2.

Getting Started

2.1.

Xplained Pro Quick Start

Steps to start exploring the Atmel Xplained Pro platform:

1.

Download Atmel Studio.

2.

Launch Atmel Studio.

3.

Connect a USB cable (Standard-A to Micro-B or Micro-AB) between the PC and the DEBUG USB

port on the kit.

When the Xplained Pro MCU kit is connected to your computer for the first time, the operating system will

perform a driver software installation. The driver file supports both 32- and 64-bit versions of Microsoft

®

Windows

Once the Xplained Pro MCU board is powered the green power LED will be lit and Atmel Studio will auto

detect which Xplained Pro MCU- and extension board(s) are connected. Atmel Studio will present

relevant information like datasheets and kit documentation. The kit landing page in Atmel Studio also has

the option to launch Atmel Software Framework (ASF) example applications for the kit. The SAM R21

device is programmed and debugged by the on-board Embedded Debugger and therefore no external

programmer or debugger tool is needed.

2.2.

Design Documentation and Relevant Links

The following list contains links to the most relevant documents and software for the SAM R21 Xplained

Pro.

•

Xplained products - Atmel Xplained evaluation kits are a series of easy-to-use evaluation kits for

Atmel microcontrollers and other Atmel products. For low pin-count devices the Xplained Nano

series provides a minimalistic solution with access to all I/O pins of the target microcontroller.

Xplained Mini kits are for medium pin-count devices and adds Arduino Uno compatible header

footprint and a prototyping area. Xplained Pro kits are for medium to high pin-count devices, they

features advanced debugging and standardized extensions for peripheral functions. All these kits

have on board programmers/debuggers which creates a set of low-cost boards for evaluation and

demonstration of features and capabilities of different Atmel products.

•

Atmel Studio - Free Atmel IDE for development of C/C++ and assembler code for Atmel

microcontrollers.

•

Atmel sample store - Atmel sample store where you can order samples of devices.

•

EDBG User Guide - User guide containing more information about the on-board Embedded

Debugger.

•

IAR Embedded Workbench

® for ARM® - This is a commercial C/C++ compiler that is available for

ARM

available from their website. The code size limit is 16KB for devices with M0, M0+, and M1 cores

and 32KB for devices with other cores.

•

Atmel Data Visualizer - Atmel Data Visualizer is a program used for processing and visualizing

data. Data Visualizer can receive data from various sources such as the Embedded Debugger Data

Gateway Interface found on Xplained Pro boards and COM ports.

•

Design Documentation - Package containing CAD source, schematics, BOM, assembly drawings,

3D plots, layer plots, etc.

Atmel SAM R21 Xplained Pro [USER GUIDE]

Atmel-42243D-SAM-R21-Xplained-Pro_User Guide-04/2016

6