I use ID-12LAs as part of my model railroad to track rolling stock as it leaves and enters yards. The ID-12LA plays an integral part in generating "Wheel Reports" that are used by Yard Masters to route cars during "Operating Sessions" which simulate the operations of real railroads. We've found the ID-12LA to have the optimum range for reliably reading "kitty tags" on the bottoms of railroad cars without getting false reads from cars on adjacent tracks. Also the ID-12LAs can placed as close as 6" from one another without interference which is great for busy yards with multiple throats.

We've even offered the RFID system to other model railroaders using the ID-12LA from Sparkfun: visit us at http://www.modelrailroadcontrolsystems.com/radio-frequency-identification/ for more information!

Sparkfun provides great support and carries all the handy bits you need to make your project come to life!

Does not read any RFID card, only those that match the frequency. Also, not shown in the specs or hookup guide, I had to use a 4.7 kohm pullup resistor between 5V and pin 9 on the sensor, or I'd just read "FFFFFFFFFFFF"

For simple projects, this is easy to set up. Aside from the 2mm pin spacing, at the bare minimum all you need is voltage, ground, and the UART receiving line. Couldn't be simpler! From there, you've got the power of RFID. You're only limited by your imagination!

The ID-12LA is a nice RFID tag reader that is reliable, simple to use and works out-of-the-box. Nothing tricky to the set up and it is easy to interface to a microcontroller or a PC serial port. Works well with small 'button' RFID tags as well as 'credit card' size ones.

This is a good module, and I will be looking for more stuff from the company that makes these.

Nice, very reliable and "not too strong" to let multiple reader be used next to each others, at the end, a quite perfect product!

All got here (Europe) on time and works just fine. Thanks!

I recently did a project for a client where I tested quite a few RFID readers, and we settled on a no-name brand that could take a custom antenna to increase the range. The ID-12LA beats that reader hands down! The range is fantastic for the size and if you need an external antenna there the ID-3LA will work. The serial output is easy to parse. My only complaint would be that the adaptor does not come with the headers wich adds $2 to the cost. If the pin spacing was 2.54mm I would give 5 stars. At ~$30 this is not cheap, but it does the job well.

Bought reader to be used with I2c reader board. The combination works great. A note about the I2c reader board. It comes set to address 0x7d. This address works but it can’t be seen the i2cdetect app. The apps high address limit is 0x77. In reading the docs for the reader board I learned the address of the board can be set via software to another address. I changed mine to 0x77.

So I got this product for an RFID experiment. I used the 125kHz button to accompany this reader. Unfortunately this reader could only sense the button at a distance of about an inch. This was a much smaller distance than expected. While using a piezobuzzer in my Arduino circuit, the buzzer signals were interfering with the reader to make it unable to detect the button. This product is not for it's price.

Used these with a dual reader shield attached to a Arduino uno to read chips attached to HO train cars. Highly recommend the extra break out board to attach them to the reader shield. Found out I can use a few more since the rest of the hardware I already have will support 8 reader chips instead of the original 4 I had planned for.

Everything works great. Only issue is ID-12LA has a very close tolerance to read a chip.

The RFID worked like champ. I was disappointed that the breakout board did not come with the product.