HobbyCNC EZ Driver Board & BeagleBone

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1

Hi All,

I would like to run my HobbyCNC EZ Driver board with a BeagleBone and LinuxCNC… I havent managed to find any mention of this configuration being used. I have the HobbyCNC EZ driver board already but would to purchase the BB and a suitable cape.

Does anyone have experience with this setup?
Thanks!

2

I have the Beaglebone Black and the HobbyCNC EZ Driver board and would like to hook it up. I have connected the Beaglebone to a DB25 connecter but am not sure if it is possible to use that way. I just see other driver boards using Machinekit but that will not work with a parallel port connector.

3

On Mon, 2 Jul 2018 12:17:49 -0700 (PDT), John Hammond
<hammond.john7@gmail.com> declaimed the
following:

I have the Beaglebone Black and the HobbyCNC EZ Driver board and would like
to hook it up. I have connected the Beaglebone to a DB25 connecter but am
not sure if it is possible to use that way. I just see other driver boards
using Machinekit but that will not work with a parallel port connector.

  If it uses an actual parallel port you are likely going to end up
having to do a lot of bit-banging (DB25 was used for parallel and serial
ports originally, then got trimmed to DB9 for common serial). UARTs won't
do it as you need to set 8-individual bits (GPIOs) for the data, along with
toggling the data-ready bit (STROBE: another GPIO), and maybe reading a few
more GPIOs for status returns (BUSY and ACK at the least). Might be easier
to use a serial->parallel shift register chip for the 8 data bits, cutting
the GPIO usage down by 7 (wait for Not Busy, raise Strobe, shift 8 bits to
shift register, drop strobe, wait for Not Busy, repeat...).

4

Isn't the Parallel port 5 volt logic? I didn't see a schematic for
the HobbyCNC EZ Driver.

But if you connect it directly to the BBB, you've probably already
blown the gpio's..

Regards,

5

I have now ordered a Cramps Board. Hopefully, that will allow some interface. Still very ignorant as to next steps, but optimistic.