Author Archive

Postage-Stamp Linux Board

EEJournal reports that Microchip’s new SAMA5D27 is almost a postage stamp that runs Linux. It is a fully realized microcontroller module that measures about 40mm on a side. It costs about $39 in small quantities. I wrote about this board in Finnish to Uusiteknogia.fi magazine.

Why batteries are holding up tech breakthroughs — and what’s happening now

https://thenextweb.com/contributors/2018/02/21/batteries-holding-tech-breakthroughs-whats-happening-now/ Despite incremental advancements, batteries haven’t changed all that much over the past decade. Major brands are investing in better environmental efficiency, and small tweaks that improve storage and performance, but the typical “battery” is still fundamentally the same. There is stagnation in the realm of batteries.

Gartner reports first ever global decline in smartphone sales | TechCrunch

https://techcrunch.com/2018/02/22/gartner-reports-first-ever-global-decline-in-smartphone-sales/ Smartphone boon era seems to be over. Smartphone market is maturing. Gartner’s latest figures record the first ever decline (a 5.6 per cent decline over Q4 2016 figure) since the analyst began tracking the market. (Though it’s not the first analyst to call a decline.) Global smartphone sales have not been firing on all

Digital Voltmeter AC 20-500V

I wanted to add an AC voltage meter to my electronics lab variac transformer output (0-275V AC). I decided to get a cheap Machifit AD16-22V 22mm Digital AC Voltmeter AC 20-500V Voltage Meter Gauge Digital Display Indicator with the following Specification: Model AD16-22V Mounting hole 22mm Voltage AC 20-500V Class of safety protection IP65 Color

Physicist Uses Regular Digital Camera to Photograph A Single Atom

http://www.iflscience.com/physics/physicist-uses-regular-digital-camera-to-photograph-a-single-atom/ In 2012, Australian physicists captured the first image of a single atom. The process was painstaking and required a super-high resolution microscope. A new photograph taken by Oxford University physics PhD candidate David Nadlinger using only an ordinary digital camera shows a single, glowing-blue strontium atom hovering within a powerful vacuum chamber. It earned

Build Your Own Touchscreen IC Tester for Just $25 – Hackster’s Blog

https://blog.hackster.io/build-your-own-touchscreen-ic-tester-for-just-25-7f10fab3815b IC testers help you identify an unknown IC by testing its input and output against a database of known components. You can follow Akshay Baweja’s tutorial to build your own. The total build cost should be around $25, and you’ll need a Arduino Mega 2560, a touchscreen display with an SD card slot, an