Bare Bones Arduino building

[JohnS]

I'm thinking of trying the Bare bones kit from Phenoptix:-
 (http://www.phenoptix.com/collections/new-products/products/bare-bones-breadboard-arduino-compatible-kit-shrinkify-your-projects)
to see what is possible, and reduce size plus costs when producing a few basic sensor setups for data logging. I've done some of the basic project concept proving (joining together existing tutorials) on an Arduino Uno and am fairly  happy I can get things going at that level, but want to reduce deployment size and costs before knocking up several working sensor stations.

I noted the comment on the product page "To program the board you'll need a USB programmer." and wondered if I could just simply switch the chip into an existing Arduino Uno, get it working, and then use the now programmed chip for my project. I think it is the same chip?
Workable or not?

I suspect this may not work - but I'm interested in finding out more about how to get these sorts of small basic projects going. Any pointers welcome to advice, tutorials, or better options given the price.

I appreciate there may be tiny Arduino boards out there that may be a better option (http://jeelabs.com/products/rbbb) for example, but adding a USB link pushes the overall price up - anything better or easier?

Advance thanks for any help,

John

[nikki]

I noted the comment on the product page "To program the board you'll need a USB programmer." and wondered if I could just simply switch the chip into an existing Arduino Uno, get it working, and then use the now programmed chip for my project. I think it is the same chip?
Workable or not?

Totally workable.
The main thing you've got to watch out for with this method is damaging the pins of the chip as you move it around.

You can get IC Extraction Tools tweezers to help with this.
http://www.maplin.co.uk/ic-extraction-tool-2555

Or you can rustle something up with a ZIF
http://www.adafruit.com/products/382 (see the 2nd image)

I'm interested in finding out more about how to get these sorts of small basic projects going. Any pointers welcome to advice, tutorials, or better options given the price.

The next step from the Phenoptix kit would be for you to buy the components in bulk.  http://shrimping.it/blog/bill-of-materials/ has done some of the heavy lifting in terms of looking for suppliers.

If you're buying the ATMega chips like this, you'll need to burn a bootloader onto them before you can start programming them with the Arduino IDE. You can do this with an Arduino board, though:

http://arduino.cc/en/Tutorial/ArduinoISP
http://arduino.cc/en/Tutorial/ArduinoToBreadboard

I appreciate there may be tiny Arduino boards out there that may be a better option (http://jeelabs.com/products/rbbb) for example, but adding a USB link pushes the overall price up - anything better or easier?

I use the RBBBs loads, but I tend to buy in 10s from the states (Modern Device website) in kit form and solder them up myself. I like the small size (better than I can do on stripboard). Think this works out at about £7 per board. By the time you're in double figures for numbers of boards, the price of the USB BUB http://moderndevice.com/product/usb-bub-ii/ or FTDI Friend http://www.adafruit.com/products/284 becomes less significant.

[JohnS]

Thanks for the full reply - I'll have an explore and see what looks viable.

[nikki]

Just spotted this http://www.aliexpress.com/store/product/1PCS-CP2104-Serial-Converter-USB-2-0-To-TTL-UART-6PIN-Module-Replace-Compatible-CP2102-module/812021_1127054200.html , which might help with the RBBB or Shrimp style boards.