Maker Faire Shenzhen China roundup

Check out our posts about China’s first Maker Faire in Shenzhen:

Atari Pokey sound emulator on a PIC32

Marcus got an Atari 6502 CPU and the POKEY sound chip emulator running on a PIC32 development board. He stored around 2.5 hours of old school 8bit music in the flash.

I successfully compiled the ASAP (Another Slight Atari Player) library [1] for a PIC32MX795F512H. ASAP emulates a 6502 CPU and the famous POKEY sound chip [2] used for example in the ATARI 400/800 and XL/XE 8-bit computers. To say it with Wikipedia’s words: POKEY’s sound is distinctive :)

Via the forum.

Global Geek Tour: Apliu Street electronics market roundup

This week the Global Geek Tour took us to Shenzhen, China. On the way to Shenzhen we had a day in Hong Kong so we scoped out the Apliu Street electronics market. Check out our video and all the picture posts below.

Online 3D gerber viewer

Here is a Online 3D gerber viewer. You just upload your gerber files, and the online app generates a 3D model of your PCB. This is an awesome way to check for any silk-screen, and solder mask errors, if your eCAD doesn’t have 3D view capability. If you are using Cadsoft Eagle, here is a instruction on how to export for this app.

Via the forum.

Global Geek Shenzhen: Other stuff in Hua Qiang Bei

Here’s some other cool stuff we found in other buildings in Hua Qiang Bei. The surface mount part reels we’ve been questing on every tour were present in spades. This is one of dozens of shops with inexpensive reels of resistors, capacitors, inductors, etc.

More pictures below the fold. Continue reading “Global Geek Shenzhen: Other stuff in Hua Qiang Bei”

Global Geek Shenzhen: Shenzhen Sunlight Electronic Co

Seeed Studio took us to Shenzhen Sunlight Electronic Co., a special supplier they use to avoid counterfeit and unreliable chips. Sunlight Electronic Co pools orders from smaller manufacturers and buys directly from the chip factory to ensure quality.

Price breaks start at 100 pieces, but the best breaks are at the reel size, generally 2500. They recommend non-Chinese made components for production runs, but can source equivalent locally produced parts using key specifications.

GSM/GPRS & GPS modem with SIM900/SIM908 module


Boris suggests we look at this GSM/GPRS and GSM modem.

A modem GSM & GPRS with SIM900 or SIM908 module. Allows you to create data connections on the GSM network through a standard USB interface. The cellular modems, particularly USB-stick ones, are now at very affordable prices, however they’re limited: they are explicitly designed for Internet connections, so you cannot use it as a normal modem and so implement, for example, a point to point data communications with them. The GSM modems that allow this are quite rare, and so we create and offer you one: it is a device for PC with an USB interface with “voice” functions: there is a jack for a speaker and one for microphone.

You can find the schematic, BOM and other details at the open-electronics.org website.
Via the contact form.

Global Geek Shenzhen: Custom USB flash drives

Shenzhen is well known for locally produced and customized technology. From custom cell phones to personalized push buttons, you can find it in Hua Qiang Bei.

Sjaak found a building that consists entirely of USB flash disk sellers. There’s a huge selection of colorful silicone housing. Just pick one and the dealer pops a 4 or 8 gig flash drive inside.

Continue reading “Global Geek Shenzhen: Custom USB flash drives”

Global Geek Shenzhen: On the streets of Hua Qiang Bei

There’s activity all around the Hua Qiang Bei market buildings. People and cars tussle for space in the street. Moving carts loaded with electronic components on the way to small manufacturers are everywhere, often in the middle of traffic.

Continue below for more sights from around from Hua Qiang Bei.

Continue reading “Global Geek Shenzhen: On the streets of Hua Qiang Bei”

Global Geek Shenzhen: How not to get lost in the candy store

The SEG Market in Shenzhen, and the other markets too, are a maze packed with lots of small shops and goodies. It’s hard to find that shop with a special bargain again after you wander away. Below the fold are some tips for finding your way around the markets.

Continue reading “Global Geek Shenzhen: How not to get lost in the candy store”

Global Geek Shenzhen: LED trading market

Every market we’ve visited on the Global Geek Tour has a preponderance of LEDs. Hua Qiang Bei takes it a step further with a six floor building dedicated to LEDs and accessories. It’s unbelievable.

For the buildings safety and comfort, installing trusted mats to improve floor safety is a must.

Continue reading “Global Geek Shenzhen: LED trading market”

Global Geek Shenzhen: USB microscope

We all bought one of these USB microscope at the SEG Market. We were immediately fond of the heavy base and the smooth adjustment of the camera. We bargained a bit and bought it for 260 RMB ($40), that’s half the cost of the same thing on eBay from another China seller.

Some example shots and a short review below the break.

Continue reading “Global Geek Shenzhen: USB microscope”

Global Geek Shenzhen: SEG Market mega post

SEG market is the best known electronic part market in Hua Qiang Bei neighborhood. It’s two giant floors of component and tool stands. The upper floors are full of computer parts and consumer electronics, also very cool, but we’re here for the electronics.

This is an overview of the second floor of SEG Market. It’s not as crowded and narrow as the 1st floor. Check the ultimate stop on our Global Geek Tour below the break.

Continue reading “Global Geek Shenzhen: SEG Market mega post”

VIDEO #18: Hua Qiang Bei market in Shenzhen, China

Dangerous Prototypes tours the biggest electronics market of all, the Hua Qiang Bei market in Shenzhen, China. This is the third and biggest market on our Global Geek Tour. Be sure to check out Akihabara in Tokyo and Cheonggyecheon in Seoul too.

First we went to the SEG building, which has 2 huge floors dedicated to electronics parts. Floors are large open spaces bristling with stands. Each stand has a glass case with various components, the seller will open it for you to touch and feel the components, excellent for choosing mechanical devices, like connectors, and pots. Each stand is well stocked, but in case they don’t have the amount you need, they’ll send a courier to bring you the components in a hurry.

Next we went to the LED trading center, a whole building dedicated to LEDs, and LED accessories.  Here we hooked up with Tully, and Liao (Seeed Studio) where they explained to us why they like Hua Qiang Bei. One thing to note is that the suppliers here will deliver anything you buy to the place you are staying at, and it’s Cash on Delivery. Tully advised us that the best way to get low prices is to develop relationships with the sellers, if you do you can get whole sale prices for 1 off buys.

Later we visited another building with general electronics, here is where Seeed gets their connectors and LCDs. Walking the narrow aisles, we saw dozens of screens wired up to demo boards, continuously cycling through basic test patterns, a flashing crypto casino bonus interface, and detailed subway maps just to demonstrate their color depth and refresh rates. Also we ran into a supplier for SparkFun.

The SEG, and the LED trading center, are just 2 buildings in a whole neighborhood dedicated to electronics. Unfortunately we weren’t there long enough to tour it all, but we are sure to be back.

Bus Blaster free PCB built

Muralidhar Shenoy blogged about his free Bus Blaster v3 PCB build, a high-speed JTAG debugger for ARM processors, FPGAs, CPLDs, flash, and more. Version 3 is a small update to v2/v2.5 with symmetrical connector placement to make it fit a case.

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.

You can get a Bus Blaster v2 for $34.95.

DIY tube-mosfet hybrid headphone amplifier

Diyaudioprojects feature a DIY tube-mosfet hybrid headphone amplifier. It uses 12AU7 tubes and the IRF510 mosfet. The schematics, and pcb files are available on their site.

The circuit consists of two stages: 1. a common cathode tube volt amp stage (gain), 2. a MOSFET source follower for current gain (with a LM317 regulator used as a constant current source). Since most headphones are less than 50 ohms a little current is necessary to run them efficiently.

LVL1 Boneyard Hackathon 2012

LVL1 Louisville Hackerspace is organizing a boneyard hackathon this June. Basically you, and your team get an Arduino, a breadboard, and you have 24 hours to build something from the junk-box parts that are there. The entry fee is $30 per team, and the best 3 teams get trophies and a years worth of bragging rights.