Hi all,
I am looking for a device (which I believe is a motion controller) that will let me control stepper motors from a PC. I will be using this with custom software, and would like to tell the device to move to some X,Y,Z (possibly X,Y,Z,A) coordinate, and the device will generate the *simultaneous* step/dir signals to send to the drivers ( for a smooth diagonal path).
Yes, I can have the PC and custom SW generate the correct pulse trains for the motors, but being able to do this with an external device would be nice, as it would save me from having to piddle around with real-time extensions to the OS (I'll be using C on Linux).
I can also build my own device to do this (using a microcontroller), but being able to purchase a ready-to-go device will save me lots of time, which is an issue nowadays.
Google got me a device called the SmoothStepper, which I think will do what I need, but it seems to be in development still -- there's a lack of detailed info and the manual states that some sections are pending. It also talks about working with Mach3 only, and does not explain how to control it direcly. I'd prefer a mature, proven product.
Any other ideas? I don't need it to have stepper drivers, as I can get those separately. And BTW, is it really a "motion controller" that I'm looking for?
Cheers,
-Neil.