$20 LCR ESR Transistor checker project

[indman]

Madires,I am afraid that your Clones file may increase in size in an incredible way, given the number of different modifications that the Chinese industry produces!

[elecdonia]

Madires,I am afraid that your Clones file may increase in size in an incredible way, given the number of different modifications that the Chinese industry produces!

Wow! It will require much time and effort to categorize so many different versions.

          At first glance I suspect all 6 PC boards in these photos have either
          Atmel ATmega324 or ATmega644 MCU for the following reasons:
1) All MCU seen in these photos have 44 pins.
2) Also all of these PC boards have a place to mount the 6-pin Atmel ISP programming header. This 6-pin ISP interface is unique to Atmel products. To the best of my knowledge it isn’t used by any other MCU manufacturer.

          In contrast:
1) All non-Atmel MCU I’ve observed in Transistor Testers have only 32 pins.
2) In addition the non-Atmel Transistor Testers do not have the Atmel 6-pin ISP header. Instead they have other types of programming interface, such as SWD (single wire debug) or CH340X USB IC

[indman]

elecdonia, I wanted to show exactly the varieties of seemingly the same topology of a printed circuit board with ATMEL MCU. To this gallery, you can add a variant with an ATMEL MCU in a DIP case.As for the variants with non-ATMEL MCU, they will make the same large gallery. 

[madires]

Madires,I am afraid that your Clones file may increase in size in an incredible way, given the number of different modifications that the Chinese industry produces!

Indeed! However, one has to do what one has to do.

[elecdonia]

Details about MCU chips found in recent production Transistor Testers:

Atmel ATmega324 has been used in Transistor Testers for several years, but recently had a big price increase ($5-15 USD) and became harder to get. This MCU has 44 pins (11 pins on each of the 4 sides). ATmega324 is supported by existing -m (Markus) Transistor Tester software. However, ATmega324 software is not available in -k (Karl-Heinz) version.

Atmel ATmega644 has same 44-pin package as ATmega324 and can be used with same PC board layout. ATmega644 has 64k flash memory compared to 32k for ATmega324. Therefore ATmega644 accommodates larger software with additional testing/measurement capability, higher resolution display fonts, and multiple user-selected languages. ATmega644 is supported by both -k and -m Transistor Tester software versions.

LGT8F328P - First used by Transistor Tester manufacturers in 2021. Price: < $1 USD. 32-pin package (8 pins on each of the 4 sides). This is same package as Atmel ATmega328. It is said to be “similar” to Atmel ATmega328. However its pinout is different and it has several additional features. For example the LGT8F328P can operate at 32MHz. The LGT8F328P has been ported into the Arduino IDE. Clone versions of Arduino Pro and Nano boards containing LGT8F328P are available. But no open-source Transistor Tester software for LGT8F328P has been officially released yet. However, one Transistor Tester enthusiast has a GitHub project to adapt the -m software to LGT8F328P:
     https://github.com/DurandA/transistor-tester-lgt328p

APT32F172K8T6 - First used by Transistor Tester manufacturers in 2022. Also < $1 USD. 32-pin package (8 pins on each of the 4 sides). Pinout, internal architecture, and instruction set are totally different than Atmel ATmega328. Only similarity is 32-pin package. Very few development tools are available for compiling and debugging APT32F172K8T6 software. Existing open-source Transistor Tester software does not support this MCU. Warning: Unfortunately some Transistor Tester manufacturers are deliberately mis-labeling the APT32F172K8T6 as Atmel ATmega328P.
 
Conclusion:
ATmega324 and ATmega644 are the only 44-pin MCU chips found in Transistor Testers.
Therefore a quick look at the PC board will distinguish these MCU chips from the other two.

[indman]

Atmel ATmega324 has been used in Transistor Testers for several years, but recently had a big price increase ($5-15 USD) and became harder to get. This MCU is in a 4-sided TQFP package with 44 pins, 11 pins on each of the 4 sides. This MCU is fully compatible with existing -k and -m Transistor Tester software.

No.There is an m324p MCU in the k-firmware makefile, but the firmware compilation ends with an error.That is,in fact, ATmega324 is not yet supported by Karl-Heinz.

[madires]

Could you please post the error message? I remember that my avr-gcc package came with a broken iom324p.h.

[indman]

madires,Karl-Heinz has not been answering my questions lately. Check out its current documentation - ATMega324 is not listed in the list of supported MCUs. I provide a screenshot of the error

[elecdonia]

No.There is an m324p MCU in the k-firmware makefile, but the firmware compilation ends with an error.That is,in fact, ATmega324 is not yet supported by Karl-Heinz.

Thank you for correcting me. I have just confirmed this:
          https://github.com/kubi48/TransistorTester-source
contains compiled ready-to-load -k firmware for ATmega644 only. But nothing for ATmega324. I will edit my post.

[indman]

Is there any functional -k software for ATmega644 at this time?

I didn't quite understand your question?For ATmega644, there have been working k-firmware for LCR-TC1(T7),Hiland644,LCD2004 for a long time

[madires]

I provide a screenshot of the error

The MCU type is missing. Edit setup.mk, copy the section for m328p, change 'ifeq ($(PARTNO),m328p)' to 'ifeq ($(PARTNO),m324p)', and 'MCU = atmega328p' to 'MCU = atmega324p'.

[elecdonia]

Is there any functional -k software for ATmega644 at this time?

I didn't quite understand your question?For ATmega644, there have been working k-firmware for LCR-TC1(T7),Hiland644,LCD2004 for a long time

Karl-Heinz firmware for LCR-TC1 with ATmega644 MCU is in Yandex repository:
     https://disk.yandex.ru/d/yW8xa5NJgUo5z/LCR-%D0%A2%D0%A11/Firmware/Karl-Heinz%20K%C3%BCbbeler/English/16Mhz

Yandex repository also mentions this recently modified Karl-Heinz ATmega644 firmware for LCR-TC1, -TC2 -T7:
     https://disk.yandex.ru/d/yW8xa5NJgUo5z/LCR-TC2/Firmware/Karl-Heinz%20Kubeller/English/FirmwareModNew
Additional details in forum post #8001:
      https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/$20-lcr-esr-transistor-checker-project/msg4578967/?topicseen#msg4578967

Please confirm. I am hoping to obtain LCR-TC2 containing ATmega644 soon. Or if I get one with ATmega324 I will replace MCU with ATmega644. Then I will install this firmware described in forum post #8001

[indman]

madires, it works, thanks a lot!  I will still check the firmware on any device with ATMega324, but I am sure that it will work fine. Really, this issue was solved so easily and simply.I'm sorry I didn't figure it out sooner.I think you will be able to pass this amendment to Karl-Heinz so that he adds it to his distribution? 

elecdonia,I think you may back edit your post regarding ATmega324 and its support in k-firmware.

[elecdonia]

madires, it works, thanks a lot!  I will still check the firmware on any device with ATMega324, but I am sure that it will work fine. Really, this issue was solved so easily and simply.I'm sorry I didn't figure it out sooner.I think you will be able to pass this amendment to Karl-Heinz so that he adds it to his distribution? 
elecdonia,I think you may back edit your post regarding ATmega324 and its support in k-firmware.

Many thanks to both of you! 

I am always happy to see compiler finish its work with zero errors!
It just fits into flash size of ATmega324.

I am very eager to get LCR-TC2 containing either ATmega324 or ATmega644. So far I received one unit with LGT8F328P and another with APT32F172K8T6. Both were stated to be LCR-TC1 by ebay vendor. Unfortunately when I ordered those two units I did not think LCR-TC1 and LCR-TC2 were different from each other. So a week ago I ordered a third unit described by vendor as LCR-TC2. 

[indman]

So a week ago I ordered a third unit described by vendor as LCR-TC2.

I think and wish you that your 3rd order attempt was a success!

[indman]

madires,what does the name of the folder "experimentelle mega328_FA-BT2" in k-firmware imply?

[madires]

That's a tester kit sold by a German ham radio magazine (kit not sold anymore). You can find some pictures at http://dk8jg.de/ttest.htm.

[indman]

Wow! A rare copy of 10.2013.Beautiful! 

[techie]

Hi,

I was able to configure ComponentTester-1.48m firmware to work properly on a new LCR-TC2 v1.2 (T7 Plus v1.2 PCB) meter. Please see attached photo.
It lacks the STC15L104W chip found in the v1.0 and v1.1 PCBs, has a larger atmega644 MCU, and it swaps the test button and power enable pins.
In order to support 32x39 symbols, a minor edit to ST7735.c was required:

The line:
#include "symbols_32x39_hf.h"

should be added after:
#include "symbols_32x32_old_hf.h"

I've attached Markus v1.48m firmware binaries, along with the modified source files (colors.h, Makefile, config.h, config_644.h, and ST7735.c) needed for re-compiling  :

Hope this helps!

[RoGeorge]

I have this one with a firmware from around 2015, MTester V2.07, should I bother updating its firmware?
If yes, where from please, so to be compatible with this hardware version from 91make taobao?

[madires]

That one seems to be a T4. For k-firmware try mega328_T3_T4_st7565 or mega328_T4_v2_st7565, and for m-firmware see Clones file.

[RoGeorge]

Thank you.  Mine seems to be the LCR-T4 version, by looking at the pics here: https://www.mikrocontroller.net/topic/transistortester-avr?goto=4120737#4105488

On the previous page it says the current repository has now changed to kubi48, i.e.
https://github.com/kubi48/TransistorTester-source/tree/master/trunk/mega328_T4_v2_st7565

1. There are countless forks on github.  Which one should I use?
2. Can not find any log for what has changed from one firmware version to the other.  Is it worth to upgrade the firmware from 2015 to the most recent one?

[madires]

Karl-Heinz' repo (k-firmware) is https://github.com/kubi48/TransistorTester-source. Your tester runs a modified k-firmware, and AFAIK there's no recent changelog. However, the k-firmware version of 2015 should be 1.10k or 1.11k (latest one is 1.13k).

[dazz]

I'm back with a question, please. A friend of mine is testing jfets with a TC1, and I have the suspicion that his measurements are not Idss and Vgsoff. Here's a picture

I perused the manual, and it seems to me that's not really Idss and Vgsoff, is that correct? Could it be that his firmware was compiled with the FET_Idss flag disabled?
Are those values shown there the ones obtained with a 680 ohms source resistor, as per the manual?
My T4 with the latest firmware does seem to measure Idss and Vgsoff, plus an extra operating point in the middle. Did I get it right and that's what it's doing?

Actually, I have two questions. I also have a few MMBFJ201 and MMBF5457, and they are both detected as BJT's by my T4, while his TC1 does spit out a reading, what's the deal there, please?

[indman]

dazz
1. Please make the resolution of your photos smaller, attach them to the message or hide them under the spoiler. See how other forum members attach photos.
2. Install m-firmware for your T4 clone and test your transistors again.Compare your results with k-firmware.
3. Carefully calibrate your tester according to the author's manual.