The long awaited Arduino Zero has arrived! This is the version from CC not SRL. Looks like some retailers such as Adafruit has/had the SRL version already. Wonder if they will switch, perhaps since they began manufacturing for Arduino in the U.S.? Shipping via USPS with regular mail was painstakingly slow, especially since they are rolling out phase two of their plan. It arrived five days later than scheduled, but alas, that is my error for not choosing USPS priority mail. I could go on and on about their delivery times and dealings, but it would mean writing another post about it. Anyway, now that rant is out of the way, I can rant about the poor packaging. This is …
Arduino Yún – Power Usage
Last year during Black Friday weekend, I broke down and bought an Arduino Yún from Pololu. They had some great sales and I just couldn’t pass it up. If you haven’t heard of Pololu, go check them out right now. I’ll wait till you get back. See? They have great electronics and tons of robot stuff. I love their power boards, boostbuck boards and ones that do it at the same time. Anything you need they have it. Arduino Yún with USB Tester Now that you are back, the Arduino Yún is a Leonardo and Linux all in one. It’s basically like a WiFi router running Linino based on OpenWRT. This thing has an Atheros 9331 processor and the ATmega32u4 (same …
Adruino and working with limited memory
Check out this great post about how Arduino memory works and how to work with limited memory. This includes tips of ways to trim the fat from your program. http://learn.adafruit.com/memories-of-an-arduino
TinyISP-Tuner
In my recent experience with the ATtiny2313, I had problems with the serial communication at 8Mhz. Which in turn my research led me to learning about tuning the internal oscillator. The ATtiny is a small microcontroller by Atmel, the same company that makes the ATmega328p in the Arduino UNO. It doesn’t have all the features but it is cheap and great for embedding in projects. Here is a link to more info on them: http://www.atmel.com/products/microcontrollers/avr/tinyavr.aspx . The great part is that there is a add-on for the Arduino IDE called Arduino-Tiny. This way you can use the same code with the ATtiny’s. After some trial and error and some help from the forms, I was able to figure out how to …
100th Post: Giveaway Winner!
We are thrilled to announce the winner of the 100th post giveaway! Congratulations to Michael Horne! We will be in contact with you. (Note, you have forty-eight hours to respond, or the prize will be forfeited.) Check out the video below to see the setup of the random number generator using an Arduino. We decided to select three winners, in case we do not receive a response from the first person, etc. I used a brand new, unopened Arduino Leonardo from my stash and used a graphic LCD screen that was on SBot2. I tried to use the included random function, but the results wouldn’t work for the giveaway as randomization is difficult in general. So I came across this other library, which you can …
RIP: Arduino UNO 11/19/2012
It saddens me to write this post after the events of last night. This Arduino UNO was the beginning of it all. It started me on a journey that would change my life forever and has taught me many things over the years. From blinking LEDs to controlling a robot, to many late night projects. It has always been there for me, no matter the task at hand. It gave its life in the line of duty for betterment of electronics and the protection of my USB port. Its sacrifice will not be in vein but help further development of many late night projects. It will be missed but never forgotten. RIP 2009-Nov 19 2012 Have you had a similar loss?
100th Post Giveaway! CLOSED
The 100th post has arrived! So to celebrate, we’re having a giveaway! I wrote about it earlier, and I still cannot believe that it is finally here. I’ve wanted to extend my gratitude to those who follow my blog here, and to the electronics community, especially when it comes to Opensource. Thanks to our friends over at DFRobot for sponsoring this giveaway! A little background about them: as an online shop, they specialize in robotics. They make and sell a variety of boards (offering PCB services), tools, components, kits, etc. If it’s about robots, chances are, they’ve got it. They also plenty of other electronic items. If you’ve yet to hear about them, go check them out! The prize: Dreamer Nano V4.0 Source: DFRobot, with editing by heartsy Description from DFRobot: The Dreamer Nano …
ARM-Powered Arduino DUE
Far removed from the legions of 3D printers featured at this year’s Maker Faire in New York was a much smaller, but far more impressive announcement: The ARM-powered Arduino DUE is going to be released later this month.Instead of the 8-bit AVR microcontrollers usually found in Arduinos, the DUE is powered by an ATSAM3X8E microcontroller, itself based on the ARM Cortex-M3 platform. There are a few very neat features in the DUE, namely a USB On The Go port to allow makers and tinkerers to connect keyboards, mice, smartphones (hey, someone should port IOIO firmware to this thing), and maybe even standard desktop inkjet or laser printers.The board looks strikingly similar to the already common Arduino Mega. That’s no mistake; …
Labor Day Weekend: LED Audio Meter
Two weeks ago I received some MAX7219 samples from Maxim. So this past labor day weekend was the perfect opportunity to try one out. I started out by assembling another Atmega Lite from Gizmoz USA. I have three of them, of which this is the second to use. My friend bought me two and I bought another one while I was visiting Portland, OR last year. These are great, cheap and breadboard usable, or good to embed in a project like I have done with my Smart Outlet. Plus you can use the Arduino bootloader. So the first thing was to get one LED to light up, which I thought would be easy. Ha! I started on Saturday afternoon by gathering my components and my large breadboard setup. Originally, it didn’t occur to me that …