At Dangerous Prototypes we have a team of amazing PCB designers. We crank out a lot of boards publicly and privately, but even we can’t keep these hungry routing addicts busy all the time. Now we’re lending our routing skills to you for your open hardware project through a new site: Dirty Circuits. If […]
Author Archives: DP
Hacker Camp Shenzhen Day 1: Surviving Shenzhen
By ian Each morning of Hacker Camp Shenzhen started with a 2 hour discussion of various Shenzhen and electronics stuff. The first day Ian @ Dangerous Prototypes gave an overview of Shenzhen, food options, and essential life skills for getting around. Jin @ FlyLin gave a crash course overview of Chinese that introduced basics like […]
DIY 100W LED flashlight
In this video Julian Ilett demonstrates his DIY 100W LED flashlight: I discovered that due to a lucky co-incidence of voltage and internal resistance, a 100W LED can be connected directly across the terminals of two 18V Nickel Cadmium power tool batteries. And that means you can build a 100 Watt (7,500 Lumens) flashlight for less […]
Laserworld CS-500RGY laser projector teardown
Jaanus did a teardown of a Laserworld CS-500RGY laser projector: I got my hands on a Laserworld CS-500RGY laser projector. This is the smallest 500 mW one. It is a device that has three laser sources (red, red and green) and mirrors for moving laser pointer. It can be controlled by sound, DMX512 or ILDA interface. So, […]
#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 […]
miniLOG – Precision standalone voltage logger
Jakub Felcenloben over at Electronics Lab has written up documentation on his latest project called miniLOG, a basic data logger: miniLOG is a precise standalone voltage logger that save the data on a SD card. It has 4 basic analog channels: one has 12bit resolution for voltage measurements, two channels have 10bit resolution for voltage measurements and […]
Hacker Camp Shenzhen Day 0: Dongmen and Copy Mall Tour
By ian Before the workshop started we planned to take a few early arrivals to Dongmen and the Copy Mall. Instead, almost the entire group came. We hit Dongmen, China’s largest street market and the oldest market in Shenzhen (Laojie metro stop exit E). Highlights included the pirate software vendors, glasses world (eyeglass and contact […]
Hacker Camp Shenzhen Day -1: Pre-game dinner at Japanese Secret Location
By ian Anyone arriving early was invited to “Japanese Secret Location” in Louhu, the oldest part of Shenzhen, for an all you can eat, all you can drink, Japanese dinner. This is one of our favorite dining spots and we wanted to share it with everyone.
NEW PROTOTYPE: Logic Pirate 8 channel, 256K sample, 60MSPS logic analyzer
The Logic Pirate is an inexpensive yet capable open source logic analyzer. For just 30 bucks it can sample 8 channels, 256K samples per channel, at a blazing (overclocked!) 60 MILLION samples per second! It’s designed to support the SUMP logic analyzer protocol on Jawi’s open source software that works on most platforms. More than […]
Nixie HV switching PSU
From the comments on our earlier HV Nixie DC-DC switching power supply post, here’s a Nixie HV switching PSU by Nick De Smith: It is probably beyond the scope of this simple document to describe the operation of switch-mode power supplies (SMPSs) – suffice to say the technique relies on the voltage pulse you get from rapidly collapsing […]
Re:Load Pro – A DC active load
Here’s an interesting open source project on Kickstarter the Re:Load Pro by Nick Johnson of Arachnid Labs: Today I’m finally launching the Re:load Pro on kickstarter. The Re:load Pro takes all the advantages of the original Re:load, and improves upon them with a robust benchtop case, a good quality display and UI, an isolated USB interface, and an […]
Power bar, a small breadboard power supply
NsN has been working on a power bar, a small breadboard power supply: The power bar is a small breadboard friendly power supply with three independent voltage regulators and built-in current monitoring. The target applications are small, mostly digital projects, which don’t need a large 0-30V, 6A benchtop power supply, but at the same time want […]
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: STM32™ in-application programming over the I²C bus
Programming the STM32F10x via I2C with this app note from STMicroelectronics A key requirement for most Flash-memory-based systems is the ability to update firmware once the system is installed in the end product. This is referred to as in-application programming (IAP). This application note describes how to perform in-application programming using the STM32F10x’s I2C peripheral. […]
App note: STM32F10x in-application programming using the USART
Programming the STM32F10x via USART with this app note from STMicroelectronics The STM32F10x microcontroller can run user-specific firmware to perform in-application programming (IAP) of the microcontroller-embedded Flash memory. IAP driver must be program first to the Flash memory base address via JTAG/SWD interface using the development toolchain of your choice or the factory-embedded boot loader […]
DIY external serial monitor
ARPix wrote this Instructable detailing the build of his DIY external serial monitor: Sometimes I needed an external serial monitor like the Serial Monitor in the Arduino Editor, to see what is going on. So I made one. The first picture shows an example how could be it designed. For the ESM I used an Atmel Atmega328 […]
Breadboard programming cable for ATtiny85, ATtiny88, ATmega328, ATtiny2313, and other AVR MCUs
Here’s a breadboard programming cable for ATtiny85, ATtiny88, ATmega328, ATtiny2313, and other AVR MCUs by Nerd Ralph For programming AVR MCUs, I use a USBasp. Initially, I would connect the USBasp header pins to header pins on the breadboard with individual jumper wires, then jumper the appropriate pins on the MCU. Then I noticed a repeating […]
Free PCB coupon via Facebook to 2 random commenters
Every Friday we give away 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 […]
Week in (p)review April 11, 2014
Here’s a summary of major developments over the last week. Free PCB Friday is coming up soon. Hacker Camp Shenzhen April 3-5, 2014 Sick Of Beige Basic Case v1 (DP5050) back in stock Yet another Logic Sniffer case Check out sparkybg’s controller for soldering irons using the Hakko T12 type tips in the project log […]
HP 436A power meter teardown
Kerry Wong did a teardown of an HP 436A power meter: HP 436A is a power meter capable of measuring RF power between -70 dBm and 44 dBm (roughly between 0.1 nW to 25 W) with a frequency range from 100 kHz all the way upwards to 110 GHz depending on the sensor module selected. This power […]