Here’s what the little Skunkworks from Jim N5IB in collaboration witih W0EB and W2CTX has been up to!
Jim says he has “A wee PC board that accepts a Teensy 3.5 or 3.6 processor, then plugs into the space that would have been occupied by a NANO”.
Corresponding I/O lines are routed to maintain compatibility with the uBITX. Since the Teensy has a RTC (real time clock) there’s a spot for its backup battery.
In principle, the adapter could be used to plug in a Teensy anywhere a NANO used to live. On a stock Raduino (you would have to remove the NANO and socket the space). On an enhanced Raduino, such as the RadI2Cino (developed by N5IB/W0EB and W2CTX) it is simply a matter of inserting the plug.
The Teensy brings lots more memory, more I/O lines including lots of analogue ports, an on-card microSD slot, and of course a Real Time Clock.
The Teensy 3.5 runs on 3-6 volts, with 3.3V logic, but has 5 V tolerant digital inputs. The Teensy 3.6 also runs on 3-6 V, but its logic is 3.3V only. It is faster and has more memory than the Teensy 3.5.
Prototype boards are in hand and will be beta tested within the next few days. Firmware portability is of course the thing that must be confirmed.
Jim promises to keep us up to date.