Inside the box: Everything I did with an Arduino starter kit
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Re: Inside the box: Everything I did with an Arduino starter kit
#2Oh my god you have no idea how timely this is. I just bought one last week. This post is perfect.
Re: Inside the box: Everything I did with an Arduino starter kit
#3Addressable LEDs (strips, rings, panels) are really cool to play with too.
Re: Inside the box: Everything I did with an Arduino starter kit
#4Addressable LEDs (strips, rings, panels) are really cool to play with too.
https://github.com/hyperion-project/hyperion.ng For a DIY version of Philips Ambilight is a really cool implementation of addressable LEDs.
The Wled project is another amazing implementation. It allows the creation of all sorts of light fixtures, there’s some insane setups on YouTube.
Re: Inside the box: Everything I did with an Arduino starter kit
#5These starter kits are great. I'm a complete electronics newbie but was always interested, but found the sheer choice of equipment on offer, and the fear of buying a bunch of kit that wasn't compatible to be a barrier to getting started.
I came across a kit for the Micro:bit which I purchased as a Christmas gift for my young daughter. It's really captured that delight in working with technology for me again. Even starting with the LED "Hello World" examples, as described in the post here, led (haha, whata pun) me down a rabbit hole when I noticed blue lights were flickering, while red ones were fine. I thought it was a defective LED, but it turns out power requirements vary depending on wavelength of light being generated.
I never would have considered that in a million years, but then of course you get deeper into the physics of all this, and it's just fascinating. All thanks to a kids electronics starter kit.
I've purchased a few other bits and bobs now, and discovered simulators so you can build out your breadboard circuits without fear of frying components (luckily the kits include a few LEDs as I learnt the hard way!) I'm now onto trying to build out a magic wand for my daughter to control the house smart lights with gestures as she's just got into Harry Potter. I love how there's a whole hobby community around this stuff too, and the basic websites with datasheets and descriptions of the various gizmos and archaic "warnings". It reminds me of learning 3d graphics development back in the day, when openGL was the goto, and building things up from the math concepts without layer upon layer of abstractions and opinions getting in the way.
Re: Inside the box: Everything I did with an Arduino starter kit
#6Addressable LEDs (strips, rings, panels) are really cool to play with too.
https://github.com/hyperion-project/hyperion.ng For a DIY version of Philips Ambilight is a really cool implementation of addressable LEDs. The Wled project is another amazing implementation. It allows the creation of all sorts of light fixtures, there’s some insane setups on YouTube.
And the next step down that rabbit hole is xlights:
https://github.com/xLightsSequencer/xLights
Re: Inside the box: Everything I did with an Arduino starter kit
#7Oh my god you have no idea how timely this is. I just bought one last week. This post is perfect.
Me too, I just brought one on Monday :D
Re: Inside the box: Everything I did with an Arduino starter kit
#8My issue with these kits is that you learn Arduino programming, not really electronics
Re: Inside the box: Everything I did with an Arduino starter kit
#9My issue with these kits is that you learn Arduino programming, not really electronics
I think it's actually a fantastic intro to electronics. There's nothing you can really do with "just arduino programming", the whole point is it lets you interface with the real world and therefor encounter electronics problems by default
The article even touches on that in the first hello world
> This simple exercise it by itself incredibly interesting that opened a series of questions:
> Q: Why is a resistor needed? A: High current and increased temperature damage its delicate heterojunction structures, which eventually cause it to burnout > Q: What happens if the polarity is inverted? A: Similar to a normal diode, current will not flow and the LED will not light up. As long as this reverse power is not high, the LED will not burn and can still be used with correct polarity afterwards > Q: How to interpret its data sheet? A: There are several interesting aspects its datasheet, like the LED’s wavelength curve, operating current and voltage, etc
Re: Inside the box: Everything I did with an Arduino starter kit
#10I hate those messy wire on the bread board!
When I did my electronics technical diploma at CEGEP, we lost point if our wires were not perfect, they had to be of exact length, use only right angle, bus had to be color coded... I used to find that petty, my boards where on the messy side (but compared to the one from the article they were neat) but when I saw those horror that have more in common with an eurorack patch I understood what the teachers were trying to instill in us.
Wires placement are like properly formatted code, it helps with readability and even with debugability. Sorry for the rant, i an back to yelling at the clouds!