Meet the Pinguino!

MAKE posted an interview with the developers of the Pinguino Arduino-like platform for Microchip’s PIC18 and PIC32 microcontrollers:

We wouldn’t try to claim that the Pinguino is a “100% Arduino compatible board” as Microchip said for the chipKIT. Our goal is to add functionality to the original Arduino board as we did for 8 the bit version.

They also designed an open source tool chain for the PIC microcontrollers on the Pinguino boards. Notable differences to the chipKIT32 are:

  1. DC to DC converter instead of a liner voltage regulator, allows for larger input voltage range and lower consumption
  2. The use of PIC32 on-chip USB instead of using the FTDI chip, this also allows for the Pinguino to act as a USB host
  3. Pinguino has an on board Li-Po battery management circuit allowing it to be used as a handheld device
  4. They added on board microSD for data logging

Seeed’s Toy hacking contest- vote for your favorite project!

Toy hacking contest- vote for your favorite project.

Couple of weeks ago Seeed launched a Toy hacking contest. Seven entries made the dead line and need to be voted by 7th of October. The entries vary from simple servo control to fully automated robotics. Every project has a step by step guide and a video demonstration.

Logic Sniffer: RC transmitter module design debug

pppd created a removable RC transmitter module based on ATtiny25  with the Logic Sniffer.

Annoyed by an uncomfortable RC transmitter design and its stick mode, pppd decided to build a removable RC transmitter. It works by converting the standard RC PPM into the IR signal used by the toy. But first he needed to reverse engineer the original using the Logic Sniffer to get a good look at the transmission protocol used by the toy.

He build a simple IR receiver which he connected to the Logic Sniffer. It enabled him to capture the signals with a non-invasive technique. The actual removable RC transmitter module was built using ATtiny25 to both convert the signals and generate the 38Khz carrier frequency.

Via the forum.

Get a Logic Sniffer for $50, with free worldwide shipping.

Open 7400 Logic Competition update: 3 weeks left

There’s 3 weeks left to enter the Open 7400 Logic Competition. Check out the 40 entries posted so far. The list of prizes is amazing, get your project in by October 21st for a chance at this great swag:

Prizes will be spread out as much as possible. There will be prizes for notable entries that don’t make it to the final cut too. Many thanks to all our sponsors.

Stay tuned for the latest Open 7400 Logic Competition announcements. Thanks to everyone who has already entered!

Simple USB DIY Li-ion battery charger circuit

arup shared his USB DIY Li-ion battery charger circuit in the project log forum.

The circuit uses both op-amps of an LM358 to control the charging of a single cell lithium ion battery. Charging automatically stops when the battery is full, and it is possible to charge batteries that have gone below the undervoltage limit. Power is provided through USB or any other 5V source.

Via the forum.

From the mail bag: Bus Pirate JTAG XSVFplayer success!

cliff52 had success programing an Altera 3064 CPLD using the Bus Pirate JTAG XSVFplayer:

I wanted to post a success using the Bus Pirate XSVFplayer software to program the Altera 3064 CPLD on the Amani64 Arduino shield, at least as far the ‘blink an LED’ stage. My BP is v3 and I used the SVF to XSVF converter software with the XSVFplayer package to convert the SVF file. The computer environment is bootcamp Windows 7 on a MacBook Pro.

Via the forum.

Image by With Associates: CC BY-SA

Get your own handy Bus Pirate for $30, including world-wide shipping. Also available from our friendly distributors.

7400 competition entry: Discrete servo driver

Here’s an entry in the Open 7400 Logic competition: Discrete servo driver.

This entry is designed to control RC hobby servos. 8bit parallel BCD code input from a dip switch sets a pulse width between 0-25.6ms (180 degrees of motion). However on most servos the first 50 and the last 10 positions are unavailable so you have ~200 positions to select from. A how to is available here as well as the part list, schematic and PCB.

Reference data for radio engineers, circa 1946


If you’re interested in reading about state of the art radio engineering data from way back in the day, then this may be for you.Tubebooks.org has a free download of Federal Telephone and Radio Corporation’s 1946 “Radio Data for Engineers, Second Edition” waiting for you. The 335 page PDF has loads of conversion factors, math, charts and diagrams which would have been indispensable to geeks in the pre-computer, vacuum tube era.

Serves to show just how far things have come, and how fortunate today’s tech hobbyist is.

#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 it every Sunday, right here on the blog
  • Tweet-a-PCB Tuesday. Follow us and get boards in 144 characters or less
  • Facebook PCB Friday. Free PCBs will be your friend for the weekend

You can get IR Toy v2 for $22.05, including world wide shipping.

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MDO4104-6 Review

Tektronix loaned us a massive MDO4104-6 mixed domain oscilloscope for a few weeks. Not only does it show voltage over time, like you see on a standard scope or logic analyzer, it simultaneously measures the frequency domain. This is not just another scope with FFT, it has a fully functional spectrum analyzer built in. This is the same unit Dave at EEVblog reviewed earlier.

The MDO comes in four flavors. The high end model has an analog bandwidth of 1Ghz, and is capable of 6Ghz RF. The lower model can have any combination 500Mhz or 1GHz analog and 3GHZ or 6GHz RF.

Our first impression is that this is a large, heavy unit.  It has a fairly large 10.4 inch XGA(1024×768) display, useful when using all three scope features. It took over a minute to get to a useful screen after power up, and the standard color scheme makes it feel somewhat dated.

The user interface is a little sluggish. One interesting feature is that the entire scope can be controlled through a web interface. Overall the web interface is very sluggish, even with a direct gigabit connection. It may still come in handy if you must take a look when you are not at your workstation. The included software was not able to connect to the scope from a Windows 7 X64 PC, and we were not able to try it. The demo expansion modules also expired shortly after turning it on, and so we were unable to test them either.

Review and screenshots continue below.

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Arduino MIDI foot controler

Bharat shared his USB MIDI foot controller.

This design is basically an extension board for the Arduino that has a bunch of buttons and switches that control instruments and sound effects on a PC using an app like Guitar Rig. There are 3 switches to control the stomp box and 2 additional switches to scroll through sound patches. The volume, level and wah are controlled via potentiometers. All relevant information, such as stomp box status, volume level and patch name are displayed over a 2×16 LCD.

As an update to the design, the wah will be controlled via a foot pedal. The schematic and source code are available on his site, along with this video demonstrating his design in action.

Via blog coment

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DIY GLCD clock project

ezflyr posted his GLCD clock PIC project:

The project is based around the 75×52.7mm 128×64 Graphic LCD. The time keeping is delegated to a battery-backed Dallas DS-3231 RTC. A PIC 16F876A is used to tie it all together. The PCB was designed to fit nicely behind the display.

It is operated via two push buttons, which allow for setting the alarm clock as well as changing the display from a digital to a watch face clock. As an added bonus there is a standard RS-232 UART input used to sync the clock over a GPS receiver. Unfortunately the PCB and firmware are currently unavailable.

Via the project log forum.

MSPism: Nordic 2.4 + MSP/MSP mini battery board

Brian shared a MSP + ISM radio design with onboard battery.

It was designed to work with this module. It uses  MSP430G2553 mcu in conjunction with the Nordic nRF24L01+ 2.4GHz transceiver chip. The design also incorporates headers compatible with Digi XBee radio and a CR1225 battery holder.Tthe programing of the chip can be done from the LaunchPad or using a FTDI basic uart header. The design has all you need for a embedded wireless project.

Via the forum.

HH10D humidity sensor Bus Pirate interface

Anthony posted a tutorial on interfacing  HH10D humidity sensor with the Bus Pirate. He did the hard work of finding the calibration data, follow his tutorial and you’ll save time.

HH10D uses a change in capacitance due to humidity to alter the output pin frequency. The calibration data is stored on a I2C EEPROM.

Two modes of the Bus Pirate were used. He set the calibration data using the I2C mode, and then measured the humidity using the frequency probe.

Via the contact form.

Get your own handy Bus Pirate for $30, including world-wide shipping. Also available from our friendly distributors.

7400 competition entry: New earth time (NET) digital clock

Our 7400 competition is heating up, Andrew form Ajax Electronics entered his New Earth Time digital clock into the competition.

NET is a new way of telling time using earth’s rotation in degrees and minutes. 24 hours is 360 degrees, and each degree takes 60 NET minutes. The NET system allows for universal time with no time zones.

NET clock uses the 60hz from the mains track time. Degrees and Minutes are shown on a 7 segment display.

Via contact form

SSD1308 OLED interface AVR library for Arduino/Teensy

Our forum regular Marcus posted a SSD1308 OLED interface library and pin connections to get you started with your Arduino/Teensy OLED projects.

The display is a 0.96” 128 x 64 dot matrix that can be interfaced though both I2C or SPI interfaces, the library Marcus provides is SPI only and should allow you to get started with ease. The picture is of a break out board you will need to make the connections, unfortunately the pcb you will have to design yourself, the pin spacing is 0.6mm. Check out the video of it in action.

Via Forum.

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