CPU Board attached to the Bebop drone

[mandelyoni]

Hi,

Which CPU Board is recommended to attach to the Bebop drone for running the net?
If available, please share a link.

Thank you.

[antonilo]

Hi,
We are using the Intel UpBoard (https://up-shop.org/27-up) for onboard computation.

[mandelyoni]

Thank you for the prompt response.
By the way, are you going to sell the small docking board with Dronet for the crazyflie soon?

[antonilo]

We do not plan to sell it since we are still in development phase. While the board can be already purchased, the integrated system will follow in the (hopefully) near future.

[mandelyoni]

Hi, thanks for your answer.
Which board, did you mean, can already be purchased?
Is it straight forward to implement the the Dronet on it?

[antonilo]

The PULP board that runs dronet in Ultra-low power can already be purchased. Implementation of the algorithm that is highly non-trivial, but we are currently on it. We will soon share our findings and implementation.

[mandelyoni]

Hi Antonilo,

Can you please share an explanation/description of how to connect the Up-board to the Bebop2?

Thanks, Yoni

[antonilo]

I would argue that the easier way to do it is using ROS. This is however not the only one and for sure not the best one in term of performance.

[mandelyoni]

Thanks, but I meant how connect the Up-Board physically to the drone (power and communication)?

Thanks again, Yoni

[antonilo]

We have an external battery to power the Up-Board and communication happens via WiFi and ROS.
Hope this helps!

[mandelyoni]

Hi Antonilo,

Is there a big difference in the performance between running the algorithms on the UpBoard or on a laptop ?
In most of your videos we didn't see the UpBoard connected to your drone? Can you please explain why?

Thank you, Yoni.

[antonilo]

In the original dronet video, computation was done off-board in a laptop. In our last projects, all computation has been shifted to fully on-board: Deep Drone Racing, Beauty and the Beast. The minimum inference time required to give good behavior is generally 8-10Hz.

[mandelyoni]

Hi Antonio,
In your paper, DroNet: Learning to Fly by Driving, in Table 3, you make a comparison with Gandhi et al.
Did you also implement their algorithm?
Thank you, Yoni

[antonilo]

Yes, we've re-implemented their algorithm as described in the paper.

[mandelyoni]

Ok, thank you.

[mandelyoni]

Hi Antonio,
Did you run Ubuntu 16.04 with ROS on the Upboard?
Is the simple version of the board adequate (https://up-shop.org/up-boards/272-up-board.html)?
Thanks, Yoni