Expansion Ports for Linux

[desijays]

Good Morning,

Is there some kind of expansion board out there, that has lots of GPIO's, I2C, SPI, SSC, USART's, ADC's, USB, Ethernet ? I would like to connect my linux computer to such an expansion board, so that I could interface my linux computer with a few robotic projects that I am currently working on. I know linux on the Desktop is not real time. But at this point, that does not matter. Because, if there is a way to connect any kind of linux box to such an expansion board, at some later date, I can get some sort of SoC(System on chip), install a real time linux kernel in there and connect it to the 'said' expansion board. And that way, I will would still know that whatever application code, I write on the Desktop linux for using the 'expansion board', will still work on the real time kernel of linux when I connect it to the 'expansion board' as well.

I hope It wasn't confusing. : )

Thank you.

 

[Nigel Goodwin]

Modern PC's are pretty well down to USB only, so I suggest you have a look here:

UBW (USB Bit Whacker) Project

 

[Torben]

(First: I swear I'm not advertising. I've used boards from these guys before and been pretty happy.)

I don't know what your budget is or what your requirements are, and I know this doesn't directly address your question, but perhaps something like a system-on-board would work better for you than a PC.

These things are pretty fun. I have not used the TS-7500 but I have used the TS-7400 quite a bit for work and it's pretty cool what you can do with one. Lots of I/O and you can either run in a barebones Linux which gives you complete control, or you can boot to an SD Card image and have a full installation (I've had apache, C++ programs for power scheduling, a power-controlling print server, and so on running on TS-7400s).

TS-7500 Ultra-Compact 250MHz ARM9 Computer Module with SD Card

(I have no affiliation with the company.)


Regards,

Torben