SAP6 / STIC - new Shetland Attack Pony

[aricooperdavis]

Last year Phil released a new iteration of his Shetland Attack Pony - the SAP6 or STIC.



This version has improved battery life and two physical buttons so that the accelerometer is no longer used for navigating around the menus (🎉).

Has anyone used one yet? I'd love to hear some reviews of this new iteration before I commit to buying one. I know that they had their issues, but I was blown away by how good the SAP5 is, considering it's "just" a side hobby, so I'm keen to keep supporting their development.

 

[MarkS]

I got one of the previous versions (5 I think?) and found it essentially unusable, as per https://ukcaving.com/board/index.php?threads/shetland-attack-pony-5-now-available.27152/page-2, so very reluctant to go for another without hearing a lot of positive feedback.

I believe there is an SAP6 currently with the team out in Mulu, so assuming they found something to survey (!) they might have some feedback.

 

[aricooperdavis]

Unusable because of the spontaneous shutting down issue? That's such a shame. Have you got in touch with Phil?

When a friend bought a SAP5 we found it really frustrating that a menu was shown after every shot, even though the shots were being uploaded to SexyTopo, so this menu was redundant. I got in touch with Phil and we added a new setting to control the appearance of the menu, which was fairly straightforward because all his code is open source.

The new SAP6 uses a completely different microcontroller, with firmware written in Python rather than C, so not only will it be much easier for Phil and others to tweak, but it also means that existing bugs are very unlikely to have been copied across.

 

[MarkS]

Unusable because of the spontaneous shutting down issue? That's such a shame. Have you got in touch with Phil?

Largely the shut-down issue, yes. It was immensely frustrating to be lying in a wet passage or hanging on a rope waiting an unknown length of time for the unit to turn on again. I did get in touch with Phil about that and another issue where a single button press would be read as a double press and turn the unit off. The latter got sorted, but not the former.

I also suggested the feature it sounds like you implemented. Would your update automatically be implemented via PonyTrainer, do you know?

 

[aricooperdavis]

Would your update automatically be implemented via PonyTrainer, do you know?

No, I don't think Phil has had a chance to merge my changes and make a release for PonyTrainer. I'm not sure whether this PonyTrainer update system is something that he'll have the time to maintain now that the SAP6 no longer needs it.

I've attached a firmware file for an earlier version of my update, which I think you can push to your SAP using PonyTrainer? It's only an earlier version because I made the name of the setting too long so it doesn't fit on the screen, but that's not a functional issue.

 

[aricooperdavis]

It doesn't look like the forum software supports .hex files, very sensibly, so I've put it on Google Drive.

 

[MarkS]

Thanks very much! I'll test it out when I get the chance.