Teensy 4.0 released

[mark03]

The STM32H7 also comes with a really long errata.  I'm not sure how the RT series compares in that regard, but we recently had to rule out using the H7 for a project after reading through the ST forum discussions where advanced users are trying to reverse-engineer their way to a working Ethernet peripheral

[JOEBOBSICLE]

Th

The STM32H7 also comes with a really long errata.  I'm not sure how the RT series compares in that regard, but we recently had to rule out using the H7 for a project after reading through the ST forum discussions where advanced users are trying to reverse-engineer their way to a working Ethernet peripheral

The H7 and most other new Cortex M7 based microcontrollers have DCacheand multiple memory buses, I.E AHB1 and AHB2 etc...  Which makes it a hella complicated chip, although very fast if you know what you're doing.

It's not that reverse-engineering is required, it's that you just have to know what you are doing regarding getting the MPU setup correctly or invalidating/cleaning DMA buffers before transmitting/receiving.
The cleaning/invalidating buffers doesn't work for transmitting unless all of your packets are coming from 32 BYTE ALIGNED BOUNDARIES



Which is unlikely in most TCP/IP stacks as you can't enforce the alignment of buffers they create... So you have to go with the reserving a custom pbuf pool approach and using the MPU.
See: http://infocenter.arm.com/help/index.jsp?topic=/com.arm.doc.dui0646b/BIHIIJDC.html

Are microcontrollers even micro considering their complexity these days? When they run at 500MHz and have caches? I think they should be called mini controllers...

[donotdespisethesnake]

Do we have Gerber files for Teensy 4.0!

None of the Teensy boards are Open Source. That, and the proprietary bootloader chip, prevent any cheap clones so the creator can stay in business.

[PCB.Wiz]

That, and the proprietary bootloader chip, prevent any cheap clones so the creator can stay in business.

Which is the boot loader ?

Addit: Found it, they moved to a Freescale 3x3 package part, as 'smart memory', but that seems a more costly way to get loader memory, as other MCUs are cheaper (eg SiLabs EFM8 3x3's)
Still, if they have a good line to Freescale, there are benefits in single vendor.... (some boards show Nuvoton parts, larger package)

[maginnovision]

Do we have Gerber files for Teensy 4.0!

None of the Teensy boards are Open Source. That, and the proprietary bootloader chip, prevent any cheap clones so the creator can stay in business.

The bootloader is exclusively the reason they aren't cloned en-masse. He's typically released boards based on the beta versions through his osh park account. The only complicated part of the boards is the size and that's not much of a problem for clones. The 3.2 board you have been able to add to an oshpark order for years. He also sells the bootloader for people who want to make their own boards that are 100% compatible.

[langwadt]

Do we have Gerber files for Teensy 4.0!

None of the Teensy boards are Open Source. That, and the proprietary bootloader chip, prevent any cheap clones so the creator can stay in business.

it might slow down dumb verbatim clones but i doubt it is much of a road block to anyone else

[splin]

STM32H7 microcontrollers are much more expensive than RT. I'm starting to use the RT1020 in LQFP144, they cost about $ 5, while the STM32H7, which are also less powerful, cost about $ 19 or more.
It's been a while since I ruled out using the H7, my bet is on the NXP RT series.

I think you are referring to the older hi-end parts. The LQFP100 STM32H750 is cheaper than the LQFP144 RT1020 - $3.99 @ 90 off (Avnet) v $4.21 @ 60 off (Future Electronics)

On paper the H7 seriously outclasses the RT1020 in many areas:

128k FLASH v 0
1MB RAM v 256k
3 x 3.6MSPS-16 bit/4.5MSPS-12 bit ADCs with 83dB SNR, 1 LSB INL*12 bit mode) v 2 x 1.4MSPS 12-bit, 66dB, 2.8 LSB INL
2 x USB v 1 *BUT* the RT1020 has an integrated HS PHY

plus:

2 x 12 bit DACs
Camera I/F *BUT* the RT1020 Flexio can provide this.
LCD I/F
High resolution timer (2.5ns)
JPEG Codec
Chrom-ART Accelerator
HDMI-CEC
Digital filters for sigma delta modulators
2 x opamps

Timers, PWM, external memory I/Fs, SPI, SAI, I2C, UARTS, SDIO/MMC, Crypto, comparators etc. seem similar

The much larger RAM is one of the most important advantages - if you need it of course - but applications needing a high performance MCU and complex/fast peripherals typically need a lot of RAM - especially if the code has to be loaded into RAM for performance reasons.
 
The RT1020 has at least one killer feature though - FlexIO which looks similar to the LPC4370. I wish all modern Cortex had something like this - especially if they supported LVDS for interfacing high speed external serial ADCs. Anybody know how fast the FlexibIO can be clocked?

The RT1020 also has an 8x8 keypad peripheral.

As to performance, I've no idea why you state that the H7s are less powerful - both are 400MHz M7s so should be identical executing from RAM (but peripheral buses may impact some peripheral/DMA performance). The H750 will vastly outperform the RT1020 for any code which doesn't fit in the latter's 256k RAM, but does fit in the H7's 1MB, unless the code takes great advantage of the 16KB instruction cache which can be very hard to design and maintain.

The RT1020 is supposed to be available at 500MHz but not yet (from distributers at least). I don't know if the 500MHz parts will replace the 400MHz ones or if there will be a price premium. The H7's are becoming available at 480MHz for revision 'V' parts - it seems to me that they are intended to replace the 400MHz parts as they don't appear to have different part numbers which is pretty confusing since distributors don't specify the silicon revisions. You have have to rely on the distributor's descriptions to determine if it is a 400 or 480MHz part, but they frequently make mistakes in descriptions. If you click through the 'buy direct from ST' links on their web site they don't even tell you which speed version you'te buying - how crap is that? 

I see that Mouser are offering a 400MHz and 480MHz version of the STM32H743ZIT6 (pretty much identical to the H750 but 2MB FLASH) for the same price, so another indication that the 400MHz part is being superceded. The 480MHz has the part number STM32H743ZIT6U but the only place you can find that referenced on the ST website is in the NUCLEO-144 User Guide. This is ridiculous ST - sort it out!!!

The RT1020 is available in an LQFP144 package whereas the H750 is only in 100LQFP or 176 and 256 pin BGA packages so that will favour the RT1020 in some cases, but ST could add a LQFP144 in the future. The H743Zi is an 144LQFP but is more expensive given the 2MB FLASH - $10.27 @ 100 (Mouser)

I said "on paper"; as mark03 pointed out the feature list is irrelevant if they don't actually work! Quite a few of the errata items have been fixed in the 'V' (480MHz) revision but still plenty remain - including all the Ethernet ones. The RT1020 has quite few errata items but not as many - perhaps because fewer developers are using it so they haven't been found yet?

Another issue with ST parts has been pin blocking severely restricting the combinations of peripherals that can be used together. I don't know if the H7 series is much better in this regard or how the RT1020 compares.

[ebastler]

Anyway, the Tensee-v4 looks "perfect" for building a graphic calculator! I have already reverse-engineered a couple of pocket calculators made by CASIO and Sharp, so ... maybe I will reuse their keyboard and LCD, replacing the motherboard with a Tensee-v4, which has a lot of horsepower for doing mathematical calculous and even more horsepower than the latest CLASSPAD 400.

But it would no longer be battery powered, right?
(Or at least that battery would no longer fit inside the case. )

Runs at about 100mA.

That Mathematica terminal is neat, by the way! 

[legacy]

The bootloader is exclusively the reason they aren't cloned en-masse.

Yet another evidence that Open Source does not work as expected.

edit: just to avoid confusion
"does not work as expected" is not equal to "doesn't work", it doesn't mean "failure of Open source", it means that it does work but with some "reserve" -> when used for business, it needs tricks and legal staff to protect your rights.

[Nominal Animal]

The bootloader is exclusively the reason they aren't cloned en-masse.

Yet another evidence that Open Source does not work as expected.

Ahem.  Do you realize that all the support libraries and so on are open source?

As I recall, Paul Stoffregen has said that the only reason the bootloader and hardware board files are proprietary, is to fund the development of the open-source support software and further microcontroller models.  (I apologize for not finding the source, but if you are interested enough, you can go on to forum.pjrc.com and ask him directly to verify.)

Assuming I recall right, this is just one business model that incorporates both proprietary and open source parts.

A better question is, why hasn't any microcontroller manufacturer employed somebody like him, to generate not just evaluation boards, but to create a full ecosystem around the boards?  Is their profit margins truly so slim that having less than half a dozen employees to set up and support a whole ecosystem is too expensive, compared to the goodwill/long term profits engendered?  It seems to me that most manufacturers are still stuck to pretty limited business models, where they try to extract value out of their customers at every single turn, from tools (compilers and environments) to documentation (by requiring them to register, so their information can be sold to advertisers, or at least used internally in advertising), and that PJRC and various Arduino board manufacturers are actually exploring the business models open source allows.  (Atmel being the odd one out, in my humble opinion; I've never liked Microchip's approach, and worry about that a bit now.)

My point is, are you sure you are not just whining because you'd like to be able to take advantage of others work without giving back in turn?  If so, that's not how share-alike open source works; and the permissive open source licenses are less than half the open-source world.  So, perhaps it is not open source that is the problem, but a limited imagination regarding business models?

As I understand it, PJRC is doing quite fine, keeping that small part proprietary, but open-sourcing everything else; actively contributing to the Arduino environment, and even making it possible for others to manufacture compatible clones of their boards.  Those contributions are definitely the main reason why I use and like Teensies, and that business model / pattern is one that I recommend others consider as well, if doing something similar.

[legacy]

edit: just to avoid confusion
"does not work as expected" is not equal to "doesn't work", it doesn't mean "failure of Open source", it means that it does work but with some "reserve" -> when used for business, it needs tricks and legal staff to protect your rights.

Ahem.  Do you realize that all the support libraries and so on are open source?

yes, but they cannot release the bootloader due to the attitude of *cloning* it for mass production, which is a serious problem, especially for "Copyleft" places (Russia, China, ...), so they keep libraries opensource (which is good), and the protect their business by making this strategy (which is also good, for them).

I do believe that it's a good trade-off.

[legacy]

I consider you like a friend, but I did find this point a bit "nah", so ... apologize in advance for the crude tone of this answer.

My point is, are you sure you are not just whining because you'd like to be able to take advantage of others work without giving back in turn?

All the projects hosted at DTB have been written by my crew and me from scratch! We have our own libraries, our own code, our own HDL code, and none in my team has ever used anyone's library for any projects or business! And personally, I am not willing to release anything to the public because the last time I did it my work got cloned and used for business without respecting any of my "rights".

I do have neither the time nor the money to pay a lawyer against someone who probably lives in the "copyleft" area, therefore not punishable, and frankly I do think that the OpenSource is bullshit if you are not willing to take legal actions, this even because I really do not like to quote people in a court case!

I am not saying that I do not trust OpenSource for large projects; in fact, I am contributing to the development of a few Linux/RISC-ish kernels by testing stuff and by reporting bugs to Bugzilla. GNU and kernel dot org have a squad of lawyers, and a lot of money, so defending the rights is not my problem.

In short, my position about "OpenSource" has constraints, and it's under trade-offs, but for sure I have never taken any advantage of others work.

[SiliconWizard]

The bootloader is exclusively the reason they aren't cloned en-masse.

Yet another evidence that Open Source does not work as expected.

Well, maybe not Open Source as a whole, but OSHW, quite possibly indeed. For obvious reasons. Hardware and software are definitely two different beasts.

If you're designing and selling your boards for a living - how the hell can it work if you release the whole thing as OSHW? If the boards become half successful, they will quickly get cloned in countries where costs are dramatically lower, will get sold at half the price or less, and you'll be left with no business. How could it ever work? I'm all ears. Usually the only way you can not be affected by this is when what you sell is actually NOT successful, so doesn't spark any interest in getting cloned. Is not being successful a business plan?

(I guess the proponents will answer that you shouldn't rely on sales of OSHW to make a living? But what exactly can you sell if both the hardware and software can be had for practically nothing?)

I know we have an example here with Dave having open sourced some of his projects such as the µCurrent. But it has gotten cloned a lot now, and I wonder how much he really manages to make out of this? I'm sure if his whole business revolved around it, that wouldn't get him very far. And still, this is a bit different kind of product IMO: it's in the "precision" category, so serious users may feel more confident buying the real thing instead of a cloned version that could contain fake ICs. But for a simple dev board? Most users don't give a damn, they'll buy whatever is cheaper as long as it appears to work.

[Nominal Animal]

Dude, I have never taken any advantage of others work, and I have not even used Arduino because I am aware that Massimo Banzi is still promoting boards "made in Italy" where they were manufactured in China, and I do not like to buy "clones".

OK, so your complaint is that open source cannot work because Russia/China/other markets do not respect copyright law.  On the face of it, that looks like a fair argument.

Fake products are a huge issue, regardless of the license or market, yet nobody claims that brand-building cannot work, because the market will be flooded by cheap clones.  Yet, that same argument should somehow mean open source cannot work.  This is a severe dichotomy I do not accept without a strong argument.

If we look at Teensies, the fact that the software side is open source, and even clones allowed, except for the bootloader that resides on a separate chip (although you can buy those off PJRC as well, and make your own compatible boards), across four generations of microcontrollers, shows that it is a financially viable pattern.  To reiterate, the open source codebase and non-exclusive hardware approach means it is sufficiently interesting even for those who design and build their own variants, while the proprietary bootloader ensures continued tech development funding.

If you had written something like "It is difficult to run a business using OSHW and FOSS alone, without any proprietary bits", I would have just nodded or posted a "Fully agree".  You didn't, you claimed that it is proof that open source is not suited for business.  And that is demonstrably not true.

The reason I "attack" that notion so aggressively, is because I think it is misleading, and limits the ideas people have for potential business approaches; you included.  Such misleading beliefs limit people, and I don't like that.
To me, the notion that "open source is not suited for any business models" is as silly and harmful as demanding people stop riding bicycles because it is dangerous.
You can definitely show examples of bicycle accidents, but to make a sound argument, one must look at the whole picture.
Yes, a pure open source approach with no proprietary bits is very hard if not impossible right now, because of bad actors who do not care about copyright law or international agreements.  That is not sufficient argument to say open source is not suitable for business.

(As to MCU manufacturers, I consider the actual chip design to be the proprietary part, and the I/Os and operating conditions and programming information to be perfectly suited for an open source approach.  I've mentioned this elsewhere, but let's just say that I have a lot of successful examples of how this kind of business approach does work right now.  The approach I do not like is the one where the manufacturer charges you for the chips, then again for the development tools, then again for development tool plugins that allow for run-time debugging, require your information and the right to use or sell that information for marketing reasons to provide you any documentation, often sign an NDA to see the full programming/usage information, and so on.  I see that value extraction as a bottleneck, hurting both the developers, and the manufacturer themselves.)

Now, as to personalities, my experience is that often a sharp poke is needed to get people to actually reconsider their position.  A friendly reminder is too easily ignored.  Because I believe your assumption is limiting your future possibilities, I took the risk of poking sharply in the hopes that it would make you think about this from another point of view.

I hope you don't think of this as a personal attack, but something like a hard nudge so that a friend does not step into a puddle on the sidewalk.  That is exactly the sense it was written in, anyway.

[langwadt]

If we look at Teensies, the fact that the software side is open source, and even clones allowed, except for the bootloader that resides on a separate chip (although you can buy those off PJRC as well, and make your own compatible boards), across four generations of microcontrollers, shows that it is a financially viable pattern.  To reiterate, the open source codebase and non-exclusive hardware approach means it is sufficiently interesting even for those who design and build their own variants, while the proprietary bootloader ensures continued tech development funding.

I don't see how a proprietary boot loader is much of a road block to someone who knows what they are doing, all the hard work has been done, just replicate the functionality

[maginnovision]

If we look at Teensies, the fact that the software side is open source, and even clones allowed, except for the bootloader that resides on a separate chip (although you can buy those off PJRC as well, and make your own compatible boards), across four generations of microcontrollers, shows that it is a financially viable pattern.  To reiterate, the open source codebase and non-exclusive hardware approach means it is sufficiently interesting even for those who design and build their own variants, while the proprietary bootloader ensures continued tech development funding.

I don't see how a proprietary boot loader is much of a road block to someone who knows what they are doing, all the hard work has been done, just replicate the functionality

That requires work and effort. Those of us who can do that respect Paul/teensy enough not to do it. Cloners don't want to go through the effort they just want easy money. You can, or could, find MANY teensy 2.0 clones because it was just hardware thrown together and used all the software paul and contributor's wrote.

[legacy]

If you're designing and selling your boards for a living - how the hell can it work if you release the whole thing as OSHW?

My opinion is that it cannot work unless you have a legal staff or a very large commercial distribution which can compensate the leakages.

Years ago I released a couple of projects and they got cloned without respecting my rights. Who did defend my rights? I was a small developer, so ... nobody did.

It also happened again to my brother when he designed a couple of kits for 3D-printers, and yet again he lost time and money because his kits got cloned and sold on the internet. Who did defend his rights? He was a student, so -yet again- nobody did.

[SiliconWizard]

If you're designing and selling your boards for a living - how the hell can it work if you release the whole thing as OSHW?

My opinion is that it cannot work unless you have a legal staff or a very large commercial distribution which can compensate the leakages.

I don't quite understand what the legal staff would really do. Of course it depends a lot on the particular situations. But a typical OSHW project "cloned" integrally doesn't in itself infringe on anything. It's the right of anyone to build it, and they can also legally sell artefacts of those ("clones") perfectly legally. That's the problem with the model. AFAIK, the only thing they could not legally do is modify your project without giving back their modifications. For a purely hardware project, this is not really a showstopper for anyone willing to sell clones. (For a software project, this may be.)

You have several ways of "working around" that.
- Protect a few trademarks. Use them liberally in your products. Hope that people tempted to sell clones will not bother removing the trademarks, or conversely will use them to capture your image and credibility. Then you have grounds to sue. Thing is, trademarks are a bit expensive to maintain, so many very small businesses can't protect a whole lot of them.
- Only make your products partially open source. Open source part of them, and keep some critical parts closed. Whatever you released as open source can be useful to some people, but they could not "clone" your product as a whole, at least not without a lot of effort. Still, many people will criticize this approach and say you're not playing the open source game right.
- Only design products that would not be cost-effective to clone. Use specific and expensive parts that have no lower-cost equivalent. Make them hard to produce, assemble and test.
- Don't base your business on the sales of hardware products. Just sell them as a means of getting business from other avenues. (This option is probably one of the most used.)

But again, OSHW is very different from OSSW. One thing that makes the OSSW model work well is the contributions. Software gives a lot of opportunities for contributing, which benefits everyone including the initial authors. OTOH, there are a lot less opportunities for contributing on pure hardware projects. That can't even be compared. So the benefits are typically a lot less obvious. Maybe it could for very specific, and very modular projects, in which new "modules" could be contributed. That works only for a very small subset of hardware projects IMO.

OSHW has educational value though. Sure if you're doing that as a hobby that may be good enough incentive. If you're running a business, well. You'll be glad some people learned something thanks to you, but it will not fill up your bank account.

[nimish]

Lame, no usb-c. For 2.0 sinks it's not even that much more complex and needs a little bit of board design to enable the flippable connector.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Nominal Animal]

- Only make your products partially open source. Open source part of them, and keep some critical parts closed. Whatever you released as open source can be useful to some people, but they could not "clone" your product as a whole, at least not without a lot of effort.

This is exactly what I recommend, and I'm more "FOSSy" than most.  The key is to make the proprietary part something that people do not need to interface with directly, or that has a published interface.  (Teensies use HalfKay via Teensy Loader; on the 32-bit Teensies, the bootloader implements that and MCU initialization.)  The key here is to realize that anyone with the resources/knowledge how to reimplement that bit, is able to create their own brand and variants with the same amount of effort. 

Still, many people will criticize this approach and say you're not playing the open source game right.

The "trick" is to make the proprietary bit either implement a published interface, or have it be something that users do not interface with directly at all.
This is quite accepted among e.g. Linux kernel developers, who only want devices programming information, and do not demand their internal firmware to be open sourced.
(Binary blobs executed by the main processor are disliked, because they make debugging kernel code impossible: those binary blobs can do anything, because they run in kernel mode.  Firmware running on the separate board, however, is just firmware; all the kernel developers ask is for their kernel interface to be public, and the firmware binaries to be freely redistributable.)

When doing this, "many people" is replaced by "only a few vocal ones (that you can safely ignore)".

If you disagree or do not believe me, look up Greg Kroah-Hartmann (gregkh) and the various Linux driver programs he has helped run.  There are even ways how the programming interface can be extracted from internal documentation under NDA, so that Linux drivers can be created.

To repeat, I consider most chips and processors to fall into this business category as well: their internals being the proprietary part.

The same approach can also work for software projects as well.  Since most bugs/issues people have are related to the graphical user interface, it makes sense to make it open source (say, written in Python, or include C/C++ sources and build facilities); but keep the core computation in a self-contained dynamically linked library.  (This also makes porting to different OSes easier.)

[donotdespisethesnake]

There are quite a few misconceptions about Free or Open Source. This leads people to think there are flaws in Open Source, but really they are just an incorrect perception.

To be clear, Paul Stoffregen has never claimed his Teensy hardware is "Open Source Hardware". So I don't see any reason why this would be considered a "failure of Open source".

Free or Open Source was never designed to support a business model, it was designed to support an ecosystem of user supported software, and it has done that fantastically well.

OSS is based on copyright law, which does not apply to hardware, so all the "Open Source Hardware" licenses don't have any real legal backing, they can be considered as "social contracts".

Regardless of whether an author creates proprietary or free designs, they can both be exploited by bad actors who don't respect the legal requirements. In both cases, you will need lawyers to chase down and enforce license terms.

I published an Open Source Hardware design and it was quickly put into production by a Chinese company. I've never had any contact with them, they must have found it on the web. I have no problem with them making money out of it, I never had any expectation of that. For me, the system worked, I created some IP which I Open Sourced, then commercial companies step in and make it available to everyone at a cheap price, without them "owning" the IP. In my book, everyone wins.

[SiliconWizard]

Free or Open Source was never designed to support a business model, it was designed to support an ecosystem of user supported software, and it has done that fantastically well.

Oh, I agree with that.

legacy's statement was a bit too blunt maybe, but I think he was mostly talking about the business side of things!

Basically, back to the start of this discussion: the question was about the Teensy boards being OSHW, and some of us just explained why this wouldn't work for the author since they are doing business around selling hardware. Again, no benefit from open sourcing the hardware whatsoever.

So again the point was not to discuss open source in general (IMO), but open source in a business context. There are quite a few ways to make it work for software, but for hardware, not so much.

I published an Open Source Hardware design and it was quickly put into production by a Chinese company. I've never had any contact with them, they must have found it on the web. I have no problem with them making money out of it, I never had any expectation of that. For me, the system worked, I created some IP which I Open Sourced, then commercial companies step in and make it available to everyone at a cheap price, without them "owning" the IP. In my book, everyone wins.

You're exactly illustrating one of my points. Everyone wins here because you didn't care about selling your design as products. If you wanted to make a business out of it, it wouldn't have worked. End of the story. That was my point, legacy's point and probably the point of the author of the Teensy boards.

[ebastler]

I published an Open Source Hardware design and it was quickly put into production by a Chinese company. I've never had any contact with them, they must have found it on the web. I have no problem with them making money out of it, I never had any expectation of that. For me, the system worked, I created some IP which I Open Sourced, then commercial companies step in and make it available to everyone at a cheap price, without them "owning" the IP. In my book, everyone wins.

But did the company give you credit for the design? In my experience with various open-sourced designs picked up by Chinese manufacturers, they don't acknowledge the designer in any way.  If you (as the designer) get neither revenue nor recognition, I don't see how "everyone wins".

[SiliconWizard]

I published an Open Source Hardware design and it was quickly put into production by a Chinese company. I've never had any contact with them, they must have found it on the web. I have no problem with them making money out of it, I never had any expectation of that. For me, the system worked, I created some IP which I Open Sourced, then commercial companies step in and make it available to everyone at a cheap price, without them "owning" the IP. In my book, everyone wins.

But did the company give you credit for the design? In my experience with various open-sourced designs picked up by Chinese manufacturers, they don't acknowledge the designer in any way.  If you (as the designer) get neither revenue nor recognition, I don't see how "everyone wins".

Exactly. Well, there's still one way he could have won. Let's suppose he doesn't intend on making revenue from it. Let's suppose he doesn't really care about recognition either. But maybe he just designed something and maybe built a hand-made prototype, and would benefit from being able to buy for cheap one or more industrially manufactured products out of his design, something he may not have the funds to do. But that's a pretty limited "win".

[langwadt]

I published an Open Source Hardware design and it was quickly put into production by a Chinese company. I've never had any contact with them, they must have found it on the web. I have no problem with them making money out of it, I never had any expectation of that. For me, the system worked, I created some IP which I Open Sourced, then commercial companies step in and make it available to everyone at a cheap price, without them "owning" the IP. In my book, everyone wins.

But did the company give you credit for the design? In my experience with various open-sourced designs picked up by Chinese manufacturers, they don't acknowledge the designer in any way.  If you (as the designer) get neither revenue nor recognition, I don't see how "everyone wins".

recognition could also back fire in people expecting support from the designer