A Digital Companion with FPGA

Abstract

Prototyping is the basis of development and innovation and it doesn't necessarily have to start in a fully equipped laboratory. The concept of our project represent digital companion that can execute a set of tasks. It can simplify the work in home laboratory. The main objective is to create a system that can execute specific tasks that are part of the developer's routine. Tasks like soldering and drilling holes in the printed circuit board can also be done by the robot system in the presence of the user, the FPGA technology making this possible. The function of the system is the process of soldering the components on the test board after the user previously mounted them in the desired pattern. The user selects the desired pads to be soldered through a VGA (Video Graphics Array) monitor interface which simulate the real PCB (Printed circuit board). The selection is made by handling a two axis joystick that move the cursor to the desired solder pad and select it by pushing the buttons of the joystick.