[Brett Melbourne]

Update. We decided to try the SP510. Seems to work fine with the ADS1115 set to max gain (GAIN_SIXTEEN) with differential measurement. Resolution is 7.8 uV, or 0.14 W m^-2. I ran it for a few days logging every 2 seconds and it doesn’t look especially noisy. We will be trying this out more thoroughly in the coming month.

[Brett Melbourne]

Thanks for looking into it. A lot of pages were working again for a while but it seems to have gone down again this morning. I’m still seeing “page not found” after clearing cache or in private browsing.

[Brett Melbourne]

Apart from the forum and home page, I see all “Page not found” messages too as of 06-12.

[Brett Melbourne]

Thanks! I see they are available for pre-order again on Amazon. Yes, summer field season is in full swing :).

[Brett Melbourne]

I found that I had to manually install the Windows 7 device drivers since they did not automatically install and Windows could not find drivers by itself. The instructions on the FTDI website are not entirely clear, so here are some additional notes.
* Follow Windows 7 Installation Guide from FTDI website
* Download both the D2XX driver and VCP driver (links are given in the installation guide), choosing the drivers appropriate to your computer’s CPU (e.g. a new computer is likely 64 bit, whereas if you are using an older laptop you might need the 32 bit x86 driver)
* The D2XX and VCP drivers confusingly have the same name, so save them into separate empty folders called, say, D2XX and VCP so you can keep track of which is which
* They need to be manually unzipped after downloading
* The first driver that is being installed in the install guide instructions is the D2XX driver
* From Device Manager, right click the device name. The Mayfly will come up under “Other devices” and be called something like “Unknown device” or “FT232R USB UART”. If it is not clear which device is the Mayfly, unplug it and watch to see which device is added when you plug it back in.
* Select *Update driver software*
* Select *Browse my computer …* – browse to and select the D2XX driver folder that you downloaded and is now unzipped (e.g. “CDM v2.12.28 WHQL Certified”)
* After installing there should be a “success” message from the installer but there may also be a separate Windows tray notification saying “failed”. This appears to be normal (the failed message appears to be indicating that a COM driver is not yet installed).
* The second installation is the VCP driver, which is the COM driver.
* Basically, repeat the same steps as the first installation but this time choose the VCP driver
* After installation the mayfly should show up in Device Manager as “USB Serial Port (COMX)”, where X is the COM number assigned to the device.

[Brett Melbourne]

I have a really similar issue (12V powered sensor + SPI-12) that I would appreciate some advice on. We want to monitor solar radiation (shortwave) under forest canopy, for which common silicon diode pyranometers (e.g. Apogee SP212) are not suitable – a thermopile pyranometer is needed. We have two options for thermopile pyranometers. 1) Apogee SP510. Self powered, output range 0-144mV. 2) Campbell Sci CS320. 6-24V excitation, SPI-12 output. We will not be using the optional 12V heater on either of these. Both sensors are actually manufactured by Apogee. I saw in another comment that the millivolt SP510 signal will be noisy with the Mayfly (an amplified version of SP510 is not available). We are working in a low light environment, so noise will be an issue. Thus, I was leaning toward the CS320 due to the SPI-12 output (hence zero logger/cable noise). But the CS320 has the same power issue as the CS451 pressure sensor mentioned above. Which would you suggest for the mayfly? Is it better to tackle the noise/signal amplification issue or the power issue?

Also, just want to say thanks for all the awesome work going on here – super exciting initiative for ecological monitoring!

[Author]

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