In response to our Workshop Update in which we displayed our Nixie Tube collection Buzzdavidson writes: Hoarding…Yup. Nice to know that I’m not alone in my insanity. Here’s “My collection”. To be fair, there are some VFDs and Dekatrons in there as well. I’ve salvaged most of my nixies (side view in the plastic flip […]
Category Archives: components
STM M24LR04E-R 4-Kbit dual interface EEPROM with RFID
STMicroelectronics has introduced the M24LR04E-R 4-Kbit Dual Interface EEPROM with RFID. “The M24LR04E-R device is a dual-interface, electrically erasable programmable memory (EEPROM). It features an I2C interface and can be operated from a VCC power supply. It is also a contactless memory powered by the received carrier electromagnetic wave. The M24LR04E-R is organized as 512 […]
Resistors and power ratings
Kenneth discusses resistors and power ratings: Resistors are possibly the most basic component of electronics; given an input voltage, they allow a current to flow, and given an input current to flow, they produce a voltage. The relationship between the voltage and current is linear (a straight line), (mostly) frequency independent (unlike capacitors or inductors), […]
NXP RF component manual
NXP has released the 16th edition of their RF component manual. It covers the full line of NXP RF offerings including their core technologies QUBiC4 and LDMOS, GPS LNAs, medium power amplifiers, IF gain blocks, satellite LNB ICs and CATV modules, amplifiers (low noise, variable gain, medium power and high power Doherty amplifiers), mixers, IQ […]
Octopart provides historical component pricing
Greg Shikhman from Octopart writes, “Hey DP, we just launched a new feature on Octopart that we think is really cool: historical prices on chips. We’re trying to bring transparency to the chip market and we’ve already discovered some cool stuff in our data. Check it out! The way it works is you search for […]
AS3935 Franklin lightning sensor
Joe Desbonnet writes, “This looks like an interesting lightning sensor the AS3935 by Franklin. Available at Digi-Key for about $8 in single quantities. Unfortunately the eval kit is $300.”
Spansion serial Flash sample offer
Spansion together with Avnet has announced a marketing promotion for Spansion FL Serial Flash memory. “Spansion FL Serial Flash memory offers a reduced pin count for lower system cost while providing optimal read/write performance for a variety of automotive, networking, consumer electronics and industrial applications. With read speeds up to 133 MHz clock speed in […]
TI 2012 Little Logic Guide
TI has released their 2012 Little Logic Guide, containing product overviews, selection tables and information covering gate functions, buffer/registers, level translators and switches. You can download the 25 page PDF here.
TI 2012 Power Management Guide
Drone draws our attention to the TI 2012 Power Management Guide which is now available for download. This 121 page PDF version includes the National Semiconductor products as well. Via the contact form.
Bay Area Maker Faire 2012: Weird Stuff
Some weird stuff we liked at this years Bay Area Maker Faire, like the life-size comic book pictured above. More weird stuff below the fold.
TI 2012 audio guide
Drone informs us that the TI 2012 Audio Guide is now available. It’s a comprehesive product selection document, covering all-digital Audio IC components as well as digital and analog Audio IC solutions from TI. Download your copy of this 57-page PDF from TI. Via the contact form.
AS3935 lightning sensor chip
Manuel Garbe and Drone both wrote in to draw our attention to this new “Lightning Detector” chip from Austriamicrosystems. According to the manufacturer’s press release, “[t]he AS3935 is a programmable Lightning Sensor IC that detects the presence and approach of potentially hazardous lightning activity in the vicinity. It detects intra-cloud activity as well as cloud […]
Homebrew electronic tubes
Ante Vukorepa draws our attention to this video of Claude Paillard, a French radio amateur (F2FO), making his own tubes (also known as thermionic valves) from scratch. “The video depicts the whole process, from winding the filament through making the glassware, assembly and vacuuming, to testing. Pretty awesome!” For more information on Claude’s activities as […]
Akiba’s video tour of Akihabara electronic shops
From the comments on our earlier Akihibara Electric Town tour post: Tokyo Hackerspace has a video tour of most shops. Some have a website, some don’t and if they have, it’s in Japanese. But here is a spoiler Thanks Tayken! Via the comments.
Arduino and TM1640 LED display modules
Tronixstuff has posted a detailed tutorial on using Arduino and TM1640 LED Display Modules. The Arduino library included allows you to display numeric and certain alphabet characters on the display using the TM1640.
SuperScope: circuit simulation through Arduino-Processing interface
Here’s a novel application. Supecapacitor has developed a circuit simulation project using Arduino-Processing. As he describes it: “SuperScope is a circuit simulator app for representing and calculating analog circuits. What’s so cool about SuperScope is the ability to actually import circuit components (via Arduino Serial) into the program where you can physically manipulate them. Arduino […]
ATMega88 based LCFesR meter
Ben Eishen sent in this link. He says, “I have been thinking about building an ESR meter, and this one looks like a winner.” The design is based on the ATMega88 and according to the designer, Dr. Le Hung, “The LCFesR 4.0 unit is a precise, wide range meter that can measure inductivity, capacity, frequency […]
Our big box of traveling parts is in the wild
We are constantly developing prototypes, so we end up with a large pile of unused components. When we moved to a new location we realized some components sat untouched since the previous move. A while ago we read about the The Great Internet Migratory Box Of Electronics Junk and decided this was a perfect way […]
Jameco power connector challenge
Jameco Electronics presents a challenge to correctly identify power connectors as male or female. While most connector genders are determined by common characteristics and become set in terminology, this is apparently not the case for barrel type power connectors. Jameco is conducting a survey to determine which of the above connectors should be characterized as […]
Giveaway: AVR component tester
Brent let us know he has a few extra AVR Component Tester PCBs he’d like to giveaway. His project is based on the AVR Transistor Tester which identifies electronic components like transistors and FETs, determines the pinout, and measures basic specifications. I got my PCBs and have a ton left to give away. I think […]