XMOS startKIT: Introduction, Terminology/Architecture, Getting Started and Example Programs

RE: XMOS startKIT: Introduction, Terminology/Architecture, Getting Started and Example Programs

shabaz — Wed, 25 Sep 2024 18:34:55 GMT

How time flies. It's been many years since I tried an XMOS part.

This is one of their more recent device programmers, called xTAG3.

Since this blog was written, there have been two new generations of parts. There is xCORE-200 (with an XS2 instruction set), which upped the performance to even allow Gigabit Ethernet with a microcontroller if required. After that, there is xCORE-AI (with XS3A instruction set) with integer vector calculation engine, and floating point unit. The third generation probably offers a lot more, but I've not looked at it in-depth.

Also, they have deprecated their older IDE, and now support command-line tools in conjunction with VS Code.

I want to give the xCORE-200 parts a go, but am a little worried about the state of their website (which of course is a key part of using a new component). The website stinks, to the point that I've written a long e-mail to them with suggestions.

And, annoyingly, the xCORE.ai parts require a different programmer tool, xTAG4. Fortunately the xTAG3 and xTAG4 programmers are low cost.

RE: XMOS startKIT: Introduction, Terminology/Architecture, Getting Started and Example Programs

Former Member — Thu, 17 Sep 2015 20:34:08 GMT

Would there be any chance that you could develop wholly on something like a raspberry pi?

RE: XMOS startKIT: Introduction, Terminology/Architecture, Getting Started and Example Programs

clem57 — Mon, 12 Jan 2015 22:03:30 GMT

@shabaz ,

Hi. I always read your reviews since you go into much depth. Can you point out any programming tips/suggestions concerning messaging between threads? I plan on running up to 16 threads on a xCORE slicekit. They seem compatible with this starter kit.

Thanks,

Clem

RE: XMOS startKIT: Introduction, Terminology/Architecture, Getting Started and Example Programs

Former Member — Mon, 17 Nov 2014 05:34:07 GMT

I'm trying to run the servo motor demo. Although you don't describe it, I assume one must create a new project for this. At any rate, that's what I did. Then I copy and paste your code into the editor (using "view plain" and copying from the resulting window). The editor shows an error on every line after the opening curly bracket of main: "Bad character sequence encountered". Lines before that are fine. When I try to compile, I get multiple "error: stray '\240' in program" and the program fails to compile. What am I doing wrong.

BTW, the first example worked fine. Thanks for creating this tutorial on the XMOS start kit!

RE: XMOS startKIT: Introduction, Terminology/Architecture, Getting Started and Example Programs

ipv1 — Wed, 25 Jun 2014 17:19:13 GMT

Wow. You have given quite a detailed post which clarified a lot of things and created an interest in XMOS... Nice.

RE: XMOS startKIT: Introduction, Terminology/Architecture, Getting Started and Example Programs

Former Member — Mon, 05 May 2014 08:37:31 GMT

You mention the dev environment is based on eclipse, then later show a windows installer. So perhaps the obvious question, but can it run on a mac or any other place I'd be able to run eclipse ?