SD-Card module
With this module you can enhance your microcontroller module with the huge amount of memory you may add with any SD card around. You can easily add up to 2 GByte of data storage for a few dollars extra.
A regular SD card may be used as an external storage unit for your
microcontroller. The card will be accessed through the SPI bus. Some ideas for usage:
- Outputs protocol data (you may then read out the card on your PC with a spread sheet program or other software)
Read in of configuration data (no individual programming, just plug in the card and the microcontroller reads out its needed data
- Read in of license data
- Read in of graphics data and other data which usually would not fit in to the program memory of the microcontroller
As the SD card uses the SPI bus we need a bidirectional level shifter which can be removed completely from the bus. The level shifter is the “translator” between the 5V system of the microcontroller and the 3V system of the SD card. Removing from the bus is crucial, as otherwise the SD card would block the bus and the display could not be used (uses also the SPI bus).