Interesting app note from Silicon Labs about oscillators used on their wireless SoC series 2 devices, oscillator basics included. Link here (PDF) An oscillator is an electronic circuit which generates a repetitive, or periodic, time-varying signal. In the context of Wireless SoC Series 2 devices, this oscillator signal is used to clock execution of instructions […]
Author Archives: DP
App note: Safety considerations for Silicon Labs series capacitor isolators
Great in-depth about electronic isolators from Silicon Labs. Link here (PDF) Isolators are widely used in automotive, telecom, industrial, and medical applications to provide protection for people and/or equipment from high voltage hazards. The robustness of the isolator’s insulation, or “isolation barrier”, over the operating life of the equipment is key to ensuring safety against […]
Measure voltage and current with the Tiny V/A Meter
Here’s KarlTorp’s palm-sized Tiny V/A: Tired of replugging your multimeter when you want to measure both voltage and current on a small project? Tiny V/A meter is the device you need! Via Arduino Blog. Check out the video after the break.
CyberDeck ZBS
Recycled cyberdeck made from old project Raspberry pi Zero Boot System @ Facelesstech: So when I redesigned my ZBS (zero boot system) I decided to also make a thinner version of my portable raspberry pi setup. This worked out great and I used it to develop the raspberry pi add-ons and the software for the […]
DIY ARC reactor CPU performance monitor, powered by an Arduino
Michael @ the-diy-life.com posted detailed instructions of how to build your own Arc reactor CPU performance monitor: In this project, I’m going to be showing you how to turn one of these popular DIY arc reactor kits into a useful Arc Reactor CPU performance monitor for your computer. It plugs into one of your computers […]
App note: Automobile harness protection
Polyswitch fuse use in automobile, app note from Littelfuse. Link here (PDF) A vehicle’s ideal harness scheme has a hierarchal, tree-like structure with main power “trunks” dividing into smaller “branches,” with overcurrent protection at each node. This architecture allows the use of smaller, space-saving wires that can reduce weight and cost. It also optimizes system […]
App note: Automatic AC line voltage selector
Implementation of automatic AC line voltage selector, App note from Littelfuse. Link here (PDF) In some cases, appliances and equipment are able to operate when supplies by two different levels of AC line voltage to their main terminals (10V or 240V). This is why, it is very common that appliances and equipment have mechanical selectors […]
Pi Zero print server
Tom writes, “I can’t believe it! I actually finished a project the same day that I started it. A while back I won a Raspberry Pi Zero W in a promotional competition for Zipcar, and today I set it up as a wireless print server.” More details on Magic Smoke blog.
Using modular synth to control Atem camera switching over WiFi using ESP8266
Sebastian writes: I’ve been wanting to control my camera switching from my modular synth. So I made a setup where a low to high transition on a digital input on an ESP8266 module generates an OSC message on the WiFi network for the ATEM Mini Pro switcher to change cameras. Here, it’s triggered from the […]
#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 […]
Experimental Zener diode tester
Dilshan has published a new build: Automatic Zener diode tester is capable of identifying Zener diodes up to 27.5V. Apart from that, it can be used to recognize leads of the diodes/Zeners and detect damaged diodes. This tester is designed using well-known ICs such as MC34063 and PIC16F88. This unit provides approximately 5% to 15% […]
App note: P-channel power MOSFETs and applications
Another app note from IXYS on P-Channel power MOSFET application. Link here (PDF) IXYS P-Channel Power MOSFETs retain all the features of comparable N-Channel Power MOSFETs such as very fast switching, voltage control, ease of paralleling and excellent temperature stability. These are designed for applications that require the convenience of reverse polarity operation. They have […]
App note: Parallel operation of IGBT discrete devices
Guidelines for parallel operation of IGBT devices discuss in this app note from IXYS. Link here (PDF) As applications for IGBT components have continued to expand rapidly, semiconductor manufacturers have responded by providing IGBTs in both discrete and modular packages to meet the needs of their customers. Discrete IGBTs span the voltage range of 250V […]
cVert, a truly random MIDI controller
cVert, a truly random MIDI controller @ danny.makesthings.work cVert is the result of an idea I’ve been kicking around for years, and took a few months of work to bring to fruition. The idea was to use a Geiger counter as a true random number generator to give a non-deterministic input for computer art or […]
DIY home made portable oscilloscope
An ATmega328 based portable home made oscilloscope with ADC from Creative Engineering: It is basically a small scaled digital oscilloscope. It is capable of displaying all type of waveform like sine, triangular, square, etc. It’s bandwidth is above 1 MHz and input impedance is about 600K. The device is mainly using the ATmega328 micro-controller as […]
Repairing an HP 3438A digital multimeter
Jeff (aka K6JCA) did a repair of an HP 3438A digital multimeter and documented the whole process on his blog: This blog post is a record of my notes made while repairing an HP 3438A Digital Multimeter I had picked up last year at a local electronics swap meet. The 3438A is a 3.5 digit […]
Extracting ROM constants from the 8087 math coprocessor’s die
Ken posted an article taking a closer look at Intel 8087 chip: Intel introduced the 8087 chip in 1980 to improve floating-point performance on the 8086 and 8088 processors, and it was used with the original IBM PC. Since early microprocessors operated only on integers, arithmetic with floating-point numbers was slow and transcendental operations such […]
Arduino to Nokia 84×48 LCD Heartbeat Display
Bob writes: I am working on some Arduino biometric designs perhaps for a new book. So far I have created the two line 1602 LCD display and now the Nokia 84×48 display. The Nokia display is more fun to work with since I can do a oscilloscope like display across the screen. I am working […]
3d printed portable arcade controller
Facelesstech has published a new build: So I recycled the Arduino pro micro off of one of my old controllers, In doing so I messed the pin 16 up so I had to use one of the analog pins instead. The wiring was quite simple really. I ran a ground wire round all the buttons, […]
Building an ATmega 1284p based data logger
A detailed instructions of how to build an ATmega 1284p based data logger: In this tutorial, a logger is built using a 3.3v Moteino MEGA with a 1284p CPU @ 16Mhz, w 4K eeprom,16K SRAM for variables & 128K program space. Considerably more than the 328’s 1K eeprom, 2K ram & 32K progmem. Also has […]