The Bus Pirate v4 Acrylic case kit v1 is back in stock at Seeed Studio. This fits the earlier Bus Pirate v4 models which comes in the non-Sick of Beige PCBs. You can get one for $3 at Seeed Studio.
Author Archives: DP
Chipstomp assembly – Digital side
Here’s Catmacey’s digital side of the Chipstomp. He wrote a post on his blog detailing its assembly: I started with the digital side of things. The first task being to get the PIC and it’s supporting circuitry up and running and confirm that all was ok by attempting to talk to it with my PicKit […]
NEW PROTOTYPE: Premium Make Your Own Keyed Cable Kit
How often have you been caught without the right cables? You can salvage an old ugly one from somewhere, or make a last minute part order that delays your project. Never again! The Premium Make Your Own Keyed Cable Kit from Dangerous Prototypes contains enough housing and sockets to make an (almost) lifetime supply of […]
A computer kit from the ’70s: Ithaca Audio Z80 CPU card for the S100 bus
Fabio Battaglia blogged about his Ithaca Audio Z80 CPU card for the S100 bus project: First of all, I assembled some simple test code to write a letter on my video console, just to check that code was actually executing. Obviously I only got a black screen at first, which seems a constant when I build […]
SMD soldering station for Weller soldering tips
Martin Kumm writes: This page provides documents about a cheap SMD solder station built as an Arduino shield (Arduino UNO). It supports active soldering tips from Weller (RT series) which contain the heating element as well as a sensor and provides a standard 3.5 mm jack. Together with the corresponding female connector you will get […]
Non contact voltage test pen teardown
Alan Parekh of Hacked Gadgets writes: If you are doing any electrical work, one of these Non Contact Voltage Test Pens can be quite handy. Just touch the wire that you want to make sure isn’t live and check that the tester doesn’t beep and start flashing. This test pen is on all the time […]
Bus Blaster v3 back in stock
Bus Blaster v3 JTAG debugger is back in stock at Seeed Studio.The cool thing about the Bus Blaster is that it uses a programmable logic chip as a buffer. It can imitate different types of programming hardware with a simple USB update. You can get a Bus Blaster v3 for $34.95.
#FreePCB via Twitter to 2 random RTs
Every Tuesday we give away two coupons for the free PCB drawer via Twitter. This post was announced on Twitter, and in 24 hours we’ll send coupon codes to two random retweeters. Don’t forget there’s free PCBs three times a every week: Hate Twitter and Facebook? Free PCB Sunday is the classic PCB giveaway. Catch […]
Box of new PCBs from DirtyPCBs: Raspberry Pi add-on boards
TonyD posted pictures of his latest batch of PCB’s from DirtyPCBs: In the box where 4, yes 4 sets of PCB’s. In the photo, the big PCB at the back is RPi-X PIAC. On the photo front row, on the left is MiniPiio LED Breakout, in the centre is MiniPiio BOP4 and to the right is MiniPiio […]
PC storage oscilloscope and logic analyzer
From the comments on our earlier USB oscilloscope with signal generator post, here’s a PC storage oscilloscope and logic analyzer by Nerd Ralph: A logic analyzer is a useful tool when working with micro-controllers, but when compared to the price of Arduino compatible boards, they are expensive. While the ability to decode different protocols is a […]
Lsquaredc, a library for I2C communications for Linux devices
A library for I2C communications for Linux devices – the Lsquaredc by Jan Rychter, that is available at Github: Lsquaredc is a tiny Linux library that allows you to access I2C (IIC, I²C, or I squared C) from userspace without causing excessive pain and suffering. The library uses the Bus Pirate convention for specifying I2C sequences, supports repeated […]
PL-2303HX bit-bang AVR programmer
Nerd Ralph writes: I’ve blogged before about PL-2303HX USB-TTL adapters. In some ways they are even better than the expensive FTDI adapters – for example they work at 6mbps. In conjunction with a cheap Pro Mini clone it’s possible to get started with Arduino/AVR programming for $5. For more advanced use such as burning bootloaders […]
Logic Pirate ICSP jig
Tom Keddie writes: This week at VHS we’re building Logic Pirates in our SMD workshops. The LP is an awesome little open hardware logic analyser design from DP. The ICSP header is a tiny 0.05″ pitch, I struggled with this a little until I came up with this top and bottom 0.1″ jig (obvious in […]
USB oscilloscope with signal generator
Jan Henrik wrote this Instructable detailing the build of his DIY USB oscilloscope with signal generator: In this project I want to show you how to make an easy and cheap USB Oscilloscope. Specifications: Price: 20$ Frequency: 2-20000HZ Resolution: 16 Bit Voltage range: +-7V / with probe +-70V Channels: 2 X-Y Mode Signal generator: Sine, Square, Triangular and Sawtooth […]
Free PCB Sunday: Pick your PCB
We go through a lot of prototype PCBs, and end up with lots of extras that we’ll never use. Every Sunday we give away a few PCBs from one of our past or future projects, or a related prototype. Our PCBs are made through Seeed Studio’s Fusion board service. This week two random commenters will […]
app note: FTDI Device Input Output Pin States
A reference app note on their reset, suspend and active states of the input / output pins of various FTDI’s devices. FTDI devices covered are: FT232R, FT245R, FT232H, FT2232H, FT4232H, FT2232D, FT200XD, FT201X, FT220X, FT221X, FT230X, FT231X, FT234XD, FT240X, FT120, FT121, FT122 & FT313H.
app note: FTDI MPSSE Basics
Introducing the FTDI’s Multi-Protocol Synchronous Serial Engine basics app note. FTDI’s MPSSE provides a flexible means of interfacing synchronous serial devices to a USB port. By being “Multi-Protocol”, the MPSSE allows communication with many different types of synchronous devices, the most popular being SPI, I2C and JTAG. Data formatting and clock synchronization can be configured […]
Impact, vibration and ultrasound sensing with PVDF Piezo sensors
Shabaz over at Element14 writes: This post is about an interesting, low-cost sensor that doesn’t need much processing to use, and has some unique characteristics – a PVDF (polyvinylidene difluoride) Piezoelectric sensor. The sensors looks like a small strip of plastic, and can be used for detecting movement or vibrations even into ultrasound. Such devices can […]
ATmega64 development board
Radek Malina of Electronics Lab has written an article on his latest project the ATmega64 development board: This project is a development board for Atmel ATmega64 microcontoller and can be used to easily develop custom AVR firmware or as an introduction board to microproccessors and programming. A development board is better to be used instead of […]
Free PCB coupon via Facebook to 2 random commenters
eEvery Friday we giveaway some extra PCBs via Facebook. This post was announced on Facebook, and on Monday we’ll send coupon codes to two random commenters. More PCBs via Twitter on Tuesday and the blog every Sunday. Don’t forget there’s free PCBs three times every week: Free PCB Sunday. The classic. Every week, get free […]