Castle link hand held programmer
 

Patrick, When will we see the hand held programmer?

YES, YES, YES.... Please. I would love that. A PC at the track is a pain in the backside at best.

I sent Patrick a PM about this in late May & he said "it is in the works". At the time they were trying to get it out at the same time as the combo. Hopefully the MMM mess did not slow down the developement of the hand held too much but I thought I would ask.

oh i would have to get one. make it play music and do other stuf too :-) (just joking)

It's not an issue with me. I have a laptop with me pretty much 24/7. What would be really sweet would be bluetooth or IR, lol.

I agree though, for most, a handheld programmer would be ideal. Actually getting the laptop out and connecting it to the MM can be a pain when there's a lot going on.


J>

I'll be different here and say I'd probably never use one. I find I never change the obscure stuff in the field. To change the basics, I just program with the transmitter.

BUMP For Patrick????

yeah, I demand a symbianOS version of castle link, and a BT adapter for the esc so my phone can do it all wirelessly!

Bump for Patrick, Any estimate on when it will be out? (or do I need to get a cheap laptop).

Speed control with built-in bluetooth would be awesome! :yes: Especially if they came out with a windows mobile application. A card is still beter than nothing. But I have my phone with me everywhere, it would be one less thing to forget at home.:lol:

That would be great but right now I would be happy with a card programmer like Losi has for their 1/8th ESC.

The real issue with a card programmer is that it is tough to do some of the customizations that you can do with the PC program -- BUT:

The card programmer is in the works. Development on it has been suspended while we get some of the other stuff out of the way -- and should resume in October. I'm hoping we will be shipping the card programmer in December or so.

It will use overlays to program the different types of controllers, like Phoenix, Thunderbird, Mamba, and Hydra controller.

Thanx!

Patrick

Thanks for the update! Any info on what will be adjustable?

Patrick...thanks for the update!

Thanks Patrick.

Cheers dude. I wouldnt worry about the clever stuff like throttle curves and such, just the basics like... the basics really. :yes:

any plans to make a castlelink for windows mobile devices?
most phones have a usb-mini plug
that would be huge.

Unfortunately, most PDAs and phones are slave only devices -- they can't host USB.

Like what you can do with the Tx for example?

Patrick, Just a thought but given what Castle has been able to do with updating the software - i.e. governor modes on the air controllers and all of the numerous enhancements on the car controllers will overalys work.

I was thinking of something with a simple screen like a hyperion charger through which you could scroll and set up the options.

The controller itself could then be flashable as your software develops - I know it would add to the cost but would make it more future prrof.

History shows you do like to add new features!

Rgds

ah, makes sense.:oops:

thanks for the reply. :yes:

Any progress on the programmer? I know you guys have been busy with the MMM & Motor but I was wondering if there is any news.

Whats wrong with the 'basic' programming you can do with the transmitter? I still don't get it...

If you go driving and wants to change your settings, are you able to remember all of them by heart? Plus how long will it take you to go through the programming. I'm going to use my ESC as an example (Keep in mind I'm not bashing Castle as I do own a few Castle products), I can program what ever setting I need very fast even if I have to plug the red wire back. I have mentioned a type of program box before and Hobbywing actually did it as I mentioned to them as well. A program box will be very helpful when you need fast programming and it can have basically all the features the PC programming can have. Use a nice little graphic display if you need to change the throttle features and that's one thing I didn't tell Hobbywing :lol:, but it's now in the open.

it would be great if i could program my stuff from my blackberry

I think the little PDA-like programmer would be nice, if it played music it would be great. But, the most i'd do in the field, would be the punch, brakes or battery cut-off. So a card would be right for me. I do all of my curves and testing in my front yard, very close to my computer

Portable Programmer Solution: buy an eee-pc from asus and install XP

What I would dig is Linux software from CC so I could buy an eee-pc from asus and NOT install XP :neutral:

So you carry around the manual instead of a programming card.. and it takes about 30s to go through programming, not the end of the world. AND, once you've done it about 5 times it is imprinted on your brain, so you won't even need the manual.

I mean yeah, don't get me wrong, a programming box would be sweet as. Just saying that for doing the basics in the field, well we can already do that.

BUMP, Patrick, you guys still working on this?

It takes me a few seconds to change the settings I need and it takes you a few seconds just to get into program mode. Lets say you are in a race and you have to change a setting, would you rather spend precious seconds with a nice program card or just trying to get your ESC into program mode? It could take a minute or 2 for you to get through all the programming not 30 seconds. I hope Patrick does offer a program box and you'll buy one. If it does come out, I'll be waiting for you to post something nice about it here. Also, all the features found in the PC programming can be implemented in the program box. Nice graphic LCDs are cheap.

One a somewhat related note, Do you have a white paper or something describing how to send commands over USB to your various units? Maybe I'll write a Linux interface for updating the firmware.

I just got the perfect system for all my robo field maintenance, it's ruggedized, it's linux based, and the screen can be passively lit for daylight readability; the OLPC:

Whoa. Howmuch would something like that cost?

The OLPC laptop can be gotten for $400, but when you buy one, you also donate one to some kid in a third world country. So, effectively, each laptop is $200, but you only get one and the warm fuzzy feeling of being charitable. :neutral:

More infro here:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/AS...nosim/arm06-20
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OLPC_XO-1

I posted about creating a linux build in another forum, and joe ford replied that they have no idea as of yet to go linux, nor open source. I've looked at the castle link hardware, it uses some pretty nifty tricks to establish a connection. I would bank on a programming card not unlike the ones available now for the ezrun etc ESCs. The only issue would be curve manipulation since a a graphics display is required for this, and that makes everything 5 times more complicated. So maybe having the same parameters available for stick programming, but allowing for greater flexibility by having smaller increments for values.

We don't need a handheld programmer. All we need is for Castlelink to work on the iphone...

While we're dreaming, how amount a Wi-fi based system where the interface is web-driven, and the ESC is updated via GPS? Totally OS independent that way! :smile:

iphone cant host usb though. It can only be the hostee. Only option would be a bluetooth link between the iphone and a castle link. not to mention recoding the entire software to be Mac oriented.

lol. That would be cool, but how many people have iPhones (I don't). A little handheld programmer just makes changing all those nice settings so much easier.

what we really need is a blue tooth link

I am sure it is harder than it sounds, but that seems to be the most logical choice for a programmer - running the full castle link software on palm, iphones, and blackberries. I hate having to drag my laptop to the track. I generally want to play with throttle curves more than anything...