Book recommendations, reviews, notes, etc.
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I previously posted about Forrest M. Mims III’s Getting Started in Electronics, one of the best books out there for someone who wants a thorough, yet unintimidating introduction to electronic components and circuits.
From the mid-1980’s through the late 1990’s, Forrest Mims also published several mini-notebooks, each dedicated to a specific topic in electronics. Each mini-notebook contains 50 pages of circuits, electronic concepts, and project ideas.
The complete set includes:
I had a few of the originals when I was growing up and wish I had kept more of them. I specially remember reading the Optoelectronics Circuits Mini-Notebook in High School. I attempted to build the optical communicator entirely with parts from Radio Shack, which was very difficult 15 years ago, and would be pretty much impossible today!
Updated/compiled versions of the notebooks are available on Forrest Mims’ website, but many of the originals can be found used for less than a few bucks each on amazon.com
Yesterday, Sparkfun had a solder paste stencil class at their HQ in Boulder, CO.
@esawdust was there and took lots of great photos and notes about the class:
Sparkfun Stencil and Solder Paste Class | PCB, Solder Paste | sawdust.see-do.org
Wish I could have been there, it looks like everyone had a great time!
Getting Started with Arduino
Massimo’s short text is an excellent introduction to the hardware and software sides of the Arduino and contains a walk-through for uploading a sketch to the board, basic programming techniques, interfacing with common sensors, troubleshooting techniques, and some interesting notes about tinkering, physical computing and interaction design. The book is based on a collection of notes that were formerly available within the Arduino wiki. The notes were removed when the book was released, but fortunately I saved a copy and you can download them here.
The book is available from amazon.com or comes as a companion to the Arduino starter kit available from the Maker Shed.
As I wait for my AVR High Voltage Programmer Shield PCBs to come back from BatchPCB, I’m starting to wonder what prototype PCB services other people are using for their boards.
Ladyada has a PCB Cost Comparison Calculator that shows the significant differences in price between various low volume PCB vendors, but what’s missing from the chart is the answer to: What vendors are people actually using?
If the cheapest fab house is also the best, obviously the more expensive vendors wouldn’t be around, would they? Unfortunately, it’s usually not that simple, cheap usually means slow, or low quality, or both.
I know that some visitors to this site make prototype PCBs at home and others send them out to be fabricated. How do you get your prototype boards made? Vote below.
[poll id=”2″]