Pioneer 3TM User Manual

ActivMedia Robotics 

Unlike the original Pioneer 1, Pioneer 2 and 3 robots are designed to support an onboard, 

internally integrated PC for fully autonomous operation.  Mounted just behind the nose of 
the robot, the PC is a common EBX form-factor that comes with up to four serial ports, 

10/100Base-T Ethernet, monitor, keyboard, and mouse ports, two USB ports, and support 

for floppy, as well as IDE hard-disk drives.   For additional functionality, such as for sound, 
video framegrabbing, firewire or PCMCIA bus, and wireless Ethernet, the onboard PC 

accepts PC104 and PC104-plus (PCI bus-enabled) interface cards that stack on the 

motherboard.  

Necessary 5 VDC power comes from a dedicated 

DC:DC converter, mounted nearby.  A hard-disk 

drive is specially shock-mounted to the robot’s nose, 
in between a cooling fan and computer speaker. 

 

 

The onboard PC communicates with the H8S 

microcontroller through its HOST serial port and the 
dedicated serial port COM1 under Windows or 
/dev/ttyS0 on Linux systems.  Automatic systems on 

the microcontroller switch in that HOST-to-PC 

connection when PC-based client software opens 
the serial port.  Otherwise, the PC doesn’t interfere 

with externally connected clients through the shared 
SERIAL port on the User Control Panel. 

Note also that some signals on the H8S 

microcontroller’s HOST serial port as connected with 
the onboard PC or other accessory can be used for 

automated PC shutdown or other utilities:  Pin 4 (DSR) normally is RS232 high when the 

controller operates normally; otherwise it is low when reset or in maintenance mode.  
Similarly, pin 9 (RI) normally is low and goes RS232-level high when the robot’s batteries 

drop below a set (nominally 11 VDC) voltage level.  

User-accessible communication and control port connectors, switches, and indicators for 

the onboard PC are on the Computer Control Panel, found on the right side panel of the 

DX or in the hinged control well next to the User Controls of the AT. 

 

 

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