Fastest Most stable Arduino signal generator possible.

nathan.andrinoid

Fastest Most stable Arduino signal generator possible.
« on February 5th, 2018, 05:33 PM »Last edited on February 5th, 2018, 11:42 PM
Hello all, I have been a quite member of the experimenter community. I have been thankful for what everyone has shared over the years. I though I would give back by sharing the best Arduino signal generator possible.

I am including my small custom terminal app java that listens to the data streaming from the serial port of the Arduino to display the frequency.

You can load the attached hex file with the install of your arduino IDE.  It will use the embedded avrdude software from the arduino IDE.

if you write a .bat file like I did you can load it with the following command (given you pick the right port number. You can you the arduino  software or my terminal app to see the list of ports.

C:\Program^ Files^ ^(x86^)\Arduino\hardware\tools\avr/bin/avrdude -C"C:\Program Files (x86)\Arduino\hardware\tools\avr/etc/avrdude.conf" -v -patmega328p -carduino -PCOM4 -b115200 -D  -Uflash:w:BestSignalGenerator.hex

look for the location of the avrdude.exe and the avrdude.conf in your arduino install and change the path to your path. Note the ^ symbol is only need to go before a space if you are writing your command out in a .bat file. 

You can compile your own executable jar from my open source code at the following location. It is a JavaFX Eclipse project.

https://github.com/nathanAndrinoid/TerminalComm/tree/master/TerminalComm/src/ArduinoSigGen

or you can install the javaSE 8 or later runtime and use the jar I am attaching.

You can see me make little demo on YouTube.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X_4NNo0Cl3s

nathan.andrinoid

Re: Fastest Most stable Arduino signal generator possible.
« Reply #1, on February 5th, 2018, 05:41 PM »
I almost forgot to mention that the analog read pin A0 is for duty cycle, pin A1 is for fine adjustment of frequency, A2 is for medium adjustment of frequency, and A3 is for course adjustment of frequency. I used 10k but 5k variable resisters will work. With the center pin on read pins and one end to ground and the other to reference voltage of the board.

Matt Watts

Re: Fastest Most stable Arduino signal generator possible.
« Reply #2, on February 5th, 2018, 06:49 PM »
Excellent work Nathan!

When I finally get my lab built, remind me to design you a nice board to plug into the Arduino and post it to OSH Park for people to take advantage of.


And I fully agree--I've never seen an Arduino produce such a nice signal before.  Let me guess, you wrote everything in low-level assembly language.  :-)

nathan.andrinoid

Re: Fastest Most stable Arduino signal generator possible.
« Reply #4, on February 5th, 2018, 11:30 PM »Last edited on February 5th, 2018, 11:32 PM
@Matt Watts - If you can design a circuit board for a custom arduino shield I would want to have one that is a cross between an old project where I add some functionality to the USB chip the UNO board. I added in a terminal display. I want to add my frequency display to a mini LCD shield with variable resistors. I am not sure if I would use the same LCD as my last project.

Yes, every bit of it was explicitly written with assembly commands. I agonized over the sequences and the techniques I implemented off and on for years.