Does linuxcnc support USB

Hi,

Regarding the ecklersoft device:
I looked at it quite a while ago. This is what I remember.....
I think it runs in USB isochronous mode not the regular client mode. This is where the CNC software gets a constant time frame of USB interaction at about 1KHz.
The LinuxCNC PC side software builds a large block of raw STEP pulse data and sends out at each 1KHz time slice.
Thus each bit in the byte could be either high or low for the step signal. 64 bytes (4 bits for 4 step signals, 4 for dir) per USB time slice would allow a maximum rate of 32KHz stepping. Or 64KHz if the dongle side automatically brings the step low and only looks for a high bit to trigger the step. Probably a little less than that to allow some overhead information like limit switches get through the channel.
Isochronous is supposed to be quite stable, so even if you did insert a USB thumb drive or something, the OS still gets interrupted and handles the USB isochronous process in real time.

Jeff

Has anybody looked into the Apple/Intel Thunderbolt port for CNC? The port is slowly showing up on PC hardware and has some interesting capabilities. The biggest problem seems to be getting access to hardware and information from Intel. Maybe it isn't ready for prime time Outside of Mac OS.

I'm far from an expert but it would seem that getting this to run on on some sort of realtime kernel would help to future proof LinuxCNC. It is getting harder to find reasonable PC's with even slots these days. Of course somebody would have to manufacture the required hardware for the other end of the Thunderbolt cable.

Since Thunderbolt also transports a PCI Express lane (afaik) it might actually be fairly easy. I suppose it won't take long before Thunderbolt->PCIe bridge chips become available to us mere mortals, and then designing a '6i25 Thunderbolt edition' shouldn't be that much work for a company like Mesa. Although processing 10Gbit signals on FR4 PCB material: ugh. That's not an easy job.

You can probably buy a TB to PCIe chassis where you can plug in your stock 6i25 or another PCIe card now.


But if I had to choose a single interface for connecting LinuxCNC to the outside world it would be Ethernet. Available on everything ranging from the smallest computer-on-a-stick to the largest multicore server, it is a galvanically isolated interface, RT drivers are available now and latency should be manageable especially in a point-to-point link.

Anis wrote:

Hi,

I am new to EMC. From the documentation, I found out that EMC works with Parallel port. Does it also support USB?


Best Regards,

clarification : I want to use "CNC controller board" with USB interface, so the communication between my PC and the board use USB in both sides

if there is no a such CNC controller board (supporting linuxcnc and use USB as interface), could you please give me the references of the most known CNC controller boards with PCI or ISA connector

Hi,

Are you looking for a motor drive with PCI or ISA *built in* to the drive board itself?
If you are simply looking for a PCI interface that will work with LinuxCNC, then look at :

www.mesanet.com/

Jeff

xylotex wrote:

Hi,

Are you looking for a motor drive with PCI or ISA *built in* to the drive board itself?
If you are simply looking for a PCI interface that will work with LinuxCNC, then look at :

www.mesanet.com/

Jeff

could you give me the exaclty website of CNC controller borad with PCI or ISA connector and supporting liunxcnc

Hi,

If you are looking for a PCI or ISA board with a built in motor drive, I do not know.

If you are looking for an interface between PCI or ISA and a driver board, then the mesanet site is where I would suggest. They also have motor drives that interface to their PCI boards.

Jeff