The PX4 team is pleased to announce early availability of the PX4 autopilot platform, with hardware available immediately from 3D Robotics.
The platform is a low cost, modular, open hardware and software design targeting high-end research, hobby and industrial autopilot applications.
PX4 is an expandable, modular system comprising the PX4FMU Flight Management Unit (autopilot) and a number of optional interface modules.
The PX4FMU autopilot features include:
- 168Mhz ARM CortexM4F microcontroller with DSP and floating-point hardware acceleration.
- 1024KiB of flash memory, 192KiB of RAM.
- MEMS accelerometer and gyro, magnetometer and barometric pressure sensor.
- Flexible expansion bus and onboard power options.
Expansion modules available at release include:
- PX4IOAR This module interfaces PX4 to the AR.Drone motor controllers, allowing a complete quadrotor to be assembled using an AR.Drone frame and motors.
- PX4IO A flexible interface module with support for eight PWM servo outputs, relays, switched power and more.
As an open hardware design, third-party and DIY expansion modules can be easily developed for specific applications, and more PX4 modules are in development.
In addition to the versatile hardware platform, PX4 introduces a sophisticated, modular software environment built on top of a POSIX-like realtime operating system. The modular architecture and operating system support greatly simplify the process of experimenting with specific components of the system, as well as reducing the barriers to entry for new developers.
Adding support for new sensors, peripherals and expansion modules is straightforward due to standardized interface protocols between software components. Onboard microSD storage permits high-rate logging and data storage for custom applications. MAVLink protocol support provides direct integration with existing ground control systems including QGroundControl and the APM Mission Planner.
Pricing of the PX4 components reflects more than a year of careful development and a strong commitment from our manufacturing partner.
This release is targeted at early adopters and developers looking for a more capable platform than existing low-cost autopilots. With more than an order of magnitude more processing power and memory compared to popular 8-bit autopilot platforms, PX4 is exceptional value for money and provides substantial room for future growth.
For more information about the PX4 autopilot platform, visit the project website at http://pixhawk.ethz.ch/px4/
PX4 modules can be purchased from our manufacturing partner, 3DRobotics.
Comments
Great board for sure...
To summerize about my tweaking needings :
The board require an external regulator to provide 4.3 - 6 V INPUT voltage ?
And we can feed the board by the pins 1 and 2 of the expansion connector, or by pin 1 of the multi connector is that true (with 18V max) ?
Can we use the micro USB for a serial connection to PC at 115200 Bds or higher ?
About the GPS, can we use the :
https://store.diydrones.com/MediaTek_MT3329_GPS_10Hz_Adapter_Basic_...
Is there a driver written for this GPS actually ?
About the accessible PINS :
- PPM_INPUT is free ? Is it ok for connecting hardware interrupt high priority ?
- GPIO_EXT_1 and GPIO_EXT_2 are free to use and 5V level usable : is it ok for connecting hardware interrupt high priority ?
- ADC123_IN11 is free for an analog read ? Is it reconfigurable to connect an hardware interrupt too ? Is it connected to the J2-12 on the expansion connector ?
- ALARM is a PWM output, software controlled, so reconfigurable too. And accessible on the J2 and J7 connectors ?
- I2C1 is already configured for 5V level I2C com, and is free of any device on this bus ?
- I2C3 has no pull up and can be reconfigured too ?
Thanks guys, Im into my tweaking....but this might be a tweak too far! :), I love the development anyway, Im an early adopter so as soon as there is feedback of flight...Ill get one!.....Well I need to go buy me a APM2 pack to add to the collection! Cheers!
@Jason, remember that this board is firstly meant for development, university, educational use so current softwares are not as easy as on generic ArduCopter. Work to have ArduCopter software working on this board is undergoing but when everything will be ready, who knows. If you don't know how to tweak things, this is not your board yet.
@Jason,
Spoiled for choice! You know, it's open source right, so the "build it and they will come" theme is here. I'm sure PX4 flies a quad fine in it's current form but it probably doesn't have all the bells and whistles that the current APM2 has. So what happens? Certainly we need to move to ARM eventually so it ends up being about how many people pile onto the new boards and push it forward, and how long does it take to surpass the APM2 atmel...exciting times one way or the other!
Call me stupid but do I buy this and the module throw it on my hexacopter....then what? how do I get it up and in the air?, Im still buzzing around with APM1, CC, Naze32, KK2...I was going to pick up a APM2 with all the trimmings but is this what I should be getting?
@PX4 yes I agree that this is a big step in the right direction, and from what I can see the software is modular and essential doing what I was saying, and the AR Drone board somewhat provides a separation between navigation and Flight control.
in my opinion the ideal state is where I can plug this AP into any craft whether it be a arducopter or Mikrokopter or multiwii or a fixed wing with FY30.
Essentially the the AP should be like an independent navigator for that craft, and a separate box acts as the "pilot" and takes care of the actual flying or driving based on directions given by the AP.
I think this new board opens up so many opportunities. For example I like Multiwii's stabilization and flight characteristics but it's autonomous stuff sucks, with separation Of functions this could be used to control the multiwii copter.
Woohoo! Great work guys. It's a pretty well planned hardware and software project.
Working with HAL sounds to be the best choice ever. It's like a "black box" concept. We just need to know the inputs and outputs from it. Not digging into the low level part should give support to full attention to the pilot's navigation intelligence and high level decision. I wanna learn to work on this scenery, for sure! =)
@Crasher
I'm not sure "firmware" is the right word for it, but those PixHawk guys have their own software stack. At the bottom they have an operating system called NuttX (a type of real-time UNIX). On top of that they have device drivers and such creating a "Hardware Abstraction Layer", with is used by application software at the top of the stack.
Also, Robero Navoni's comment was that he has already been maintaining an ArduCopter port on another ARM platform (VR Brain), and he expects/intends to port that to the PX4 hardware. So then there should be at least two types of software that can use this hardware.
Since Ardu* uses MavLink (which was created by PixHawk), they already operate in the same "software ecosystem". Because STM32/ARM7 is a popular choice for other full-featured autopilot platforms (Paparazzi and OpenPilot for example), it seems possible that there could eventually be even more choices regard to the software that you can run on the PX4 in the future, now that 3DR have decided to produce it in quantity.
Having said that, NuttX looks pretty cool and I'm keen to check that out too :)
@Alex the design will be available shortly as fully open hardware, like almost all other 3DR products are. We just want to make sure to have everything tidy and nice for the hardware files release.
Regarding the firmware: The PX4 software stack contains two layers - the operating system and the sensor drivers and then the actual high-level autopilot code. The OS and drivers are fully operational and we have autopilot code for the AR.Drone ready, with fixed-wing to be finished shortly. In addition to that, as mentioned in previous posts, work is under way to have some well-established codebases ported to NuttX.
Great work, this board looks awsome! Is this board going to actually be open hardware? IE github access to the latest design files/ BOM/ gerbers etc?? Or will it just be limited access to some files that are never updated?
Please dont get me wrong, I have no problem with either way, since there are many cloners who just replicate and give no credit to origional developers. Its just that its not truly open hardware?
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