MeatPi

Team 30 have worked closely together to develop a product concept which meets the needs of students starting out in the field of electronics. Having previously studied together in the Advanced Diploma at RMIT, we have decided to develop a product which will address the incoherence in the per subject hardware requirement of the diploma. This concept aims to replace a multitude of equipment that in most cases was unsupported, obsolete, or expensive.

The MeatPi is an education centric development board that intends to grow with a student as they learn and master new skills. The board will use modern technology favoured by industry whilst maintaining a student friendly price point.

The MeatPi will comprise of a microcontroller, programmable logic device, various built-in IO, and peripheral pins intended to access expansion boards. The microcontroller included will be an AVR ATmega which will feel familiar to anyone who has worked with an Arduino. The AVR include both digital and analogue pins as to cover multiple student projects. In addition to this, the board will include a built in USB programmer, like that of the Arduino’s, so that students can instantly start writing programs for it at home with Atmel’s free development software. The included logic device will be an Intel Cyclone FPGA with an external configuration device. This device has been selected for its logic element density, low cost, and free to use development environment. By default, the FPGA will be configured to receive and route digital signals between the microcontroller and the boards IO pins, but as the student progresses, the FPGA can be programmed to act as a standalone device or even incorporate DSP functionality.

To supplement this, our group intends to host a suite of example projects and tutorials at MeatPi.dev to help students get started. This might include ‘hello world’ style starter projects, configuration files to reset the board or show off its capabilities, or CAD templates for expansion boards.