If you follow the Ardunio world, you will have seen that the standard platform is now based on the Atmega328 chip, not the Atmega168 chip that we were all using last year. The main difference between the 328 and the 168 is that the 328 has twice as much flash and EEPROM memory.
Atmel was only able to provide through-hole versions of the 328 until this month, so the only Arduino boards at the moment that use the 328 are the big development boards with DIP chips, such as the Duemilanove. But now the surface-mount version of the 328 is starting to trickle out, and it's time for the Ardunio boards to make the move to 328, too, to get access to that additional memory, which will allow us to do a lot more with the code.
You'll notice that ArduPilot is now out of stock at SparkFun again. That means two things. First, we've sold nearly 500 ArduPilots! Second, we let it go out of stock so as to not make any more Atmega168 boards, assuming that it's better to not sell any ArduPilots for the next two weeks than to make another batch of boards that will be immediately outmoded.
[UPDATE: We're now back in stock and all board will use the 328 chip from now on.]
The latest info we have from Sparkfun is that the 328 chips will be coming in this week, and we should be among the first boards to get them. We'll need to test one board, and then we can start a full production run of 500 328-based ArduPilots. If you backorder the board, we guarantee that it will be filled with the new 328 version and you'll be the first to get them.
So what does that mean for current ArduPilot owners? As mentioned in the ArduPilot roadmap, version 2.2 will require the new boards with the 328 chip. But all versions before that will continue to be supported and will work fine with the current board.
So if you're happy with anything from ArduPilot 1.0 to the forthcoming ArduPilot 2.1, you're fine with the current board. But if you want the features in ArduPilot 2.2 and above, you'll want to upgrade to the new board. The price will remain the same ($24.95), so this won't cost you a lot. Hardware upgrades don't come much cheaper than that!
Do I need to place a backorder for the obsolete model and will I get the new Atmega328 chip one when available? I didn't see the upgraded chip version on the site.
@Chris:
Chris, with the added memory of the 328 chip, do you think it will be possible to mate the Ardupilot with Atomic IMU 6 DoF or UAVDevboard? Is the processor powerful enough to handle Bill and Paul's Matrix Nav code in your opinion?
Yes, if you have mad SMD soldering/unsoldering skillz you can swap the chips out yourself (the SMD 328 is not available yet in single-unit quantities, but will probably cost about $5 when it is). I, myself, suck at soldering and would screw that up so $24.95 (actually the relative price is just $19 compared to buying the new 328 chip itself) is a small price for me to avoid that frustration, but it's up to you.
if the chips have exactly the same footprint.
can the old board be update to the new chip?
is there anything else on the card that will change?
and will sparkfun to sell the DIP chip?
thanks
Magnus
Wow, congrats on the selled 500 ! Unbelievable ! Have four of them fortunately :-), will exchange the controller to the 328 in the next few days. This week the first Arduino MEGA board should arrive my workbench :-).
Comments
Do I need to place a backorder for the obsolete model and will I get the new Atmega328 chip one when available? I didn't see the upgraded chip version on the site.
Tks
Chris, with the added memory of the 328 chip, do you think it will be possible to mate the Ardupilot with Atomic IMU 6 DoF or UAVDevboard? Is the processor powerful enough to handle Bill and Paul's Matrix Nav code in your opinion?
Erwin
can the old board be update to the new chip?
is there anything else on the card that will change?
and will sparkfun to sell the DIP chip?
thanks
Magnus
Atmega328 chip
Erwin
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