Freetronics Eleven Tutorial to ATTiny85

Right-o … now that I have my Arduino to ATTiny85 ICSP working, it’s time to start working out the practical differences between the Arduino and the ATTiny85.

When I bought my Freetronics Experimenters Kit from Jaycar, the kit came with an Experimenters Guide (Experimenters Kit - Getting Started Guide). The guide, whilst basic, was very helpful and was quite good. The guide is designed to give the experimenter some confidence in the platform and their own ability, so … job done.

What I plan to do is to work through the 11 tutorials in the guide and apply them to the ATTiny85. Some tutorials have to be modified right from the get-go because of the simple fact that there aren’t as many pins on the ATTiny85 as there is on a UNO or UNO clone board. The one that I’m thinking of here is “Project 2: Controlling 8 LEDs”. Sure, you can control 8 LED with an ATTiny85, but the tutorial is about handling each LED from a single pin. This could be done using a shift register or charlieplexing, but that isn’t in the spirit of the tutorial, so instead this will be “Controlling 6 LED”.

I won’t be going over the ICSP and uploading sketches to the ATTiny85, that was pretty much covered in the Arduino ATTiny85 ISP articles.

I will preface each of the tutorials with the pertinent information from the original tutorial and show the converted breadboard layout and sketch from the perspective of the programmed ATTiny85.

Because of the absence of the UNO in the tutorial, it is expected that the breadboard will take it’s power source from a 5V regulated power supply. I recommend that, if you want to build these tutorials, that you also build that circuit (9V to 5V voltage regulator).

The first Tutorial “01 - Controlling an LED” is the simple blink sketch and really doesn’t need much explanation, however, I will be starting with this tutorial as a basic building block tutorial and it may prove useful to some.

I am also considering doing the same thing with an ATTiny84 so that there will be a source of these tutorials on the Interweb where people who are interested in starting out with the 84 and 85 can come and see the tutorials from the perspective of the platform that they are using.

Anyway … on with the show.