Friday, September 19, 2008

Research on accessing SD card with AVR.

Using AVR as a data logging system is cool, but data storage is a great problem as external eeprom or flash memory may be too small and expensive. I guess most of us have some 16MB and smaller SD card on your desk because nowadays you are using 2G SD cards on your camera!

Here are some links may useful:
http://www.captain.at/electronic-atmega-mmc.php
http://www.avrfreaks.net/index.php?name=PNphpBB2&file=printview&t=61851&start=0
http://www.roland-riegel.de/sd-reader/doc/index.html

Tuesday, September 16, 2008

4D OLED with Arduino.



4D Systems makes some really nice serial OLEDS. They aren't hard to use, but the documentation for them is very scattered. This tutorial pulls together the various pieces i've found so that you can get up and running very quickly.


Link:
http://jennylc.com/4d/

Bandai Lumindot for children!


Lumindot is a new kind of toy for children produced by Bandai, it is a Backlit frame with 70x50 holes on it, so you can put the colorful pins in the hole. It is a very cool way to do pixel arts, it looks like a 70x50 Led matrix if you know about electronics.

Demo video:


Links:
http://technabob.com/blog/2008/09/15/bandai-luminodot-like-lite-brite-on-steroids/
http://www.luminodot.jp/about/

Friday, September 12, 2008

Recommend Book: iWoz by Steve Wozniak/Gina Smith



Recently, I am addicted to this book "iWoz" by Steve Wozniak, who is the co-founder of Apple.
He shares the experiences, thought of making all the cool products and inventions in an engineer perspective or he claims that is an artist view. He can also help you understand how the first home computer was born: the Apple I & II. He is really a fun person and passionate about technology and who really want to use technology to improve people's life.

Links:

http://iwoz.org/
http://www.amazon.com/iWoz-Computer-Invented-Personal-Co-Founded/dp/0393061434

Handmade Accessory with Ponoko!




I have made one cell phone strip and one necklace by using the laser-cut service provided by Ponoko. You prepare a vector graphic design and choose what materials (plastic or wood) to cut out your masterpieces in Ponoko.

It is pretty good though the shipping cost is really too much for me. Anyway, I worked it out. I think it may be a good idea to make your robot parts or your electronic project enclosure next time with this online laser cut service.

My product:
Sakura phone strip & necklace:



Make your own now:
http://ponoko.com/