I am looking for a low cost SBC with serial port & Wifi and/or Ethernet.
If it takes a cheap touch sensitive display, so much the better.
I would prefer something with a good IDE for C or C++ programming, preferably with good debugging capabilities.
Thanks in advance for any advice.
Hi,
Here is our Single Board Computers section. The Raspberry Pi 3 Computer Board might interest you as it is probably the most popular single board computer. It has integrated 802.11n wireless LAN and Bluetooth 4.1.
This Getting You RPi Ready for C Programming article might be useful.
Also, this 7" LCD Touch Screen for Raspberry Pi might interest you.
Regards,
Yes, I was thinking of the Pi.
What about a UART? A hat, or USB to serial?
Would I be cheaper getting a Pi with WiFi, or Pi zero and adding WiFi?
Hi,
The Raspberry Pi 3 has already an on-board UART port (GPIO pin 8 : TX and GPIO pin 10 : RX). Therefore, you won’t need a USB to serial hat.
One of the solutions of adding Wifi to the Raspberry Pi Zero would be to use an OTG cable with a Wifi adapter which might be cheaper than the Raspberry Pi 3.
Sounds good. Do you also sell a cable for the UART pins, to connect to a standard PC UART?
Is there also a UART solution for the Pi zero? I am developing a vending machine controller and will need hundreds, hopefully thousands per year in time, so would like to keep costs down.
I need a UART to communicate at 9,600 baud, 8, N, 1 to the coin box and WiFI, maybe BT to program from 'phone when reloading the machine (price changes, etc) and retrieve sales data. WiFI is probably better to allow them to call home when almost empty, or to report problems.Perhaps Ethernet instead of wifi in a few cases (implying Eth + BT. If that sounds complicated, let’s just say WiFI only).
Also a display and keypad. This can be just a 2 or 3 line LCD display. or can be a touch sensitive screen, if reasonably priced.
Hanging from the GPIO I need to drive motors to expel purchases, maybe measure internal temperature, a drop sensor to detect that the vended item actually falls, tilt sensor & audible alarm; maybe a few other things.
I am a software developer of several decades experience. I don’t mind programming the hardware, but leave it to others to select & wire the hardware.
What would you recommend as a low cost solution? There would be a single running application, with very little activity, so a heavy duty CPU is not required. Code size less than 1mB probably. Some NVMEM would be nice, but I could just as well use an SD card.
That;s about it. Thanks in advance for any advice which you can give me.
You can use a UART to USB Converter to connect the Raspberry Pi to your computer. Like this DFRobot FTDI USB to Serial Basic Breakout Board.
We suggest you to take a look at our Raspberry Pi Accessories section. This 2.8” USB TFT Touch LCD Display for Raspberry Pi might interest you.
As for Keypads, please take a look at this.
We unfortunately don’t have a straight-forward solution for your application. This will require custom design/wiring/programming.
