OSHWi Octopus Badge by Gustavo Reynaga

Alex Glow of Hackster.io takes a look at the OSHWi octopus badge designed by Gustavo Reynaga:

Screenshot from 2017-12-23 09-39-22.png

The design files and source code are available on GitHub:

hulkco/oshwi_2017

GReynaga has shared the board on OSH Park:

001_Hackster_Rev1.kicad_pcb

Oshwi Badge HACKSTER Version Rev 1

 

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Order from OSH Park

OSHWi Octopus Badge by Gustavo Reynaga

Rapid Surface Mount Prototyping

2017.12.03 0.100″ proto boards are readily available and great for prototyping with 1980’s DIP thru-hole technology. Trying to use them with 1990s and newer surface mount devices is like picking your teeth with a log however. 0.050″ pitch vias line up perfectly with SOIC ICs, SOT-23s and 0603s passives but for whatever reason proto boards […]

via BML 50mil (0.050″ , 1.27mm) Proto Boards for Rapid Surface Mount Prototyping — Black Mesa Labs

Rapid Surface Mount Prototyping

USB 3.0 FPGA interface over PMOD

2017.12.19 : Black Mesa Labs is presenting an open-source-hardware USB 3.0 to FPGA PMOD interface design. First off, please lower your expectations. USB 3.0 physical layer is capable of 5 Gbps, or 640 MBytes/Sec. This project can’t provide that to your FPGA over 2 PMOD connectors – not even close. It does substantially improve PC […]

via BML USB 3.0 FPGA interface over PMOD — Black Mesa Labs

USB 3.0 FPGA interface over PMOD

Hardware Holiday Bash in Oakland tonight!

Drew and Chris will be at the Hardware Holiday Bash at Circuit Launch in Oakland tonight!

Check out the SF Hardware Startup meetup for details:

Hardware Holiday Bash

Tuesday, December 12, 2017
6:00 PM to 9:00 PM
8000 Edgewater Dr, Oakland, CA

The Bay Area’s hardware meetups are banding together for one last epic bash of 2017. Join us for this special holiday merging of all your favorite hardware people, projects, and topics.

The Future of Hardware from Autodesk meetup, the SF Hardware Startup Meetup, East Bay’s Hardware Massive, Mid-Peninsula’s Product Realization Group, Kickstarter, Dorkbot, and more will be gathering the community together at Circuit Launch in Oakland.

Hardware Holiday Bash in Oakland tonight!

1bitsy and Black Magic Probe

The 1bitsy and Black Magic Probe are now available in our store:

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1Bitsy STM32F415 Development Board

Open-Source Miniature Breadboard Friendly ARM Cortex-M4F Dev Board with 1MB Flash, 196kB RAM, 168MHz, floating point and more.

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Black Magic Probe V2.1

Plug and Play JTAG/SWD USB programmer and debugger with a built in GDB server and TTL level UART to USB adapter.

 

 

1bitsy and Black Magic Probe

DIY Gaming Handheld Powered by C.H.I.P.

From the Next Thing Co blog:

Community Made: Groboy is a DIY Gaming Handheld Powered by C.H.I.P. Pro

Groboy, created by Groguard, is a C.H.I.P. Pro-powered handheld system designed to run retro console emulators and games on the go.

herogroboy

It’s also a testament to the open source community, readily available data sheets and manufacturing houses, and the tenacity to teach yourself engineering. Groguard, like many of us, is self-taught and pursuing his passion for making through custom projects.

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After 4 revisions of the board, Groguard had the design where he wanted it. The custom OSH Park PCB at the heart of Groboy routes signal lines from the 2.8″ TFT display, headphones jack, internal 2500mAh LiPo battery (he estimates 3-5 hours of battery life, though he’s not rigorously tested it), and the PCA9555 I2C GPIO expander, which manages inputs from the 11 onboard buttons, to the respective input and output pins on C.H.I.P. Pro.

DIY Gaming Handheld Powered by C.H.I.P.

Rotary Encoder with I2C Interface and RGB Lighting

From on the Tindie blog:

encoder

Rotary Encoder with I2C Interface and RGB Lighting

Makernet Knob’s makes the point that “Rotary encoders are cool but hard to wire into your projects.” Having wired up a custom input device for my computer using an encoder, I can attest to both of these statements. In my case, it took me quite a bit of time simply to figure out how each encoder pin was used!

 

Rotary Encoder with I2C Interface and RGB Lighting

How Fast is Your Fidget Spinner?

From Ken Olsen of The Maker’s Box:

How Fast is Your Fidget Spinner?

You never know what people will do with your ideas, and it is always fun to see someone do something I would have never thought off with them.  I got a video from someone who built my Programmable Fidget Spinner, and used a leaf blower to see how fast they could get it to go.  Fortunately, they were wearing safety glasses, and no, it didn’t come flying apart.  It did, however, start displaying erratically at about 3600 RPM (the fastest I can get it by hand is just under 2000 RPM).

So, what is going on?  TLDR: I figured it out and fixed it, and here is proof.

How Fast is Your Fidget Spinner?