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Home | Product Categories | Android | DEV-10745

Electric Sheep

sku: DEV-10745 RoHS Compliant OSHW

Description: Do Androids dream of Electric Sheep? Well if not, they should. The Electric Sheep board is a development tool (similar to the Arduino Mega ADK) for creating custom Android accessories. Based on the ATMEGA2560-16AU and carrying the same bootloader as the Arduino Mega 2560, this board communicates with your Android device over USB by taking advantage of Android's "Open Accessory" protocol. Android device-side interfaces can even be created without having to write Java code or mess around with the Eclipse IDE by using HandBag for Android!

Note: Because of the configuration of the Open Accessory protocol, this board needs to supply 500mA to the Android device over the USB connection. If you're running peripheral devices from the board, you will need to provide more current to the DC input, which is rated for up to 1.5Amps.

Dimensions: 53.50 x 101.50mm

Features:

  • ATMEGA2560-16AU Microcontroller Pre-loaded with Mega 2560 Bootloader
  • USB-Host Connector On-board for Connection to Android Devices
  • Create Android Accessories using the Arduino IDE and HandBag
  • Arduino-style Pin Configuration (Shield Compatible)
  • FTDI Header for Programming
  • Input Voltage: 6-15VDC

Documents:

Pricing

In stock

79.95
71.96
63.96

93 in stock

price
10-99
100+



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images are CC BY-NC-SA 3.0

ASCII version


Comments 13 comments

  • Member #185099 | about 4 months ago 2

    The low volume cost price for this board would appear to be about $25. Why is it $99.95?

    • Easton L | about 4 months ago 1

      Agree! i was ready to order (thinking finally a cheap mega type board) but then i saw the price…

    • SigEpBlue | about 4 months ago 1

      Same here. I was excited too, but alas, $100 is a bit steep for me. I just don’t see that much value in this product; maybe $20 worth of parts or so…? Plus PCB & mark-up (I know, we all have to eat). Am I missing something?

    • doofenshmirtz | about 4 months ago 1

      Agreed. i would love to have one but not at that price.

  • PaulGroenendaal | about 4 months ago 1

    So what is the main advantage over the Arduino Mega ADK? It’s 12 euros more expensive and it does not have USB B connection or female pins… The part that I do like is the alignment of the power bus and the usb connector, but the ftdi header sticks out?!

  • funkathustra | about 4 months ago 1

    I’m not sure there’s any advantage over the official Arduino Mega ADK, other than there’s not a programmer permanently stuck onto it, which makes it better suited for battery applications.

    Besides, Arduino ADK is nothing more than a poor hack. This line of AVR processors has no USB functionality, and trying to add USB functionality by soldering on extra ICs seems very silly. The main reason why there are so many freaking microcontrollers to choose from is that each one of them has different features.

    If you really want to develop an Android accessory, at least start with a micro that actually has a legitimate USB PHY and support software for it — The Microchip PIC24H Android development kit is about $70, and way better in almost every measure.

    • infrared | about 4 months ago * 1

      Look at the many products coming out from android OEMs such as the Moto Atrix lapdock and media dock which both use a MSP430 from TI ~$15 in small volume for a 16 bit work horse (all bells/whistles). You can even purchase their entry level full featured dev board for less then $5. I am sure the ADK could be ported to that board with a better value line micro-controller. FWIW: The media dock accessory has less then $20 in parts yet retailed for $200 at Atrix launch… Although the Arduino is fully open in both hardware and software

  • Vertex | about 4 months ago 1

    I’d be extremely pleased to see this working with the kindle fire.

  • Member #294253 | about a month ago 1

    I’ve received a Electric Sheep board, but all my os (including ubuntu 11.10 64bit, ubuntu 10.04 LTS, windows xp, windows 7 64bit) can’t recognise it. After connecting the board via USB, nothing heppen. Windows was’t show any new unknown device to install, and linux wasn’t show any device like /dev/tty*. And I use minicom to connect via serial port, lots of "

    TEST_1: USB TEST FAIL
TEST_2: A0 IO TEST FAIL, CHECK FOR JUMPERS!
TEST_3: A1 IO TEST FAIL, CHECK FOR JUMPERS!"

    shows up repeatedly. Any advice ?

    • Member #55938 | last month 1

      I might be wrong, but looking at the Features, the USB seems to only be for “talking” to Android. The FTDI Header is for programming.

    • Kinch | about 3 weeks ago * 1

      What you’re seeing is the Test code (an Arduino sketch) that ships out on the chip. This test code is designed to work with our in house test equipment, so without that hardware you’re going to see failure messages printed to the serial port. But don’t panic! Your board is totally fine.

      To remedy seeing those error messages you simply need to start playing around with Arduino or Handbag for Android and start creating your own Android accessories. You can upload to the board via the FTDI headers.