Gen7 Board 1.3.1

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This page describes something which is no longer the most recent version. For the replacement version see: Gen7 Board-AVR 1.5


Gen7 Board History   --   Gen7 Board is part of Generation 7 Electronics

This supersedes Gen7 Board 1.3.

Crystal Clear action run.png
Generation 7 Electronics Board

Release status: working

Gen7 Board 1.3 Assembled.jpeg
Description
Generation 7 Electronics
License
Author
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Upgrading from v1.3.1 to v1.4

To upgrade from a Gen7 v1.3.1 to a Gen7 v1.4 you can keep a lot of parts:

  • The ATmega.
  • Connectors and crimp pins, except the ones for the stepper motors.
  • Heatsinks.
  • Endstops.
  • USB-TTL adapter.
  • Stepper drivers (Pololus/StepSticks).

New parts needed for upgrading

This list shows all parts needed for assembling a Gen7 v1.4. If you're willing to unsolder items from your v1.3.1, this becomes less, of course.

Having all these parts and your older Gen7, you can start assembling it as if you had everything new.

Name Count Designations Remarks
Printed Circuit Board (PCB) 1 See Gen7 Board 1.4#How to get it
0.6 mm Wire 50 cm for the wire bridges on single sided PCBs
Resistor 10 Ohms 2 R11, R12
Resistor 560 Ohms 2 R14, R22
Resistor 1 kOhms 6 R2, R6, R8, R10, R16, R18
Resistor 4.7 kOhms 2 RT1, RT2
Resistor 10 kOhms 1 R30
Diode 1N4004 2 D1, D2
Coil 100 uH 1 L1
Crystal 16 MHz or 20 MHz 1 U6
Reset Switch 1 RESET
Ceramic Capacitor 0.1 uF 12 C5, C8, C9, C10, C11, C12, C13, C14, C16, C17, C18, C19
LED 3 mm Green 3 LED2, LED5, +5V
LED 3 mm Yellow 1 Standby
Ceramic Capacitor 22 pF 2 C3, C4
Electrolytic Capacitor 10 uF 2 CT1, CT2
Electrolytic Capacitor 100 uF 4 C1, C2, C6, C7
Jumper Header 2 Pin Pairs 4 pair J2/J3, J5/J6, J8/J9, J11/J12 cut them into appropriate pieces
Jumper Header 2 Pin 2 J13, J14 cut them into appropriate pieces
ICSP Header 1 CONN6 alternatively, assemble this out of the remainings of the Jumper 2 Pin Headers
Pololu Header 8 or 4 U2, U3, U4, U5 cut them to appropriate length, you want 8x 8 pins
Socket for the ATmega 1 U1
MOSFET IRFZ 44N 2 Q1, Q2
Molex KK100 2 Pin Header 2 TEMP1, TEMP2
Molex KK100 3 Pin Header 3 X_MIN, Y_MIN, Z_MIN Reichelt are tested to be fully compatible with Molex
Molex KK100 4 Pin Header 4 X_MOT, Y_MOT, Z_MOT, E_MOT
Cable Connector for the above 4
Crimp Contact for the above 16
Molex KK100 6 Pin Header 1 SERIAL alternatively, use the same as for Jumper 2 Pin
Heater Header Molex 26-48-1045 (2 Pin) 2 HEATER1, HEATER2
Alternative to Heater Header: 2 Pin Screw Terminal 2 HEATER_1, HEATER2
Disk Power Header 2 CONN2, CONN3 also see DIY 4 pin molex connector
ATX24 Power Connector 1 CONN1 Molex Mini-Fit 44206-0007. Also known as VAL-U-LOK (20 or 24 Pins).

How to get it

PCBs

Get Gen7 Board PCBs from Traumflug.

As Gen7 is designed to be manufactured on a RepRap, you can make PCBs yourself, of course. How to do this on a RepRap or a general milling machine is described on the Gen7 main page. You want one "Gen7Board" PCB and up to six "Endstop" PCBs.

Yet another way is to purchase from one of the many houses specialized in manufacturing prototype PCBs. Gen7 is single sided, so this won't cost a fortune. If you want to sell excess copies, ask Traumflug for a commercial license.

Components

Get Gen7 Components Kits and Gen7 Connectors Kits from Traumflug.

If you want to assemble the collection yourself, see the #Parts Lists section.

Parts Lists

To assemble or verify these lists, open the layout with gEDA/PCB and export a "BOM". This will give you a list of all required components.

Special considerations:

  • The Pololu Stepper Drivers want two single rows of 8 pin female connectors soldered into the board, so get these.
  • The Pololu Stepper Drivers come with their male headers, so there's no need to purchase them separately.
  • Don't forget enough (8-9) jumpers for the jumper headers.
  • Resistors with 0.25 W are on the safe side, even if the footprint name reads "0.125".
  • The Pololus can be operated with up to 35 V, so you may want like-rated electrolytic capacitors.
  • You may want to add the cable side of the connectors, their crimp pins and some wire.

Electronic Components

This list is ordered to match the order of assembly.

Name Count Designations Remarks
0.6 mm Wire 50 cm for the wire bridges on single sided PCBs
Resistor 560 Ohms 2 R14, R22
Resistor 1 kOhms 8 R2, R6, R8, R10, R11, R12, R16, R18
Resistor 4.7 kOhms 2 RT1, RT2
Resistor 10 kOhms 1 R30
Diode 1N4004 2 D1, D2
Coil 100 uH 1 L1
Crystal 16 MHz or 20 MHz 1 U6
Reset Switch 1 RESET
Ceramic Capacitor 0.1 uF 12 C5, C8, C9, C10, C11, C12, C13, C14, C16, C17, C18, C19
LED 3 mm Green 3 LED2, LED5, +5V
LED 3 mm Yellow 1 Standby
Ceramic Capacitor 22 pF 2 C3, C4
Electrolytic Capacitor 10 uF 2 CT1, CT2
Electrolytic Capacitor 100 uF 4 C1, C2, C6, C7
Jumper Header 2 Pin Pairs 4 pair J2/J3, J5/J6, J8/J9, J11/J12 cut them into appropriate pieces
Jumper Header 2 Pin 3 J13, J14, J15 cut them into appropriate pieces
Jumper for the two above 9
ICSP Header 1 CONN6 alternatively, assemble this out of the remainings of the Jumper 2 Pin Headers
Pololu Header 8 or 4 U2, U3, U4, U5 cut them to appropriate length, you want 8x 8 pins
Misc Header 1 MISC cut to appropriate length
Socket for the ATmega 1 U1
ATmega 644 (or 644P) 1
MOSFET IRFZ 44N 2 Q1, Q2

All components on Mouser: $28.61 Updated: All components on Mouser $50

All components from RepRap DIY: €16.40 ($21.76) without VAT, €19.50 with VAT

Connectors

Name Count Designations Remarks
Motor Header Molex 26-48-1045 (4 Pin) 4 X_MOT_0.156, Y_MOT_0.156, Z_MOT_0.156, E_MOT_0.156 This is the one also used in Gen2 and Gen3 Electronics.
Cable Connector for the above 4
Crimp Contact for the above 16
Alternative to Motor Header: 4 Pin Screw Terminal 4 X_MOT_0.156, Y_MOT_0.156, Z_MOT_0.156, E_MOT_0.156
Heater Header Molex 26-48-1045 (2 Pin) 2 HEATER1, HEATER2
Cable Connector for the above 2
Crimp Contact for the above 4 same as the one for the motor headers
Alternative to Heater Header: 2 Pin Screw Terminal 2 HEATER_1, HEATER2
Disk Power Header 2 CONN2, CONN3 also see DIY 4 pin molex connector
ATX24 Power Connector 1 CONN1 Molex Mini-Fit 44206-0007. Also known as VAL-U-LOK (20 or 24 Pins).
Molex KK100 2 Pin Header 2 TEMP1, TEMP2
Cable Connector for the above 2
Crimp Contact for the above 4
Molex KK100 3 Pin Header 6 X_MIN, X_MAX, Y_MIN, Y_MAX, Z_MIN, Z_MAX Reichelt are tested to be fully compatible with Molex
Cable Connector for the above 6
Crimp Contact for the above 18 same as for TEMP1, TEMP2 above
Molex KK100 6 Pin Header 1 SERIAL alternatively, use the same as for Jumper 2 Pin
Optional: Cable Header for the above 1 only needed if you intend to solder your own USB-to-TTL cable
Optional: Crimp Contact for the above 6 only needed if you intend to solder your own USB-to-TTL cable
Heatsink for the MOSFETs 1 or 2 Please note that Reichelt ones are quite wide (18mm). Two of them won't fit.
Bolt M3 x 8 mm for mounting the MOSFET heatsink 1 or 2
Washer M3 for mounting the MOSFET heatsink 1 or 2
Nut M3 for mounting the MOSFET heatsink 1 or 2 Not needed for the Reichelt heatsinks, which come with an M3 tap already.
Heatsink for the Pololus 4
Double Sided Heat Conductive Tape 1 For glueing the Pololu's heatsinks, cut in appropriate pieces. Another working solution is a drop of Loctite glue.

All connectors on Mouser: $33.80

All connectors from RepRap DIY: €19.- ( = $25.10)

Miscellaneous

Generation 7 Electronics uses a TTL header for serial communications to the host. As many modern PCs lack a serial port, these need an appropriate USB to TTL cable:

USB to TTL Cable DigiKey Mouser Adafruit Industries MAKE Store MakerBot Industries Watterott

An alternative to the USB to TTL cable is the same electronics in form of a small breakout board:

USB to TTL Breakout Board Watterott Sparkfun
Cable for the above Watterott

Another alternative is the E'go USB-TTL adapter, see instructions and limitations below.

Last not least, you need four stepper drivers, of course:

Pololu stepper driver boards Pololu stepper driver boards
Open Source Alternative StepStick

Assembly Instructions

  • To find out which components to put where, have the layout on your PC screen available.
  • PCBs fabricated with Voronoi paths need more heat, so raise your soldering iron's temperature by about 20 deg Celsius.
  • Start with the flattest parts, usually wire bridges or resistors. This way, components won't fall out when you lay the PCB on it's front for soldering. Then continue with parts of raising height, connectors are usually among the last ones.
  • The parts lists are sorted with that in mind, simply start at the top and assemble towards the bottom.
  • To ease soldering jumper headers and similar components, put a small drop of cyanacrylate glue onto the component side before inserting them. As the PCB is single-sided, this won't hurt the solder point.
  • The coil 100 uH looks just like a resistor. It's a bit thicker and comes with rings brown-black-brown.
  • As 8 pin headers for the Pololus are expensive, many kits come with lower cost 10 pin headers. Cut 2 pins off of each.
  • While soldering a pair of these headers, insert a Pololu to ensure good alignment.

Caution: Don't solder MOSFETs or insert the ATmega until after the Power Supply Checks.

Assembly in Pictures

Click on the pictures to view them bigger.

As you can see, neither the MOSFETs nor the ATmega are inserted yet. We'll come back to that later.


Setup

These steps show how to get from a soldered mainboard to a working one.

Possible Power Sources

Generation 7 Electronics has a plentitude of options to satisfy you machine's power needs.

Gen7 v1.3 Power Options.jpeg

Option 1

This is the recommended one. Take your PC power supply and plug in the ATX24, as well as both Disk Power connectors. This will supply the electronics with everything needed.

PC PSUs have two strings with several Disk Power connectors on each string. Each of the strings can supply about 10 Ampéres only, so make sure you plug in only one connector of each string into Gen7's headers.

In this scenario, the ATmega can run and talk to the host with the PSU turned "off" (in Standby mode). So, don't be surprised if you start working with your Mendel and the PSU is still quiet. Each G-code command requiring more juice will turn the PSU on, and some time after the last command off again.

Note: the ATX24 header is backwards compatible to the older ATX20 connector, so if you have a PSU with an ATX20 connector, plug in that. There's only one position where it fits (without pushing very hard) and there is no drawback in using an older supply:

Gen7 ATX20 in ATX24.jpeg


Option 2

This is for people with a non-PC power supply. Make connectors feeding 5 V to the upper Disk Power header, as well as 12 V into both of them. The ATX24 is left empty.

No standby feature here, ATmega, Pololus, motors and heaters are supplied all the time.

Option 3

This allows talking to the ATmega only and may be useful for firmware programming. Leave the ATX24 and both Disk Power headers empty. The ATmega will be fed through the serial header. This assumes your serial header actually supplies 5V: some USB-TTL converters need soldering to enable this feature.

As said, this option won't allow the motors to move or heat the extruder.

Power Source Selection

After choosing an option for the power supply, you have to tell the board where to get 5V from.

Gen7 v1.3 Power Selection.jpeg

In the lower right corner of the board you see three jumper headers.

  • ATX24: recommended for option 1.
  • Disk Power: recommended for option 2.
  • Serial: required for option 3.

You may jumper one, and only one of them.

NOTE: Actually combinations "ATX24+Serial" and "Disk Power+Serial" are also possible and usefull if you need to supply power from Generation 7 board to the serial connector (for example, to power a max232 based converter board).

Power Supply Checks

With the 5 V selection jumper and all power connectors inserted, you can take a few measurements to make sure your brand new ATmega won't blow up when inserted.

Gen7 v1.3 Power Checks.jpeg
  • Red: power supply inserted according to any option. In case of an Option 1, PSU not yet activated.
  • Blue: as above, with PSU activated or power supply according to Option 2. Not applicable to Option 3.

Note: in the picture, no 5 V selection jumper is inserted, but you need the right one here.

Checks:

  1. No smoke? Great.
  2. The yellow LED in the lower right corner is lighted? Even better.
  3. If you've chosen Option 1, short the two wire bridges like the dashed green line in the picture. This should activate the power supply.
  4. At the same time, the green LED in the lower right corner should go on as well.
  5. If you have a voltage meter, measure the voltages shown in the picture.
  6. Also, check each of the pins of the ATmega socket, none of them should have more than 5.5 volts.
  7. For extra security, check the pins in the lower row of the Pololus. Neither of them should exceed 5.5 volts as well.

With everything within the limits, you can pretty safely assume to not blow up the expensive parts when inserting them.

Insert Semiconductors

Now, with some safety tests done, it's a good time to insert semiconductors.

Gen7 v1.3 Semiconductors.jpeg
  • Disconnect the power supply entirely.
  • Solder the MOSFETs into place with the flat side towards the center of the board. Use sufficient solder, as high currents are flowing here.
  • Mount the heatsinks. The picture shows the recommended placement.
  • Insert the ATmega into it's socket. Like every integrated circuit, there's a notch (groove) on one end of the package. This notch faces towards the MOSFET side of the board, the un-notched end is close to the ATX24 header. Done right, you can read the text on the package from the ATX24 header side correctly.

Another, perhaps more sensitive heat handling solution is to put a big heatsink onto the MOSFET for the heated bed while leaving the other one free:

Gen7 v1.3 Single Heatsink.jpeg

Prepare your Arduino IDE

Note: If you have an ATmega1284P CPU, you have to use Arduino IDE 1.0 or later (the avrdude supplied with the previous versions of this IDE don't know this chip yet.)

  • Download and unpack or install the Arduino IDE.
  • Also install Gen7 Arduino IDE Support.
  • Fire up your Arduino IDE.
  • Under Menu -> Tools -> Board, select your variant of Gen7 board (there should be four new entries). They differ in processor type and clock speed.
  • Under Menu -> Tools -> Serial Port, select the correct serial/com port.

Bootloader

If you bought your ATmega with one of the Gen7 kits, the bootloader should have already been uploaded. Any other bootloader, like the one used for the Sanguino, RAMPS, Sanguinololu or whatever is also fine.

If you bought an factory fresh ATmega, e.g. from a general electronics supplier, the ATmega will be without bootloader. Bootloader binaries come with the Gen7 Arduino IDE Support package, so upload instructions can also be found there.

If you're in doubt, just continue with the setup. A missing bootloader will result in a timeout error when attempting to upload a firmware.

Serial Connection

It's recommended to either use a USB to TTL cable or USB to TTL breakout board. Custom solutions are possible, see #Customisations & Others.

Here's how you connect them, GND is always the pin to the left:

Gen7 Serial Connection With USB2TTL Breakout Board.jpeg Gen7 Serial Connection With USB2TTL Cable.jpeg

Simply plug the connector in, connect USB to your PC and a new serial port should show up in your PC's operating system.

Your First Firmware Upload

After all this assembly, and with this complex firmware thing ahead, wouldn't it be a good idea to upload some test firmware to test whether basic things work? Of course!

You can find such a test firmware in Gen7's Github repository.

  1. Download that file SetupText.ino. If it opens in the browser window, do a "Save as...".
  2. Prepare your Gen7 by inserting power plugs, the serial converter, the USB plug of that converter and so on.
  3. Start your Arduino IDE.
  4. With the IDE, open SetupTest.ino. You'll be asked if you want to create a folder of the same name, click "Yes".
  5. Make sure the right serial port and the right type of board is still selected in the Test menu.
  6. Hit the "Upload" button (the second from the right).

After a second or two, you should see something like

Binary sketch size: 2142 bytes (of a 63488 byte maximum)

in the black text field, and after another second of blinking on the serial connector, it should say "Done uploading." right above that text field.

Gen7 v1.3 SetupTest.png

Now you can safely assume uploading a firmware works. The test firmware has a few more features:

  1. If you open the IDE's serial monitor and listen at 9600 baud, you can read what the ATmega is doing. If you can read clear text, the serial line is working.
  2. Three or four seconds after the upload, the power supply should spring to life, blink the LED of HEATER1 a few times and turn the PSU off again.
  3. The same happens after each hit of the Reset button on the board, independently from the IDE or the serial connection.

Microstepping

Last not least, you probably want to set up microstepping to something other than the default. The default is halfstepping. Smaller microsteps make the motors run smoother, but also raise the computing load for the ATmega. The smallest steps possible are 1/16 microstepping.

Feel free to select different settings for each of the motors, e.g. 1/8 microstepping for threaded rod axes (Z) and 1/16 microstepping for belt driven axes (X, Y).

Selecting microstepping is done with the jumpers in front of each of the Pololus, they refer to MS2 and MS3. Allegro documents also know about MS1, which is hard wired to High in Gen7. Plugging a jumper sets High, while leaving the header free sets Low. Here's a detail picture of a Gen7, with MS2 set to High, MS3 set to Low:

Gen7 Microstepping Jumpers.jpeg

The following table shows what you get with each combination:

MS2 MS3 Microstep Resolution
Open Open Half step
Open Plugged Not allowed!
Plugged Open Eighth step
Plugged Plugged Sixteenth step

You can change microstepping at any time, even while a motor is running.

Firmware

In principle, you can run any of the RepRap Firmwares on this board. Adjust the I/O pin layout, adjust compile time options for no secondary board/no RS485 and proceed. Just like Gen2, RAMPS or similar electronics.

Teacup Firmware

Teacup's Simple Installation instructions show nicely how to do this. Some details for Gen7:

  • Have your Arduino IDE prepared for Gen7, as explained above.
  • Use the config.gen7-v1.1-v1.3.h and ThermistorTable.double.h you find there.

With config.h left untouched, at least something should move. This is fine for first tests, but not sufficient to have everything right for your machine. Edit your config.h further to match your machine and your setup. Config.h has a lot of comments inside the file, helping on the details. For example, STEPS_PER_M_X should be set according to your choice of microstepping. Also, default maximum speeds are very slow, you likely want to raise MAXIMUM_FEEDRATE_....

Note that to test the extruder heat sensor, the extruder heater must be turned on!

Reprap software is in constant flux, so try to use recent software both for host software and slicing, or you may run into compatibility problems. For example, the original reprap host software may not report the temperature correctly (if at all). Using Pronterface for host software solved this problem for one user. Using Slic3r rather than Skeinforge solved another problem where the Teacup firmware would be stuck forever 'waiting for target temp'.

Repetier Firmware

Tested on 644 @ 20Mhz. See this post for sample config and pins files. Should be integrated into the default firmware soon.

Here is the github download page, and documentation is on the github wiki

FiveD Firmware

FiveD has been run succssfully on Gen7. As the ATmega pin layout of v1.3 almost matches that of v1.2, firmwares running on v1.2 continue to work on v1.3. Snuggles has kindly contributed his sources:

File:FiveD 20100610 for Gen7 v1.2.zip

To upload the Firmware do the following:

  • Have your Arduino IDE prepared for Gen7, as explained above.
  • Open the FiveD_GCode_Interpreter.pde file inside the FiveD_GCode_Interpreter folder with the IDE.
  • Press the upload button in the IDE's toolbar.
  • If there are no errors, you're done.

This should get you started, but don't forget to adjust STEPS_PER_MM in configuration.h to match your mechanics.

Sprinter, Marlin

These two are limited to 16 MHz electronics. Instead of fixing the software to allow faster speeds, their makers try to convince people 16 MHz is better than 20 MHz. Similar to how Golf GTI drivers try to convince people their car is better than a Porsche.

Update 2012-03-12 from a Marlin developer: Marlin now supports arbitrary clock frequencies, so 20 MHz should work properly.

Experimented with Marlin, Sprinter too?:

  • To avoid continuous brown out resets we need to replace 100µH L1 coil by a 10µH one as in Gen7 1.5.
English Forum thread: http://forums.reprap.org/read.php?181,175191,175191
German Forum thread: http://forums.reprap.org/read.php?247,170384,171365
  • Alternatively, 100µH L1 coil can be replaced by a strap, with a 100µF cap added in parallel with C19.
  • To avoid bad temp messages at startup, thermistors must be continuously powered as described at the bottom of this page: Thermistors on 5 V Standby.

Other Configurations

The following should help to configure other firmwares.

Pinout

Sanguino pin bindings
Function ATMega Name Teacup Original firmware Direction in firmware
X Step PC3 DIO19 19 Digital Output
X Direction PC2 DIO18 18 Digital Output
X Min PB7 DIO7 7 Digital Output
X Max PB6 DIO6 6 Digital Output
Y Step PC7 DIO23 23 Digital Output
Y Direction PC6 DIO22 22 Digital Output
Y Min PB5 DIO5 5 Digital Output
Y Max PB2 DIO2 2 Digital Output
Z Step PA5 DIO26 26 Digital Output
Z Direction PA6 DIO25 25 Digital Output
Z Min PB1 DIO1 1 Digital Output
Z Max PB0 DIO0 0 Digital Output
Extruder Step PA3 DIO28 28 Digital Output
Extruder Direction PA4 DIO27 27 Digital Output
Power Enable PD7 DIO15 15 Open Drain Output, active low
Motors Enable PA7 DIO24 24 Digital Output
Heater 1 PB4 DIO4 4 Digital Output
Heater 2 PB3 DIO3 3 Digital Output
Heater 3 PA0 DIO31 31 Digital Output
Temp 1 PA1 AIO1 1 Analog Input
Temp 2 PA2 AIO2 2 Analog Input

Changes from v1.2:

  • Fan 1 (PA0 / DIO31 / 31) is gone.

Customisations & Others

This part describes possible modifications - for advanced users only.

Non-12 V Voltages

While it's very practical to use 12 V from the power supply, Gen7 is prepared for other voltages, too. Even better, you can supply different voltages for motors and heaters.

Possible usages:

  • 12 V for the heaters, 24  for the motors. This will still allow to use standard Reprap heating elements for the extruder and heated bed, while the motors can now run faster. Motor supply voltage is only limited by the Pololus and can go up to 35 volts.
  • 12 V for the motors, 5 V for the heaters. This would load your power supply more evenly.
  • 12 V for the motors, 3.3 V for something like EDM or inductive heated nozzles. Remember, the IRFZ44N can switch pretty fast, and the ATmega has frequency/PWM generators on board.
  • ...

On where to supply what, see the picture above. Simply rewire the disk power connectors to your needs and make sure all power sources contact at least one GND pin, to give them a common ground.

The 5 volts on the upper disk power connector is not needed if you use the ATX20/24 connector, but don't supply a different voltage at this connector, or a voltage from a different power supply, either.

Serial Connection

If you want a custom solution, you can create one, of course. Just connecting an RS-232 port to the serial connector won't work, however, even if you ignored the different voltage levels. ATmega's serial signal is inverted (Logical 0 = 5V, Logical 1 = 0V). Here's the serial connector's pinout:

Gen7 Serial Pinout.png

 

1 2 3 4 5 6
GND CTS (set to GND) +5 Volts RxD TxD Reset

RxD is ATmega's pin 14 (data to the chip); TxD is ATmega's pin 15 (data from the chip).

With pin 3 you can feed the ATmega, if you have no other current source. If you have another current source, e.g. your power supply, you might have slightly different potentials of 5V though, so you better keep this pin unconnected.

Pin 6 is usually connected to the serial line's DTR. This triggers a reset each time you start a connection to the ATmega and is very convenient when uploading firmware - no pressing of the reset button needed, then. Arduinos have this hardwired. If you keep pin 6 free, press the reset button each time your IDE (avrdude) attempts an upload.

Using an E'go USB-TTL adapter

This converter is cheap, uses the Silicon Labs CP2102 chip and basically works:

E'go USB-TTL Converter on Gen7.jpeg

 

Gen7 GND (Pin 1) +5 Volts (Pin 3) RxD (Pin 4) TxD (Pin 5)
USB-TTL adapter GND (Pin 5) +5 Volts (Pin 6) TxD (Pin 3) RxD (Pin 4)

Important here is to not connect both Reset pins.

Note 1: CP2102-based converters normally do not support auto-reset. Because of this, the Arduino IDE behaves like it's stuck when uploading the sketch, flooding the console with lines 'avrdude: Recv'. To work around this, press the reset button just a second before the uploading starts, which happens shortly after 'Binary sketch size is...' message appears.

Note 2: It is possible to add auto reset functionality to any adapter using this chipset by connecting the DTR "pin" of the chip itself directly to the RST pin on the adapter. Also note that the chip is a fairly difficult to solder QFN package.

Note 3: You need to select "AVR ISP" as the Programmer in the Arduino IDE, not "AVRISP mkII"

Suppliers of this adapter

Thermistors on 5 V Standby

Sometimes it's convenient to have the thermistor inputs on 5 V Standby instead of the regular 5 V supply. This enables reading temperatures while the power supply is turned off. This is a standard feature of Gen7 v1.4 and consumes only about 0.25 milliWatts at room temperature.

Nophead explained how to do it in the forum, Terramir came up with pictures: Thermistor always on. The black lines in Terramir's pictures show where to cut the copper tracks, the green lines show where to re-connect them. Thanks to both!