User Manual

Gertboard Overview

Figure 1: Gertboard and Raspberry Pi

The Gertboard is an input/output (I/O) extension board for the Raspberry Pi computer. It fits onto the

GPIO (general purpose I/O) pins of the Raspberry Pi (the double row of pins on the upper left corner)

via a socket on the back of the Gertboard. A bit of care is required when putting the two devices

together. It is easy to insert just one row of pins into the socket, but all of the pins need to be

connected. The Gertboard gets its power from those GPIO pins, so you will need a power supply for

the Raspberry Pi (RPi) that is capable of supplying a current of at least 1A.

The Gertboard has collection of functional blocks (the major capabilities of the board) which can be

connected together in a myriad of ways using header pins. The functional blocks are:

 12x buffered I/O

 3x pushbuttons

 6x open collector drivers (50V, 0.5A)

 18V, 2A motor controller

 28-pin dual in line ATmega microcontroller

 2-channel 8, 10, or 12 bit Digital to Analogue converter

 2-channel 10 bit Analogue to Digital converter

The location of these blocks on the Gertboard is shown in Figure 2.