Introduction

First we have to start by saying what a pleasure it was to work with TinyCLR's line of FEZ products. We found the FEZ Panda great to work with and simple to get started. One of the best things about this board is the eclectic collection of ports / interfaces available on the board out the door. Secondly, it includes an SD card slot which always comes in handy when working on just about any project!

Don't forget - you get to use Visual Studio and debug the code running on the actual board through the IDE. Such a bonus! For those of us used to coding, compiling, downloading and monitoring a serial port for debug statements to pop up if any - this is heaven send!

Lastly, something that most people don't know is that .NET Gadgeteer is based on this platform. That means you can get started with .NET Gadgeteer before it is officially released!

Overview

To start out, this is a .NET Micro Framework compatible board. Therefore, you have the entire .NET Framework to work with. There is vast framework / code library available to work with. You don't need to hope and pray for the open source community to get something together.

TinyCLR FEZ Panda Board Features

• Programmable LED
• USB Client Connector
• External Power Source Compatible
• Pads for expansion and customization
• UEXT Support
• Onboard push buttons
• USBizi Chip Based
• JTAG Support
• .NET Micro Framework
• Integrates with Visual Studio Express and Professional Editions
• Similar Footprint to the Arduino
• Arduino Shield Compatible
• 3.3V and 5V Support

TinyCLR FEZ Panda Technical Specifications

• Arduino Duemilanove pin-out compatible with 30+ more IOs
• 2.67" x 2.08" (6.8cm x 5.3cm)
• 72Mhz 32-bit ARM
• USBizi-100 Chipset
• 148KB Free Flash
• 62KB Free RAM
• TCP client/server, UDP, DNS, DHCP, using WIZnet W5100, with up to four simultaious sockets.
• 60x Programmable I/O's
• 6x PWM Ports
• 8x Analog Ports
• 1x Analog Output Port
• 4x TTL Ports
• 2x SPI Ports
• I2C Support
• 2x CAN Ports
• Debugging, custom or Emulates keyboard, mouse or CDC
• 4-bit SD bus with SDHC support. The connector is available using
• 2KB Battery Backup Ram
• User Application Protection
• 103mA Active Power Consumption
• 65mA Idle Power Consumption
• 5.74mA Hibernate Power Consumption
• Operating Temperature Range : -40° to +85°
• Lead Free RoHS Compliant
• USB, Serial Debug Interfaces
• Exposed JTAG
• Weight : 0.7 oz.

Hardware Illustrations

The following illustrations shows the top of the TinyCLR FEZ Panda up close.



The following illustration shows the TinyCLR FEZ Panda up close highlighting the primary components of the board.



The following illustration shows the TinyCLR FEZ Panda up close highlighting the available pads the board. These pads allow you to further customize the board to better fit your robot projects.



The following illustration shows the TinyCLR FEZ Panda up close highlighting the primary ports of the board.



The following illustration shows the bottom of the TinyCLR FEZ Panda up close.

Pro's & Con's

Pro's

• .NET Micro Framework Support
• Visual Studio (Express/Professional) Integration
• Easy Programming Language (C#)
• Arduino Shield Compatible
• Many Port Interfaces (i.e. CAN, PWM, Analog, I2C, etc)
• Customizable
• Expandable
• SD Support
• Simple and Easy to Use

Con's

• No RTC (Real Time Clock)
• Real Time operations can be troublesome

Compatibility

The great news is - this board is compatible with many of the Arduino shields currently available in the market. We have tried with various shields from DFRobot and other like manufacturers and without fail they have worked like a charm! We found no issues coding to them using the .NET Micro Framework. You can rest comfortably knowing your existing shields will work out just fine with this board.

Support

TinyCLR has a wealth of knowledge available online on their website. We had zero issues with their support and gave them a 5 star rating. Furthermore, any coding help you may require can be found both on their website as well as on Microsoft's MSDN website.

Conclusion

In conclusion, we found TinyCLR's FEZ Panda a pleasure to work with. We were able to download all the software they recommended without a problem and hit the ground running. Trust us - we were surprised it worked so well. If you are new to coding for these boards or a veteran for other boards - you will find this to be a sigh of relief. One of the main things we enjoyoed is the capability to debug the code as it ran on the actual board from our IDE. It did this effortlessly without fail. Get rid of your port listeners and additional tools used to debug your board code and start using the IDE to leverage everything!

If asked to recommend to this board - we would without a hiccup. The only caveat to all this is the lack of real time support we found using the boart. You can still accomplish things in real time - however - you will have to do a little fancy footwork to make it happen.

Where to Buy?

TinyCLR
DIYbin.com

Additional Resources

Interacting with Servo's
Working with Digital I/O
Working with Analog Ports
Flickering the LED