SparkFun Electronics - Light Intensity to Frequency IC

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Product Info

Light Intensity to Frequency IC

sku: SEN-08940

Description: This is a programmable light to frequency IC from TAOS that outputs a pulse train or a square wave (50% duty) with the frequency that is directly proportional to the incident light intensity. Uses a simple TTL output for easy interfacing to a microcontroller.

Three different sensitivity selections and four different frequency scaling parameters.

Features:

Supply voltage 2.7 - 5.5VDC
320nm - 1050nm response range
2mA supply current in power on mode
5uA current in power down mode mode
Temperature compensated for UV to visible range

Documents:

TSL230R Datasheet
Great Arduino Tutorial by Roaming Drone

Pricing

	271 in stock backorder allowed

$5.95	price
$5.36	10-99 (10% off)
$4.76	100+ (20% off)

	quantity

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Comments

9 comments

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	by p07gbar +1.7 \| October 24, 2008 at 2:28 PM 0
I want one! I've never seen a clear IC before... Good function too.

	by oren +6 \| October 25, 2008 at 7:07 PM 0
That's the coolest DIP package I've ever seen...

	by micah +3.7 \| October 25, 2008 at 10:10 PM +0.52
I'm really happy to see these at Spark Fun. I've bought these from Parallax before, and I can vouch for how amazing these chips are. Response time is very fast, and the overall noise is quite low. I used two of these as servo feedback sensors to build a laser projector out of hard disk voice coils: http://www.flickr.com/photos/22238428@N05/2932267038/

	by maclover +1.8 \| October 7, 2009 at 8:30 PM 0
That laser projector is pretty neat, could you post a build log

	by shutterdrone +3.8 \| October 29, 2008 at 10:31 AM 0
Can you specify whether these are the 230R, 230AR, or 230BR? The datasheet references three different models with different tolerance levels. Thx.

	by Nate \| October 31, 2008 at 11:54 AM
This IC is the TSL230R version.

	by shutterdrone +3.8 \| October 31, 2008 at 1:29 PM 0
Excellent - thanks!

	by Doctor Who +1.8 \| November 21, 2008 at 11:06 PM 0
Hello! And what's the difference between this version and the originals from Texas Instruments?

shutterdrone

+3.8

| December 1, 2008 at 8:47 AM

Dr. Who: the original had slightly different response curves and specs, otherwise its its a drop-in replacement. Namely the difference is that the TI chip reached an optimal responsivity (1.0) at about 780nm, whereas the Taos chip reaches that responsivity at 640nm. Also note that the Taos chip is more highly sensitive to light in the range of 650-900nm, meaning you have to adjust down for those wavelengths.