SparkFun Forums

[coldeai]

Hello,
I want to hookup the BC118 BLe Mate2 with Arduino, the purpouse is to send from Arduino to BC118 some commands and read the commands feedback on Arduino.
I watch this tutorialhttps://learn.sparkfun.com/tutorials/bc ... okup-guide and i can't understand the real purpouse of the FTDI SmartBasic, can you please tell me if i can hookup Arduino to BC118 without using a FTDI SmartBasic?
Thank you!

[n1ist]

The Arduino (unless it is a mega) has only one hardware serial port. This port is used for programming the Arduino. You can connect other things to that port (like the BC118) however you would need to disconnect it before uploading a program to the Arduino. The FTDI smartbasic has hardware on board to make that disconnect easier. Alternatively, you could use software serial to connect to the BC118 on another set of pins.

/mike

[katrinakaif]

The FTDI SmartBasic is a variation on our classic FTDI Basic which allows you to connect a second device to the hardware serial port on an Arduino Pro, Pro Mini, or other USB-less board without compromising the ability to bootload code from the Arduino IDE.

[Exurbru]

The FTDI SmartBasic is a variation on our classic FTDI Basic which allows you to connect a second device to the hardware serial port on an Arduino Pro, Pro Mini, or other USB-less board without compromising the ability to bootload code from the Arduino IDE.

Thanks for this post. This has cleared some of the questions I had with smartbasic. Thanks again.