After you program and get your desired output (lighting up LEDs), what is the next step to making your own device?
I’m able to hook up my Arduino UNO to my computer and load various programs. I’ve gotten the LEDs to light in different patterns and all. Plus learning a lot about electronics. Love this site!!
My question is how do I go from programming the microcontroller chip on the Arduino board, to some other board that’s smaller and can be put into a container for display?
To hopefully clarify my question, lets say I program my Arduino board and use the breadboard to light up 6 LEDs in random patters. Then lets say I want to take those 6 LEDs and mount them in a plastic box for display to take to work. I’m assuming that I would not use my Arduino board inside the plastic box along with the breadboard to get the LEDs to light up and confuse my co-workers. What kind of board would I use and how is that programmed?
Could someone please point me in the right direction as to how to do this? So far I’ve just seen tutorials on how to use your Arudino board to program things… which is great. I’m learning a lot about electronics and can’t wait to build my first homemade device. Are there tutorials here that I should read, youtube videos, books? Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Thank you,
Todd
I’d say you want a smaller form factor.
What I’d do is design a pcb that houses a surface mount ATmega328P with the necessary components and connectors to program it and drive the LEDs (or whatever) of a size that fits inside the intended box.
Something a bit more in reach for your initial forays into device building – you can put a through-hole 328P with Arduino bootloader (SFE sells 'em) on a prototyping board, and solder in crystal, reset pullup, bypass capacitors, ftdi connector (or 6-pin AVRISP connector), etc. It’ll probably be smaller than a standard Arduino sized board.
Another option is to use a pro mini Arduino, much smaller form factor. Something like that can be soldered onto a proto board. The advantage is that it has all the support components (crystal, pullups, etc) so you just have to solder in the LEDs (or whatever else)
Derek Malloy has some tutorials which include building an Arduino on a breadboard. This might help you make your own circuit without an actual Arduino board.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_m9aciePKEk&lr=1
I have some other AVR/Arduino links here.
http://forums.parallax.com/showthread.p … ost1049899
The above link is my list of electronic links I frequently use. Post #5 of the index has AVR/Arduino links. (Much of the rest of the index is Propeller related.)