LABVIEW TOO PRICEY

[Paul]

Can't deny its brilliant, but I just want to drive a single stepper motor
for a home project.
Can anyone point me to some kits for rs232 control/software on a budget; UK
preferred.
Thankyou for informative reading
Paul

[were]

Have you looked into the Basic Stamp?

If it would work for you here is a place were you can order a nice starter kit.

http://www.phanderson.com/stamp/starter.html

Paul wrote:

> Can't deny its brilliant, but I just want to drive a single stepper motor
> for a home project.
> Can anyone point me to some kits for rs232 control/software on a budget; UK
> preferred.
> Thankyou for informative reading
> Paul

[James Morrison/Joan Lester]

There is always Java, free, free, free and you can get serial components rather
easily. And its easy to get lots of support, examples, advice etc. to.

Jim

Paul wrote:

> Can't deny its brilliant, but I just want to drive a single stepper motor
> for a home project.
> Can anyone point me to some kits for rs232 control/software on a budget; UK
> preferred.
> Thankyou for informative reading
> Paul

[Rudolf Potucek]

There is the hush-hush solution: find someone who has the FULL LabView
packet, including the compiler and get the VI compiled. AFAIK the policy
on the compiled stuff is that you can do wahtever with it, even sell it 😉

Rudolf

Paul wrote:
: Can't deny its brilliant, but I just want to drive a single stepper motor
: for a home project.
: Can anyone point me to some kits for rs232 control/software on a budget; UK
: preferred.
: Thankyou for informative reading
: Paul

[CraigGraham]

Or student edition? Is this simply a cutdown version for everyone or only
available on proof of student status?

Or Lego Mindstorms? 🙂

Rudolf Potucek wrote in message
news:93jbgi$psu$1@nserve1.acs.ucalgary.ca...
> There is the hush-hush solution: find someone who has the FULL LabView
> packet, including the compiler and get the VI compiled. AFAIK the policy
> on the compiled stuff is that you can do wahtever with it, even sell it 😉

[James Morrison/Joan Lester]

That is definately not the policy. There is a limit to the distribution. I
forget the specifics.

Jim

Rudolf Potucek wrote:

> There is the hush-hush solution: find someone who has the FULL LabView
> packet, including the compiler and get the VI compiled. AFAIK the policy
> on the compiled stuff is that you can do wahtever with it, even sell it 😉
>
> Rudolf
>
> Paul wrote:
> : Can't deny its brilliant, but I just want to drive a single stepper motor
> : for a home project.
> : Can anyone point me to some kits for rs232 control/software on a budget; UK
> : preferred.
> : Thankyou for informative reading
> : Paul

[Peter Reeves-Hall]

I hope this doesn't start a deluge of can I have the schematics/software
e-mail as I unfortunately havn't got the time to transcribe from lab books /
data sheets all the info but as a hint:

You can make a 4 stepper motor interface for less than 50 UK pounds (70 US
dollars) from components from your favourite mail order electronics
supplier.

Chips are available to control stepper motors simplifying the 6 control
lines to 3 "TTL" lines:

High/Low for On/Off (energises the motor coils)
High/Low for direction Clockwise/anticlockwise
Low-High-Low pulse at almost any sensible rate to do one step per pulse.

You only need to interface the direction and step lines to the computer as
you can "short" the on/off line to the voltage (+) supply (optionally via a
manual s
witch).

The parallel port has 8 data lines than can very easily be used for output
by directly writing to the appropriate base address with a single byte with
appropriate bit pattern corresponding 1:1 with the individual data lines.
There are other status lines/pins on the parallel port you can use as output
(and inputs) if you need more connections.

There are lots of programming languages (inc. free ones) that will give you
access to the base memory of your PC to control the printer port. Sometime
OS's can cause problems though (eg. NT).

Good luck,

Peter



"Paul" wrote in message
news:93iqno$16v$1@plutonium.btinternet.com...
> Can't deny its brilliant, but I just want to drive a single stepper motor
> for a home project.
> Can anyone point me to some kits for rs232 control/software on a budget;
UK
> preferred.
> Thankyou for informative reading
> Paul
>
>

[Jared 323]

Paul,

Check out www.boondog.com here is a sample from the homepage.

Boondog's tutorials provides you with do-it-yourself-style articles. These
articles show you how to interface devices to your PC. Devices like motors,
relays, A/D and D/A converters, LCDs, keypads etc. The tutorials are complete
with schematic wiring diagrams, parts lists, parts suppliers, Black & White
photos highlighting construction tips, circuit and programming code descriptions,
PCB artwork and source code. So freely download and happy building.
Jared

"Paul" wrote:
>Can't deny its brilliant, but I just want to drive a single stepper motor>for
a home project.>Can anyone point me to some kits for rs232 control/software
on a budget; UK>preferred.>Thankyou for informati
ve reading>Paul>>

[David Thomson]

You can check with your local NI rep if you want, but I'm almost sure
that the official policy from NI is that you are allowed to take a copy
of LabVIEW home if you have a legal license at work.

Regards,
Dave
-------------------------------------------------------------
David Thomson 303-499-1973 (voice and fax)
Original Code Consulting dthomson@originalcode.com
www.originalcode.com
National Instruments Alliance Program Member
-------------------------------------------------------------
Research Scientist 303-497-3470 (voice)
NOAA Aeronomy Laboratory 303-497-5373 (fax)
Boulder, Colorado dthomson@al.noaa.gov
--------------------------------------------
-----------------

[Ian Stokes]

There used to be a student edition which included a book on using the
software along with a scaled down version of the software (not a demo
version) . It could be used with some of the NI boards and RS232. The price
was about £25 4 or 5 years ago and sold through bookshops rather than
National Instruments. I think it was published by Prentice Hall.

Good luck.

Ian


Paul wrote in message <93iqno$16v$1@plutonium.btinternet.com>...
>Can't deny its brilliant, but I just want to drive a single stepper motor
>for a home project.
>Can anyone point me to some kits for rs232 control/software on a budget; UK
>preferred.
>Thankyou for informative reading
>Paul
>
>