Lego Mindstorms EV3 replaces Lego Mindstorms NXT
Overview
The biggest change from the LEGO Mindstorms NXT and NXT 2.0 to the EV3 is the technological advances in the programmable brick. The main processor of the NXT was an ARM7 microcontroller, whereas the EV3 has a more powerful ARM9 CPU running Linux. A USB connector and Micro SD slot (up to 32GB) are new to the EV3. It comes with the plans to build 5 different robots: EV3RSTORM, GRIPP3R, R3PTAR, SPIK3R, and TRACK3R. LEGO has also released instructions online to build 12 additional projects: ROBODOZ3R, BANNER PRINT3R, EV3MEG, BOBB3E, MR-B3AM, RAC3 TRUCK, KRAZ3, EV3D4, EL3CTRIC GUITAR, DINOR3X, WACK3M, and EV3GAME. It uses a program called LEGO Mindstorms EV3 Home Edition, which is developed by LabVIEW, to write code using blocks instead of lines. However it can also be programmed on the actual robot and saved. MicroPython support has been recently added.The EV3 Home (31313) set consists of: 1 EV3 programmable brick, 2 Large Motors, 1 Medium Motor, 1 Touch Sensor, 1 Color Sensor, 1 Infrared Sensor, 1 Remote Control, cables, USB cable, and 585 TECHNIC elements.The Education EV3 Core Set (45544) set consists of: 1 EV3 programmable brick, 2 Large Motors, 1 Medium Motor, 2 Touch Sensors, 1 Color Sensor, 1 Gyroscope Sensor, 1 Ultrasonic Sensor, cables, USB cable, 1 Rechargeable battery and 547 TECHNIC elements.An expansion set for the Educational Core Set, which can be bought separately, contains 853 LEGO elements. However, the expansion set and the educational set combined do not contain enough components necessary to build most robots of the retail set. This contrasts with NXT; the educational set combined with the resource set could build any of the retail designs. The EV3 educational set was released a month earlier than the retail set, on August 1, 2013. Robots that can be built with the core education set are the EV3 educator robot, the GyroBoy, the Color Sorter, the Puppy and the Robot Arm H25. Robots that can be built with the expansion set are the Tank Bot, the Znap, the Stair Climber, the Elephant and a remote control. Another robot that can be built with a pair of core sets and an expansion set is the Spinner Factory. NXT's Hitechnic sensors Blocks can be used with EV3 & NXT.
NXT's sensors can be used with the EV3. It can boot an alternative operating system from a microSD card, which makes it possible to run a modded firmware, ev3dev, a Debian Linux-based operating system.