Posts Tagged Engineering

First Hardware Order

Time for a technical post – we thought you might want a change of pace from all the documents and presentations. :)

The first components – our flight computer and development carrier board – have just been ordered from Toradex AG in Germany. We’re using the Marvell/Intel XScale PXA320 embedded processor (which has low power consumption and can handle temperatures down to -45 degrees) that comes on a convenient SODIMM module. The idea is to plug the CPU module into the development board, get our development environment up and running, and start working on the in-flight software. At the same time, we’ll be designing our own custom board to interface with all the onboard sensors and components. Once it comes back from the circuit board fabricator, we’ll detach the CPU module, snap it on to our custom board, and we’ll be ready to roll.

Special thanks go to WEEF for their support in funding this purchase, and we’ll keep you updated when more components arrive.

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