USB control

Help & Support Robot Parts
1

Hi there - I’m a real newbie to all this, but have set myself a bit of a project to play with robotics.

I bought a cheap kit robotic arm kit , and have had a lot of fun controlling it from my laptop USB port. I’m wanting to do something a bit (but not brain numbingly) challenging.

I’d like to try to control a number of small motors / LEDs etc in a number of ways from my laptop. I’m not wishing to break the bank, but would happy to put a few pounds into the project.

I know nothing of how to generate USB output signals - but figure there must be control software out there that I could run, and obviously I’m going to need some sort of interface to interpret the control signals from the USB.

Any suggestions ??

Is there anyone out there who’d like to suggest some options ?? - it’s my hope to start playing with STAMP microcontrollers as well - I have their basic kit, but have yet even to open the box

2

Thanks Casmat - well that looks like it won’t break the bank - what would you suggest for software to generate the necessary output ?

3

One easy way of controlling robots or microcontroller is by using a USB-to-serial adaptor. This way, all you need to care about is producing the serial command that the robot will need to interpret. In the same way, the robot can report information back to the computer.

Also using Phidgets modules would be a good solution.

4

If you are interested in Phidgets then this page about programming will get you started with the programming: phidgets.com/programming_resources.php