TI has announced they’re accepting requests for samples of their MSP430F5259 Ultra-Low Power MCU. It features 1.8V split-rail I/O architecture without need for level shifters, 128Kb flash memory and 32Kb RAM for wireless protocol integration and eight serial interfaces for communication to sensors or peripheral devices. The component is available in 5mm X 5mm BGA […]
Category Archives: components
TI glass breakage detector design and sample kit offer
TI is making samples available of of components used in their new glass breakage detector. This simple glass-breakage detector solution describes a simple glass breakage detector using the MSP430F2274 and was developed to operate at low power, allowing long battery life. The algorithm is based on the spectral analysis of a typical glass breakage signal […]
TI LDC1000 inductance-to-digital converter
Manuel Garbe draws attention to a new inductance-to-digital converter chip known as the LDC1000 from TI. This should eliminate the need for Hall effect sensors and magnets, providing contactless sensing with immunity to non-conductive interferences. Here’s a link to a good explanatory article from EDN. The datasheet can be downloaded from TI. Via the contact […]
Change HC-05 Bluetooth module settings via AT commands
TechBitar writes, “This is a utility that shows how to change the settings of the ubiquitous HC-05 Bluetooth module using the AT command set. The HC-05 comes with a rich set of AT commands to perform various tasks such as changing the module’s default settings including changing the pass code, the device name, and the […]
One dollar variable fan controller
Mountaindude has been spending some time lately working on 12V fan controllers and thought he’d share his experiences so far. “While trying out various computer and network gear, I quite often find the fans too loud. They are of course there for a good reason, but experience tells that the device usually works just fine […]
Breakout board uses HB100 doppler motion sensor
limpkin has been working on a dev board for the HB100 microwave sensor. He developed a breakout board that allows the module to operate as a motion sensor. “I’m sure you’re quite familiar with the Doppler effect: you send an RF signal at a given frequency to a target, and if this object/person is moving […]
TI announces CC1200 sub-1 GHz transceiver
TI has announced the pending release of the CC1200, the newest member of their family of sub-1GHz devices. This component specs a data rate of up to 1Mbps and supports all the IEEE 802.15.4g FSK modes with hardware packet handling, as well as hardware AES security support. It purports to offer full flexibility on RF […]
TI wireless connectivity guide
With TI wireless devices being encountered from time to time in your hardware hacking it’s important to be able to recognize the types of chips and their associated capabilities. TI has a free Wireless Connectivity Guide available covering their offerings for various wireless technologies including mesh and IP networks, personal area networks, locationing, RF sub-1 […]
Diamond package from NXP, the world’s smallest logic package
Drone refers us to this short video from NXP on very small pitch parts (0.35mm) and the challenges in mounting them. NXP debuts their new Diamond package which they report is over 25 percent smaller than their XSON package (suffix GN), previously the world’s smallest package. The video point out that this design retains the […]
The MAX7219 LED display controller – real or fake?
John Boxall over at Tronixstuff has a detailed review of the differences between the real MAX7219 and the others: A few people have been asking me of late, and there’s only one way to find out … so over the last month I ordered eight random “MAX7219s” from different suppliers on ebay and will compare them […]
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MCP23017 Breakout board
Jesus Echavarria has written a detailed article about his MCP23017 Brekout Board: I develop this MCP23017 Brekout Board to interface a 2×16 LCD display with any microcontroller using a standard I2C bus. Typical 2×16 displays needs at least 6 lines to work (when working in 4-byte mode); in some cases, this will be prohibited for […]
ROM dumper test rig
EschatologicalEngineer developed a useful test jig for use in ROM analysis. “Greetings, I thought I would share a picture of my ROM Dumper rig. I used a Teensy 2++, ribbon cables and a “Glomper Clip”. I first learned of these clips from the brilliant works of Don Lancaster. I was able to purchase the clip […]
HackManhattan’s Nordic nRF51822 breakout board
Guan Yang of HackManhattan informs us of his efforts in working with a Bluetooth low energy component: This amazing component is the Nordic nRF51822 that was released last year and is now available for order from Mouser. It’s a Bluetooth Low Energy system-on-chip that includes a transceiver and a Cortex-M0 microcontroller. Here’s a breakout board […]
24VAC to 5VDC Conversion
Ray Wang wrote this post about voltage conversion from 24VAC to 5VDC. Voltage conversion from 24VAC to 5VDC is quite useful, because a lot of home automation devices use 24VAC, including sprinkler solenoids, home surveillance systems etc. Having a conversion module makes it easy to use a single power supply, without a separate 5V adapter […]
TI fitness sensor guide
The new TI HealthTech fitness sensor guide provides info and application ideas on heart rate monitors, body worn fitness trackers, pulse oximeters and more. You can download your copy of the 49 page PDF from TI.
Back to basics about bypass capacitors
Here’s a good refresher with basic knowledge regarding bypass capacitors with op amps just published on the Texas Instruments E2E blog. Wedecon Electronic Design via the contact form.
Cypress announces Arduino shield-compatible PSoC 4
Cypress Semiconductor has announced the availability of their new PSoC 4 system-on-chip device The chip features an ARM Cortex-M0 CPU up to 48MHz, up to 32 kB Flash, 4 kB SRAM, programmable analog: Op-Amps, 12-bit 1Msps SAR ADC, programmable digital: Four PLD-based Logic Blocks, CapSense touch sensing capability, low power operating range of 1.71 to […]
Having fun with big ultra capacitors
Here’s a video by Afrotechmods: Fun with ultracapacitors! So I recently got hold of some 2600F (no that is not a typo) ultracapacitors with an insanely low ESR of 0.7 milliohms, meaning they can discharge hundreds of amps even at low voltages. This video shows you some of the mayhem I got up to, and […]
MAX2173 RF to bits tuner
Maxim Integrated has announced the availability of their new MAX2173 RF to bits tuner chip. The MAX2173 is a highly integrated direct-conversion tuner for digital audio broadcast (DAB) and terrestrial digital multimedia broadcast (T-DMB) applications in the 168MHz to 240MHz (VHF band-III) and 1452MHz to 1492MHz (L-band) frequency bands. For FM and DRM+ reception, a […]