RoadTest: Enroll to Review the Arduino Uno R4 Minima
Author: swathic
Creation date:
Evaluation Type: Development Boards & Tools
Did you receive all parts the manufacturer stated would be included in the package?: True
What other parts do you consider comparable to this product?: Arduino MKR, Arduino Leonardo, Arduino Micro, etc.
What were the biggest problems encountered?: No problem encounter as I am familiar with Arduino UNO
Detailed Review:
The Arduino UNO R4 Minima is the first UNO board featuring a 32-bit microcontroller, the RA4M1 from Renesas. It is faster, has more memory and has a number of built-in features such as a DAC, RTC and HID. The UNO R4 Minima is a 5 V only board. For more details on pin diagram, datasheet and documentation please go through the link.
https://docs.arduino.cc/hardware/uno-r4-minima
The Arduino UNO R4 Minima is a development board with the classic UNO form factor, based on the RA4M1 microcontroller made by Renesas. It now comes with 32 kB of RAM memory, a clock speed of 48 MHz, and a USB-C port. This is the first UNO board that uses a 32-bit architecture, being previously based on an 8-bit AVR architecture. The below link take you to the article for technical reference to Arduino UNO R4 Minima board, introducing the various components of the board, as well as resources to get started.
https://docs.arduino.cc/tutorials/uno-r4-minima/cheat-sheet
For fastness test and comparison of Arduino UNO R4 Minima and Arduino UNO, here is a sample demo.
In the section learn how to emulate a mouse/keyboard using an Arduino UNO R4 Minima board with the Keyboard and Mouse APIs.
This feature can be used to create game controllers, keyboard extensions or other HID devices. Further more details and sample examples can be found in the following link
https://docs.arduino.cc/tutorials/uno-r4-minima/usb-hid
Human interface devices (HID) are devices designed for humans (keyboards, mice, game controllers etc.), that frequently sends data over USB to a computer. When you press a key on a keyboard, you send data to a computer, which reads it and in turn activates the corresponding key.
The UNO R4 Minima has built-in support for HID, a feature found on most modern day development boards, but not on previous UNO revisions.
The keyboard functions enable 32u4 or SAMD micro based boards to send keystrokes to an attached computer through their micro’s native USB port. More examples on the keyboard are available in the below link:
https://www.arduino.cc/reference/en/language/functions/usb/keyboard/
The mouse functions enable 32u4 or SAMD micro based boards to control cursor movement on a connected computer through their micro’s native USB port. When updating the cursor position, it is always relative to the cursor’s previous location. More examples on the mouse are available in the below link:
https://www.arduino.cc/reference/en/language/functions/usb/mouse/
The following example moves axis of mouse in Vertical with 40 points to select the listed items on menu.
Digital Scarecrow for heap watching in fields
Farmers are facing issues after getting the yields when they are placed in heaps before packing. In such cases a Digital Scarecrow which will avoid the spoiling by animals (cows, boars, etc), birds (pigeons, sparrows, etc), small creatures (rats, rabbits, etc) of grain, vegetables, fruits, etc when farmers place food items in the fields for drying or remove moisture as shown in below figures before bagging or packing to transport.
I would like to design a Digital Scarecrow for Farmers to avoid the crop damaging by animals, birds, small creatures, etc. As the Arduino Uno R4 Minima has silent feature to interface PIR motion sensor to sense the human and animals in any light condition so it help in protecting the farmer’s crop in day and night. If the sensor senses the animal movement it raises the alarm voice louder/ sounds to make the animals afraid and in night it blink the RGB LED in a particular sequence which animals and birds don’t like or afraid. This kind of Scarecrow plays a major role in fields to help in relaxing the farmers.
This kind of Scarecrows are not only useful for gain heaps watching but can also use at the pits on roads, streets if any maintenance work is going on, unclosed borewell holes, manholes, etc places.
