SparkFun Photon RedBoard¶

The SparkFun Photon RedBoard is a complete Wi-Fi enabled development platform for creating connected devices with ease. The Photon RedBoard has been based around the P1 Particle Module. The I/O, USB, and power connectors are all broken out to a familiar Arduino shape.

The P1 (P-one) is Particle’s tiny Wi-Fi module that contains both the Broadcom BCM43362 Wi-Fi chip and a reprogrammable STM32F205RGY6 32-bit ARM Cortex M3 microcontroller.

In addition to having 1MB of internal flash memory for storing the firmware, the SparkFun Photon also features 128KB of Ram, 1MB of extra SPI flash and 120 MHz of clock.

Pin Mapping¶

SparkFun Photon RedBoard Official Schematic, Reference Design & Pin Mapping are available on the official SparkFun Photon datasheet page.

Flash Layout¶

The internal flash of the SparkFun Photon RedBoard is organized into sectors of different size according to the following table:

Device Summary¶

• Microcontroller: ARM 32-bit Cortex™-M3 CPU Core
• Operating Voltage: 3.3V
• Input Voltage: 3.6-6V
• Digital I/O Pins (DIO): 24
• Analog Input Pins (ADC): 5
• Analog Outputs Pins (DAC): 2
• UARTs: 2
• SPIs: 3
• I2Cs: 1
• CANs: 1
• Flash Memory: 1MB
• SRAM: 128 KB
• Extra Flash Memory: 1MB
• Clock Speed: 120Mhz
• Size (LxW mm): 36.58 X 20.32

Power¶

Power to the SparkFun Photon device is supplied via the on-board USB micro B connector or directly via the VIN pin:

• If power is supplied directly to the VIN pin, the voltage should be regulated between 3.6VDC and 5.5VDC.
• If the device is powered via the USB port, VIN will output a voltage of approximately 4.8VDC due to a reverse polarity protection series schottky diode between V+ of USB and VIN.

Typical current consumption is 80mA with a 5V input. Deep sleep quiescent current is 160uA. When powering the SparkFun Photon from the USB connector, make sure to use a quality cable to minimize voltage drops. If a high resistance cable (i.e., low current) is used, peak currents drawn from the SparkFun Photon when transmitting and receiving will result in voltage sag at the input which may cause a system brown out or intermittent operation. Likewise, the power source should be sufficient enough to source 1A of current to be on the safe side.

Connect, Register, Virtualize and Program¶

On Windows machines (Windows 10), the SparkFun Photon RedBoard in Standard Mode is automatically recognized as Virtual Serial port; otherwise Particle USB Drivers for SparkFun Photon are required by Zerynth Studio for accessing the serial port establishing a connection with the STM32 UART.

To install the drivers on Windows plug the SparkFun Photon on an USB port, download the *.exe package, and follow the installation steps to complete the operation.

On MAC OSX and Linux platforms USB drivers are not required.

#SparkFun Photon
SUBSYSTEMS=="usb", ATTRS{idVendor}=="2b04", ATTRS{idProduct}=="d008", MODE="0666", GROUP="users", ENV{ID_MM_DEVICE_IGNORE}="1"
SUBSYSTEMS=="tty", ATTRS{idVendor}=="2b04", ATTRS{idProduct}=="d008", MODE="0666", GROUP="users", ENV{ID_MM_DEVICE_IGNORE}="1"
SUBSYSTEMS=="usb", ATTRS{idVendor}=="2b04", ATTRS{idProduct}=="c008", MODE="0666", GROUP="users", ENV{ID_MM_DEVICE_IGNORE}="1"
SUBSYSTEMS=="tty", ATTRS{idVendor}=="2b04", ATTRS{idProduct}=="c008", MODE="0666", GROUP="users", ENV{ID_MM_DEVICE_IGNORE}="1"

Once connected on a USB port, if drivers have been correctly installed, the SparkFun Photon RedBoard can be seen as Virtual Serial port and it is automatically recognized by Zerynth Studio and listed in the Device Management Toolbar as “SparkFun Photon RedBoard DFU Mode” if the device is in DFU Mode, otherwise as “SparkFun Photon RedBoard”.

To register and virtualize a Photon RedBoard, it is necessary to put the device in DFU Mode (Device Firmware Upgrade).

The official Particle Core DFU driver and the related installation procedure are reported here but they also work for SparkFun Photon RedBoard.

Follow these steps to register and virtualize a Photon RedBoard:

• Put the SparkFun Photon in DFU Mode (Device Firmware Upgrade):
  • Hold down BOTH buttons (reset and mode);
  • Release only the reset button, while holding down the mode button;
  • Wait for the LED to start flashing magenta, then yellow;
  • Release the mode button; the device is now in DFU Mode (yellow blinking led);
• Select the SparkFun Photon on the Device Management Toolbar;
• Register the device by clicking the “Z” button from the Zerynth Studio;
• Create the unique Zerynth Virtual Machine for the connected device by clicking the “Z” button for the second time;
• Virtualize the device by clicking the “Z” button for the third time.

After virtualization, the SparkFun Photon is ready to be programmed and the Zerynth scripts uploaded. Just Select the virtualized device from the “Device Management Toolbar” and click the dedicated “upload” button of Zerynth Studio and reset the device by pressing the Reset on-board button when asked.

Firmware Over the Air update (FOTA)¶

The Firmware Over the Air feature allows to update the device firmware at runtime. Zerynth FOTA in the SparkFun Photon device is available for bytecode.

Flash Layout is shown in table below:

Power Management and Secure Firmware¶

Power Management feature allows to optimize power consumption by putting the device in low consumption state.

Secure Firmware feature allows to detect and recover from malfunctions and, when supported, to protect the running firmware (e.g. disabling the external access to flash or assigning protected RAM memory to critical parts of the system).

Both these features are strongly platform dependent; more information at Power Management - STM32F section and Secure Firmware - STM32F section.