Ardunio announced the Arduino Due, which increases performances thanks to an 84MHz SAM3X8E processor from Atmel.
This new processor is based on the 32 bit ARM Cortex M3 architecture.
From the arduino.cc site:
"Overview
The Arduino Due is a microcontroller board based on the Atmel SAM3X8E ARM Cortex-M3 CPU (datasheet). It is the first Arduino board based on a 32-bit ARM core microcontroller. It has 54 digital input/output pins (of which 12 can be used as PWM outputs), 12 analog inputs, 4 UARTs (hardware serial ports), a 84 MHz clock, an USB OTG capable connection, 2 DAC (digital to analog), 2 TWI, a power jack, an SPI header, a JTAG header, a reset button and an erase button."
The Arduino DUE board is longer than the Arduino UNO board (take a look to the following picture)
In this way they have achieved the compatibility with the Arduino UNO board, so you can use your old shields with this new product.
If you look at the picture you can see that the connections (0->Rx0 to AREF and A5 to IOREF) are the same you can find on the previous Arduino.
From the arduino.cc site:
"The Arduino Due is designed to be compatible with most shields designed for the Uno, Diecimila or Duemilanove. Digital pins 0 to 13 (and the adjacent AREF and GND pins), analog inputs 0 to 5, the power header, and "ICSP" (SPI) header are all in equivalent locations. Further the main UART (serial port) is located on the same pins (0 and 1). Please note that I2C is not located on the same pins on the Due (20 and 21) as the Duemilanove / Diecimila (analog inputs 4 and 5)."
*** PAY ATTENTION ***
Unlike other Arduino boards, the Arduino Due board runs at 3.3V. The maximum voltage that the I/O pins can tolerate is 3.3V. Providing higher voltages, like 5V to an I/O pin could damage the board
But now, you have more HW, more speed, more connections…….
Let's start
| Microcontroller | AT91SAM3X8E | |
| Operating Voltage | 3.3V | |
| Input Voltage (recommended) | 7-12V | |
| Input Voltage (limits) | 6-20V | |
| Digital I/O Pins | 54 (of which 12 provide PWM output) | |
| Analog Input Pins | 12 | |
| Analog Outputs Pins | 2 (DAC) | |
| Total DC Output Current on all I/O lines | 130 mA | |
| DC Current for 3.3V Pin | 800 mA | |
| DC Current for 5V Pin | 800 mA | |
| Flash Memory | 512 KB all available for the user applications | |
| SRAM | 96 KB (two banks: 64KB and 32KB) | |
| Clock Speed | 84 MHz |
As you can see, it is a very different system respect to the Arduino UNO.
I've seen a lot of Arduino UNO/2009/Diecimila used in small domotic/hobbystic/personal projects. It does the work and it is really simple to program and use.
Arduino DUE goes up a level…..
It has more CPU power, it has 4 hardware UART's.
All the available memory (Flash, RAM and ROM) can be accessed directly as a flat addressing space.
It has two pin dedicated to the CAN BUS.
It has two DAC's
Really, I think the use cases for Arduino DUE have nothing to do with the ones for Arduino UNO. If I need to check a temperature from an i2c sensor I can use Arduino UNO, it costs less, it is, at least, as simple as Arduino DUE, I can build it at home soldering PDIP chips from ATMEL.
I see a very different target for this board, imagine you want to build a voice recognition system, now you have all the power you need.
So I think the UNO will live again and again and again….
Gg1