Tinkering with electronics

I design interfaces for a living, but tinkering with hardware is one of the most satisfying journeys I know. Every now and then, like OP, I play around with different hardware projects. It's amazing how, showing a half-baked hardware project to a friend gets them a lot more exciting than showing them a nicely designed software project. It feels like when you're tinkering with hardware a lot more parts of the brain are challenged and thus generate a more fulfilling experience. I highly recommend everyone who's into software or design but never did anything with hardware to spend some time this week building a simple blinking LED project with the Arduino. You'll know exactly what I'm talking about.

Welcome to my weekend!<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;imgur.com&#x2F;a&#x2F;XxMUY" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;imgur.com&#x2F;a&#x2F;XxMUY</a><p>This is an AVR-based pong video game (Grant Searle), modified to work with BBC micro:bits as digital paddles - also operatable from phones via Bluetooth!<p>This is for a STEM&#x2F;Code Club event at a local school, for a bit of retro-meets-contemporary fun, and a paddle programming challenge - let&#x27;s try using the micro:bit accelerometers.<p>The breadboarded circuit will be made up on stripboard, but I&#x27;ll take along the prototype.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;linker3000&#x2F;Microbit-TVPong" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;linker3000&#x2F;Microbit-TVPong</a>

If you want to get into electronic tinkering the Kris Cochrane youtube channel is a good palce to start. He only uses hobbyist kit (so really cheap from AliExpress) and he&#x27;ll teach simple soldering and surface mount soldering. He also walks through building reallly cheap chinese electronic kits.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;channel&#x2F;UCh8JiW2G9yR2v7TwUm04m_g" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;channel&#x2F;UCh8JiW2G9yR2v7TwUm04m_g</a>

Great projects!<p>I got an Arduino recently and it’s the best £6 I’ve spent in ages. My pet project is building a synth driven from the midi output of my keyboard.<p>As a software person, “real” electronics felt hard to grok. The Arduino has been a dream. You have to learn loads along the way. How do I get audio out? Oh right, what’s PWM? Oh ok, how do these timer things work? But it’s soooo satisfying.<p>Highly recommended!

Just found this YouTube playlist on electronics basics on YouTube: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;playlist?list=PLAA9B0175C3E15B47" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;playlist?list=PLAA9B0175C3E15B47</a> the videos from the usaf training are particularly good. Person who made this playlist has a lot of other good ones too.

After building some electronics [1] I kind of think it&#x27;s a pain. It took me seven tries to get the switching power supply working right. Can&#x27;t do that on a prototyping board; layout matters, and all the parts are surface mount. LTSpice simulations get you close, but not quite there. Then I had to learn to surface mount solder, which means working with tweezers under a microscope. I&#x27;m not that good at it.<p>People like that design. Others have built more of them. Someone in Australia plans to manufacture a hundred or so. There&#x27;s enough interest for hobbyists to build it, but not enough for a real production run.<p>[1] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;John-Nagle&#x2F;ttyloopdriver" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;John-Nagle&#x2F;ttyloopdriver</a> (USB interface for old Teletype machines, models from 1910 to 1960).

I love tinkering with hardware. I just hate the debugging because now you have both physical on top of code debugging you have to deal with in order to find out where things go wrong.

I would love to see what tinkering could be done with low-power, minimal or &quot;self-sufficient&quot; location-placement of sensors to gather data and report data using Lora, cdma, or HF for long range. Why? Because electronics are small and there should be interesting ways to exploit the difference between this smallness and full blown CPUs operating on the grid.<p>But I have a hard time generating good ideas. Any thoughts?

This blog is excellent, and has a good &quot;what to buy&quot; and some similar projects eg <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.technoblogy.com&#x2F;show?WNM" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.technoblogy.com&#x2F;show?WNM</a><p>The ATtiny85 costs around $1 - it&#x27;s amazing what you can do with it. I&#x27;ve made &#x2F; adapted quite a few projects from there and other blogs

Does anyone know what kind of circuit would be able to convert 12VDC (e.g. from a small lead acid gel. cell battery) to 20VDC (which my Lenovo E470&#x27;s DC charging voltage)? The E470 is my work computer and does not have an easily swappable battery, so I wanted to experiment with some kind of external charging system I can use when working remote at sites without accessible outlets.

Armbian sounds like a version of ambian