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 […]
Author Archives: DP
Week in (p)review April 04, 2014
Here’s a summary of major developments over the last week. Free PCB Friday is coming up soon. DP6037 Protoboard v1, Bus Blaster v3 acrylic case v1 are PCB back in stock UK print press – Custom PC article on ATX breakout board Bus Pirate Demo Board 3: I2C Part B Coming up: Free PCBs via Facebook on […]
Building a 4bit / 8bit computer in CPLD
Hackshed crew has been working on a homebrew CPU from scratch in CPLD: Building things on breadboards is fine but I often find that I either need to pinch something from the design, I knock wires out of place or there’s some other reason that it gets destroyed. In order to get round this, I’ve started […]
Bus Pirate Demo Board 3: I2C Part B
Andrew Rohne posted another article on Bus Pirate Demo Board I2C showing the MCP4725 digital to analog converter and the PCF8563 real-time clock. Check out the part A here. Like the last post, the ground and Vin need to be connected, and VPU (the pull-up resistors) need to be connected to the Vin as well. CLK on […]
DP6037 Protoboard v1 PCB back in stock
The DP6037 Protoboard v1 PCB is back in stock at Seeed Studio. A multipurpose 0.1″ pitch prototyping board that fits a DP6037 acrylic case. Grab a PCB from Seeed for $2.50.
Tear down of a cheap external USB battery
cpldcpu did a teardown of an external USB battery: The device has a USB micro-b socket which is used as 5V input for charging, and a normal USB-A socket as 5V output. The output power can be turned off and on by a toggle button. There are LEDs to indicate active power out (blue) and charging (red) […]
Novena, the open source computing platform
Bunnie has announced the launch of Novena, a new open-hardware computing platform: Novena is a 1.2GHz, Freescale quad-core ARM architecture computer closely coupled with a Xilinx FPGA. It’s designed for users who want to modify and extend their hardware: all the documentation for the PCBs are open and free to download, and it comes with a variety […]
Bus Blaster v3 acrylic case v1 back in stock
Bus Blaster v3 acrylic case v1 (SoBv1-DP8049) is back in stock at Seeed Studio. A clear laser-cut acrylic case kit for the Bus Blaster v3. This case is designed to be simple, cheap, and easy to assemble. You can get a Bus Blaster v3 acrylic case v1 for $3.
Nixie bargraph clock
Thereisonlyme wrote this Instructable detailing the build of his Nixie bargraph clock: This is a cool Nixie Bargraph Clock that has an hour and minute tube, the heights of the plasma in each tube indicates the time. There are some wires wrapped around the tubes so you can easily see what time it is without estimating. The […]
SMT700 New vision based SMT machine
Supertronic writes, “I am designing a small vision based machine having 60x 8mm feeders exchangeable at a size of 800x700mm.” More pictures here. Via the forum.
#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 […]
Troubleshooting damaged chips
Steve at Big Mess o’ Wires writes: The most common failure I’ve seen is something I call “burnout”, and has affected about 4% of the units. After anywhere from one minute to a few hours of working normally, the Floppy Emu stops functioning, and both the 3.3V regulator and the CPLD become hot to the […]
DIY Arduino bluetooth programming shield
Here’s a how-to on making a DIY Arduino Bluetooth programming shield by Joshua Newell: If you’ve ever wished you could program your Arduino without lugging a USB cable around, wanted to put an Arduino project somewhere out-of-reach but still be able to easily upload changes to it, thought about building a project that interfaces with an […]
A digital thermometer hygrometer with analog displays
Kerry Wong writes: In this post, I will show you yet another thermometer/hygrometer build. But instead of using an LCD or 7 segment display for the output, I decided to go retro, using two “needles” to display the temperature and humidity readings instead. And to make the project more fun, I did not use analog […]
EasyPIC v7 development board review
Raj of Embedded Lab has posted a detail review of mikroElektronika’s popular EasyPIC v7 development board: MikroElektronika, a Belgrade, Serbia-based company is well-known for producing quality software and hardware development tools for a wide range of microcontroller families, including PIC, AVR, and ARM processors. Their mikroC Pro for PIC has always been my favorite PIC compiler, […]
UK print press – Custom PC article on ATX breakout board
Phenoptix writes: “The review has hit the news stands today!” Thank you to Phenoptix for supporting the ATX breakout board bench power supply! Phenoptix in UK is a ATX breakout board distributor, pick one up here. Via the contact form.
BeagleBone Black and MSP430 based Wireless Sensing
Chirag Nagpal created prototype of a Wireless sensing system using MSP430, BeagleBone Black and XBee: I have developed a Wireless Sensing System using an MSP430 microcontroller based node, powered by 2 AA batteries, relaying data to a BeagleBone Black using XBee. The BeagleBone is then hosting a javascript based webpage graphing these values using processing.js. The […]
Experience with the TM240A pick and place
Chuck of LinearLogiX writes: We bought the TM240A and found it works pretty good for our needs. A couple items I found was that using the SMD type tant caps on a reel, I had to actually Grind the side to open width so the plastic holder would fit. As you can see in the pictures it would […]
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: Adjustable Electronic Load for Low Voltage DC Applications
Here’s an old but still good app note from Unitrode (Texas Instruments) on Adjustable Electronics Load. Testing power supply regulation over a specified output current range is greatly simplified with the use of an adjustable electronic load. Load current can be varied from zero to the full rated value with the twist of a panel […]