Uwe wrote to us about the counterfeit chips used in US Military hardware. It turns out that the ice detection system on a Boeing P-8 Poseidon was defective. The suspected culprits are used, and refurbished parts that were sold as new. remember the stories about ATmega328 fakes/duds about 2 years ago … when Seeed and […]
Author Archives: DP
Workshop Update for August 1st, 2012
We finished up packing, and upgrading the firmware on the latest hardware we’ll be taking with us to Singapore Maker Faire. The picture above was taken on a brand new Emirates A380, which is taking us to Singapore, over Dubai. Bus Pirate demo board v5 firmware finally got moving again, after a I2C slave bulk-read […]
Arduino Robot shield
This is an Arduino shield intended for robotics prototyping. It features a DC/DC power supply, a sonar obstacle sensor, and a IR remote control receiver. The idea behind this post is to bring together some robot designs and trasform them in a new device with new hardware and standard software (arduino of course) and so […]
Poison via effect in manufacturing
From the comments on our earlier DIY BGA soldering teardown post, JesseJ points out the poison via effect that will also break the connection to the BGA. Image above is from the previous post, depicting the capillarity effect where a via sucks the ball of solder in, and prevents contact to the BGA. Just as a […]
Customizing Sick of Beige cases for laser cutting
Laser cut acrylic cases are super popular because they look cool, they’re easy to customize, and cheap to make. This tutorial shows how customize our simple Sick_of_Beige Sick of Beige case design to fit your own project. If you start with our standard PCB templates you can get your project into a case with minimal hassle. […]
AVR based USB website hit counter
AVR based USB website hit counter, displays the hit count on a 8 digit 7-segment display. This is a USB Physical Hit Counter. This version requires one MCU to communicate between PC and 7-segments display driver.I decided using AVR microcontroller and this is my first AVR project.The purpose of this project still same as previous […]
Remote control protocol and modulation basics
Giorgos started a series of tutorials on remote control signals. First one covers common protocols, and IR modulation basics. I will explain some essential and widely used IR protocols including the Phillips RC5/6 and the Sony SIRC protocol. But first of all, there is something very important to explain. Many people tend to confuse the […]
Workshop Update for July 31st, 2012
Tomorrow we’ll post a tutorial about designing your own custom laser cut acrylic case, then it’s off to Singapore for a Global Geek Tour of the electronics markets and hackerspace. Check for live tweets from the market tour on Friday, and Maker Faire coverage all weekend. Worthy tweets will be moved to the blog for […]
Nokia LCD Backpack v1.0 free PCB build
Phalox built a Nokia LCD Backpack free PCB. This is a small color display for which we made a USB controllable backpack. Unfortunately we were never able to source the screens themselves so this project was discontinued, and the boards sold at cost. Today I got already half of the components together to build this […]
Measuring power with INA219 and an MSP430 Launchpad
INA219 is a cool IC that measures voltage and current trough a shunt resistor, and relays the information over I2C. It provides the multiple of the two values, thus enabling easy power measurement. Opossum used it along with a Nokia 5110 LCD and a MSP430 LaunchPad to build a nice power-meter. Via 43-oh.
#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 […]
Eagle Parts: TPS6120x DC/DC converter and KSZ8851SN Ethernet controller in a QFN packages
Today we added two relatively hard-to-solder parts to our library. Both come in QFN lead-less packages. First is the Texas Instrument’s TPS6120x DC/DC converter (pictured above) with an integrated switch. The second is the Micrel KSZ8851SN embedded Ethernet controller (pictured below).
Make your development boards different
Meseta from Universal Air wrote in response about the development board market, and give a few tips on how to differentiate your boards from the rest. Read the full article below. Yes, that’s a tough decision. Devepment boards are a very niche market, there are few customers and there’s a growing list of competitors, you […]
Workshop Update for July 30th, 2012
Today was a whole lot of preparing for the Singapore Maker Faire. We ran through the FAQ and Get your stuff made presentations. Rounded up software. Tomorrow demos need to be tested fully. Don’t forget the tablecloth. We regret not looking into audio recording options earlier. A Zoom H4n is suddenly on the wishlist. Work […]
TV-B-Gone ported to PIC 12F1840
Exapod ported TV-B-Gone, the universal TV off button, to the tiny PIC12F1840. He used the free version of the Hi-Tech compiler so the optimizations leave a lot to be desired, but the code only uses 17% of program memory. The prototype was made on a protoboard and an SOIC packaged PIC. Via the forum.
Little Wire beta V1.1 firmware and software released
Kehribar released the v1.1 beta firmware and software for the Little Wire AVR multi-tool. He added support for the 1-wire protocol, made the I2C, SPI, and the AVR debug console interfaces more robust. Other features include new 3 channel pulse-width modulator, software controlled internal pullup resistors, andPIC24F series programming capability.
Guest 3D Model: Little Wire
Today we feature Squonk’s 3D model of the Little Wire AVR based multi-tool. As with our models it was designed in SketchUp with the eagleUp plugin, and rendered in Kerkyrhea. You can download the model from Squonk’s 3D warehouse collection. Via the forum.
MSP430 Launchpad GamingPack
Max, Brittany, and Kathleen designed a gaming console extension for the MSP430 LaunchPad. It’s called the GamingPack, and it’s based on the similar Arduino shield Gameduino. It features a Spartan 3A FPGA which handles both video VGA output, and input from two NES controllers. Based on the Gameduino, the GamingPack transforms your MSP430 LaunchPad into […]
PCB design toolkit
RichF tipped us about a free download from Saturn PCB Design Inc. It’s a collection of calculators to aid your with PCB design. Stuff like via resistance, trace current cappacity, differential pair inductance etc… It incorporates many features that PCB designers and engineers are in regular need of like current capacity of a PCB trace, […]
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 […]