available ARM7 chip,
> such as http://mcu.st.com/mcu/inchtml.php?fdir=pages&fnam=str710 or
> http://www.atmel.com/dyn/products/product_card.asp?part_id=3524
It is most often cheapest to buy rather than make, so using a proven solution
off the shelf makes a lot of sense.
Think of the development costs of using ARM IP on a custom chip. Suddenly LEGO
would become a hardware development group, and the costs would be really high.
Even if they used PLAs, they would still have a large development cost in design
and verification. This is just for the hardware.....
They still have the development and testing costs of the software. One has to
wonder if National Instruments is doing all the software design and testing, or
whether like the RCX, LEGO does firmware and NI does the programming
environment?
We know we have ARM7, 256KB flash, 64KB RAM, Analog to Digital, PWM, Bluetooth,
and LCD. Do either of these chips fit well with these capabilities.
Anyone out there knowledgable about graphic LDC displays? Do they have a
standard interface, or are they all proprietary?
I would assume that LEGO will go with off the shelf parts that provide the best
capabilities for the lowest cost.
Kev
>
> ROSCO
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