Months ago SparkFun mentioned that they were working on something similar to the Bus Pirate. We asked them to please consider using the Bus Pirate design because it already has a bunch of features, and it’s in the public domain.
Today we received a prototype of the SparkFun Bus Pirate. SparkFun is the fourth company to sell Bus Pirate hardware, a group that already includes an eBay seller, Fundamental Logic, and Seeed Studio.You might call this the Arduino-fication of the Bus Pirate.
It’s awesome that the Bus Pirate is becoming a popular, widely available prototyping tool. Hopefully SparkFun’s exposure gives a lot more people the chance to use one. Of course, we’d prefer you buy a Bus Pirate at Seeed Studio because each sale directly funds the development of this open source project.
We give our impressions of the SparkFun hardware after the break.
SparkFun started with the BPv3 design, and shrunk the passive components to 0402. This is probably their stock size, the way we use 0805. The Bus Pirate is intended as a hackable engineering tool, the 0402 parts make it more difficult to mod or repair by hand, but that won’t matter to most users.
The 0402 size components opened up a bunch of extra board space. SparkFun added a second USB status LED so that both RX and TX status are displayed. They were also able to move the IO header to the corner, and fit a shrouded connector.
The ICSP header to the PIC is unpopulated. We added our own connector between the PGC and PGD pins in order to trigger the bootloader for firmware upgrades.
SparkFun removed the ferrite bead that filters the USB power supply. They also replaced the 10uF tantalum capacitors on the voltage regulator outputs with ~1uF ceramics. We prefer to include the ferrite bead, but we may follow their lead and reduce the output capacitance on future designs that use MIC5205 regulators.
We had seen the schematics for this Bus Pirate prior to receiving the hardware. VR2, the 3.3volt regulator for PIC, was listed as a 5volt part. The PIC24FJ64GA002 is a 3.3volt PIC, 5volts will eventually ruin the chip. We reported the error, but noticed that they included the 5volt regulator on this prototype. We’re not sure if this is just an engineering sample, or if they had actually manufactured some Bus Pirates with this defect. Update: yes, some shipped, but it has been corrected.
After we hot-aired off the 5volt regulator and replaced it with the correct 3.3volt regulator, the PIC still seems to work. The Bus Pirate passed a self-test without errors.
The Bus Pirate developers don’t get a cut of the SparkFun Bus Pirate sales, but we’re proud our hardware is featured at another site. SparkFun is a great company with a reputation for working with open source hardware.
If you want to support the development of the Bus Pirate, and new features like the AVR STK500v2 programmer clone and the PIC programmer firmware currently in development, please consider buying a Bus Pirate at Seeed Studio.
Each Bus Pirate purchased at Seeed Studio funds the development of this open source project, the bounties placed on new features, and the staff who answer questions in the forum. If you order one from SparkFun, that’s great too!
8 comments
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December 22, 2009 at 10:46 am
James
I noticed this on their website a while back and don’t really approve, in all fairness it’s an open design so I can’t really find anything wrong with selling them but you guys developed it so I’ll never by it anywhere else.
December 22, 2009 at 11:05 pm
Joel
The major reason I do like that SparkFun is now selling them is lead time. If I were to order one from them, I can have it in three days. Seeed Studio takes 3-4 weeks, and one order from them a while back took OVER FIVE WEEKS, even though the part was listed as “in stock”. SparkFun’s BPv3 was available about 3-4 days after Seeed had shipped mine out, and that took 3 weeks.
December 23, 2009 at 4:35 am
chipres
Joel for me its all most same unless they ship with fedex
December 24, 2009 at 1:34 pm
ericwertz
Personally I think it’s kind of weak that SparkFun doesn’t kick something back to Bus Pirate Int’l, LLC. Especially since the bulk of the BP’s value is in the software, not an area in which SparkFun is particularly prolific.
Perhaps everyone at BPI,LLC can get a cut of the Free Day action. And I guess you could argue that moves like this help make Free Day possible.
January 29, 2010 at 12:48 am
Josh
SparkFun REALLY fubar’d the voltage reg?!?! That’s a hard messup.
Any suggestions on a replacement part for the *correct* vreg? I’d also like to replace.
January 29, 2010 at 6:56 am
Ian
Check the Bus Pirate v2go or v3 article, it’s the 3v3 used for vr2.
Measure between the 3.3v and gnd pins of the ICSP header to be sure. Maybe it was only the prototype where they did this.
February 1, 2010 at 6:52 am
Jake
Its unfortunate that sparkfun didn’t make an agreement with you to sell your design.
I would much rather purchase from seed (to help fund development as much as possible), but they always seem to be out of stock! Is there any way to get on a waiting list or something?
February 1, 2010 at 7:00 am
Ian
Hey Jake, Just moments ago Seeed started a new preorder. We’re working on a permanent stock, but the flow of 24fj64ga002 has always been spotty. Thanks for your support!
http://www.seeedstudio.com/depot/preorder-5-bus-pirate-v3-assembled-p-609.html?cPath=61_68