Hardware to Support ROS, OpenCV, and Motor Control
I would like to build a robot arm that has sonar and camera sensors to manipulate physical objects. I intend to use ROS for the motion planning and sensor processing and OpenCV for the camera processing. I'm early into this project and I've tentatively picked some hardware that I think will get me in the ballpark but I'm not really sure if it will work.
My choices so far are: 1) Pandaboard ES (dual-core ARM 1.6MHz) to run Lubuntu and ROS (motion planning, sensor processing) and OpenCV for video processing, 2) a Mini Maestro 16-channel PWM motor control driver to drive up to 10 motors (with room to grow), and 3) Talon SR H-bridge controllers for each of the motors. Note that the motors are 12V and may have max currents up to 60A. I assume that I'll be able to run the motor encoders back to the GPIO pins of the Pandaboard to form a closed-loop control system.
I'm worried that the Pandaboard won't have enough CPU power to handle all the image processing, motion control, and motor control. Is there a better way to handle these needs? Perhaps a different dedicated board to handle complete PID control of the motors? If so, what specifically would you suggest?
