Jaromir shared his AVR programmer in the forum: Just from pure passion to see how low-end PIC exercises AVR, I made this programmer. Basically it is STK500 port on PIC16F1825. I took this tuxgraphics.org one, did some clean-up, wrote new hardware layer for PIC16 and voila – new programmer is born. It was done in […]
Author Archives: DP
Free digital design text book: Digital McLogic design
We previously covered the Free VHDL book. Now Viswa tipped us to this Free digital design text book : Digital McLogic Design This text presents introductory digital logic design concepts and introductory VHDL modeling concepts. This book focuses on block-level design and has removed many of the unimportant low-level digital design details typically found in […]
BatLev, a LiFePo4 cell balancer
Blarson posted his project the BatLev, a LiFePo4 cell balancer in the project log forum: Lithium Feric Phosphate cells are a lower engergy density variety of lithium-ion cells that don’t have the fire hazard and short life problems of the more common li-ion cells. They are popular for electric vehicles and are gradually making their […]
Jeremy Blum remote controlled graduation cap
Here’s a cool remote controlled graduation cap by Jeremy Blum: Congrats to Jeremy Blum for graduating from Cornell University! He made a cool Remote Controlled Graduation Cap that he controls using a custom built wrist control box. The cap has an RGB LED in it and is capable of not only grabbing user submitted color […]
Lightning LoL necklace wearable
Erin of RobotGrrl has written an article about her simple, blinky, 3D printed necklace. This is up on Thinkiverse: Here was a quick project that I created in time for C2MTL. It’s a simple, blinky, 3D printed, wearable electronic. We wanted to wear something that would be interesting and a conversation starter (it worked!).
MIT’s silkworm-powered, fantastical, biological “3D printer”
MIT’s silkworm-powered, fantastical, biological “3D printer” : The primary structure was created of 26 polygonal panels made of silk threads laid down by a CNC (Computer-Numerically Controlled) machine. Inspired by the silkworm’s ability to generate a 3D cocoon out of a single multi-property silk thread (1km in length), the overall geometry of the pavilion was […]
Photodiode Gamma ray detector
Alan over at vk2zay.net posted an article describing how he designed and built his gamma ray detector using a photodiode: Gamma photons interacting with cheap photodiodes produce small current pulses which are easily amplified and allow detection of individual photon events. This offers the possibility of cheap, small and rugged radiation detectors of reasonable sensitivity. While not […]
Mediacenter with Raspberry Pi
Luca wrote a short tutorial on how to install and use Raspbmc. ‘Raspbmc is a Linux distribution for the Raspberry Pi; it already includes the fantastic XBMC media player’: The Raspberry Pi, thanks to the Videocore 4 GPU integrated in the Broadcom BCM2835 chip, is perfect for a home mediacenter; the GPU is indeed capable […]
#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 […]
Homemade LED wristwatch
Montspy was inspired by Mats’ DaTajm wristwatch so he made his own, the LED wristwatch: It has 12 red LEDs to display hours and slices of 5 minutes. And 4 orange LEDs to obtain a minute-precision display. Check out the video after the break. Via the forum.
Bus Pirate LCD Adapter v2b free PCB build
Timotet built a free Bus Pirate LCD Adapter v2b PCB. If you build a free PCB we’ll send you another one! Blog about it, post a picture on Flicker, whatever – we’ll send you a coupon code for the free PCB drawer. Get an LCD adapter for $9.
125 kHz RFID reader based on ATtiny13
125 kHz RFID reader based on ATtiny13 by Vassilis Serasidis This is an 125 kHz RFID reader that is based on ATtiny13 micro-controller and an LM358 Operational Amplifier. No special RFID chip is used. The reading, decoding and printing the unique ID from 125 kHz RFID tags is made entirely in software by ATtiny13. Via […]
USB virtual serial benchmarks
Paul over at Dorkbotpdx has written a detailed article on his USB virtual serial receive speed benchmarks: As part of optimization work to support large-scale LED projects, PJRC developed three simple USB virtual serial receive speed benchmarks. The complete source code is available below. Here are the benchmark results for boards that currently support native […]
DP6037 PTH v1 free PCB build
IhorM built a DP6037 PTH v1 free PCB. My first DP pcb via Free PCB coupon ! Quickly assembled and tested ! If you build a free PCB we’ll send you another one! Blog about it, post a picture on Flicker, whatever – we’ll send you a coupon code for the free PCB drawer.
App note: Pulse Oximeter using dsPIC33
Here is a reference design of a pulse oximeter built around the dsPIC33 digital signal processor. Pulse oximeter is a non-invasive medical device that monitors the oxygen saturation of a patient?s blood and heart rate. This application note demonstrates the implementation of a high-accuracy pulse oximeter using Microchip?s dsPIC® Digital Signal Controllers (DSCs) and analog […]
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: Ensure long lifetimes from electrolytic capacitors
Here is an article from Maxim describing the longevity of electrolytic capacitors in conditions which require high temperatures. As well as some pointers in LED light bulb design. Electrolytic capacitors are notorious for short lifetimes in high-temperature applications such as LED light bulbs. The careful selection of these devices with proper interpretation of their […]
Allegro A4988 and Arduino
Luca shows us how to build a controller to adjust speed and rotation direction of a stepper motor: Using the controller, you can adjust the speed (from 0 to 70 RPM, revolutions per minute) and the rotation direction. On the LCD are displayed the actual speed, direction and a progress bar.
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 May 31, 2013
Here’s a summary of major developments over the last week. Free PCB Friday is coming up soon. ATX Breakout board free PCB build Bus Pirate Arduino Shield free PCB build Another laser cut case for the Logic Sniffer Coming up: Free PCBs via Facebook on Friday App notes on the weekend Free PCB Sunday 3D model […]