SparkFun Electronics Commentsurn:uuid:214d0e4e-f1b1-d287-ce26-ac5b4c9f82492024-03-28T08:15:12-06:00SparkFun Electronicselmer_fud on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red Boxtoberelmer_fudurn:uuid:66bba14e-eb70-da0c-edac-0d8cd4aff9fd2012-09-05T22:32:45-06:00<p>I vote for demoing your most popular product ;)<p>https://www.sparkfun.com/products/97</p><p>I was thinking it would be neat to use the camera to try and pick up the hoops or barrels that you used in the AVC</p></p>
Snibble on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red BoxtoberSnibbleurn:uuid:20bb8a85-b8b9-ca0a-ac9c-06b35bdeeece2012-09-04T15:15:17-06:00<p>How about a pile of stuff from Ding&Dent for the showcase? Seems like there's fun to be had there.</p>
MikeGrusin on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red BoxtoberMikeGrusinurn:uuid:8415e22a-6f1d-73b6-5bff-5f19e7ddbef22012-09-04T14:29:02-06:00<p>We're actually quite friendly with Parallax. They visited SparkFun last week to talk shop and show off some very cool projects, so I wouldn't be surprised to see more Propeller-based products from SFE in the future.</p>
RobertC. on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red BoxtoberRobertC.urn:uuid:04a90f1a-4dca-fd01-5bc4-9dbf07fb9f062012-09-04T11:55:43-06:00<p>noted. I'm not sure if that's what I was thinking though. we want to simply demonstrate a use-case for a product, but what you're proposing would take a lot of prototyping and testing to see if we could get the result we're after.</p>
RobertC. on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red BoxtoberRobertC.urn:uuid:9cc04110-9a1e-3077-6e10-4453a3945cce2012-09-04T09:26:39-06:00<p>either <a href="https://www.sparkfun.com/search/results?term=microrax&what=products" rel="nofollow">microrax</a> or <a href="https://www.sparkfun.com/search/results?term=makerbeam&what=products" rel="nofollow">makerbeam</a></p>
Stevenson on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red BoxtoberStevensonurn:uuid:a2f4ac88-0516-6e64-16a2-92953ab66b0b2012-09-04T06:39:42-06:00<p>Accelerometer ADXL193 , this breakout board has a high range of 250G
The other version of the IC is set for 120G. I would appreciate both versions
being offered.My application with the Gravity Force Accelerator device would use
30G to 80G approximately. The 120G part would give more accurate readouts
for that range of Gravity Force.</p>
Customer #239017 on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red BoxtoberCustomer #239017urn:uuid:f6b5091c-728d-a354-28c5-192e23c2c5fa2012-09-02T22:42:00-06:00<p>what kind of aluminum extrusions are you guys using in the CMUCam? I've never seen any that small. Thanks!</p>
mmotte on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red Boxtobermmotteurn:uuid:ddac6666-497d-e64f-b278-fe73264804ce2012-09-02T20:44:11-06:00<p>The CMUCam could be a targeting computer. Now you can make a dandelion getter like a roomba. I have wanted a garden weeding robot for years but the vision was always the hard part. Real cool device.</p>
baum on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red Boxtoberbaumurn:uuid:0bd41522-78a7-87fa-2282-d1416c71eee82012-09-02T14:01:01-06:00<p>??? I'm not sure which one to believe...</p>
girlinmotio on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red Boxtobergirlinmotio urn:uuid:41f010db-c7e8-a6db-be01-1da27a996a9d2012-09-02T00:18:13-06:00<p>How about a computer vision security system? Show it a deck of colored cards, in a specific sequence, to unlock your hacker treehouse?</p>
media4theworld on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red Boxtobermedia4theworldurn:uuid:c17549ac-14ca-c82b-ad2e-9ab6fc12cf9d2012-09-01T19:50:54-06:00<p>I want to see a product demo on Serial Controlled Motor Driver
(ROB-09571)
or
USB Relay Controller with 6-Channel I/O
(DEV-09669)
or
Si4735 FM/AM Radio Receiver Breakout
(WRL-10906)</p>
ddegn on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red Boxtoberddegnurn:uuid:6bdffed1-750b-239c-dbc0-0a7da9ec2b802012-09-01T14:38:43-06:00<p>FYI, The Propeller chip is under the camera. As in the camera is stuck directly to the Propeller chip. The chip Robert pointed to is likely the EEPROM.<p>One really nice thing about the CMUCam is it's all open source, software and hardware. You could use it to do much more than track colors if you program it to do so. (Like they say, it's just a small matter of programming.)</p><p>One of the big limitations of using the Propeller for machine vision is it's small amount of RAM. It doesn't have enough internal RAM to hold an entire color picture (of resonable size) inside its 32KM of program/data RAM.</p><p>While the board comes with a SD card, I'm not sure if it can write to the card fast enough to use it for image capture.</p><p>There are lots of examples available of adding SRAM to a Propeller. It might be possible to do some really interesting things with the CMUCam4 by adding some external fast RAM such as SRAM.</p><p>I've made a list of some machine vision applications using the Propeller <a href="http://forums.parallax.com/showthread.php?135706-Index-Test&p=1049897&viewfull=1#post1049897" rel="nofollow">here</a> (post #4).</p></p>
Sora62896 on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red BoxtoberSora62896urn:uuid:a4f47ff2-7443-eea0-ece8-18d2555103b02012-09-01T13:05:01-06:00<p>Can we get another prank? Maybe with the PowerSwitch tail II or maybe the Makey Makey kits? Or maybe a mix of the two!! Something where someone goes up a set of stairs and turns off the lights? Or a computer monitor again? What about that? Maybe car horns set off to turn on when someone passes through a door or go up stairs? (Although stairs could go terribly wrong......)</p>
Calif on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red BoxtoberCalifurn:uuid:72a74c30-d9bd-181f-abe8-a641644a03472012-08-31T17:55:38-06:00<p>Would be ecstatic if the OmniVision 9665 was sold separately.</p>
Pelican on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red BoxtoberPelicanurn:uuid:e3b8bfee-fb24-2370-b803-6185ed430f7c2012-08-31T15:21:36-06:00<p>Oh, just off the top of my head, I have thought that the Simon kit is interesting as a kind of near-Arduino with a little bit of I/O. Some of the things one might build on it:<p>Add IR I/O and you can have a minimalist TV remote (or TV-Be-Gone), a communication node to connect to other IR-equipped projects, a remote annunciator (like that crazy rabbit-thing, Nabaztag; did that ever get off the ground?) with different sound and light sequences for different conditions.</p><p>Add an SMC socket and you could make a data logger, or a chiptunes player. With a mic, it could be a voice notes recorder.</p><p>The audio amp kit could be modified as a signal driver for remote wired communication with data gathering or control stations.</p><p>I would love to see the Weevil Eye board repurposed to make something innocuous look ... different.</p><p>I suspect the color organ could be modified to become a field detector.</p><p>The Botanicalls kit is just begging to monitor CO, or wind speed, or insolation, or power-line voltage quality.</p><p>The Big Time could easily (and without pushing into "abuse" territory) become something like a Pomodoro timer.</p><p>Digital Oscilloscope? How about portable medical monitor (heart rate, blood pressure, temperature? I don't know much about what would be considered useful.) (For research purposes only, because the FDA is picky about things like that.)</p><p>Or, for the gearheads, use it to monitor engine data.</p><p>I suspect the force-sensitive resistors and flex sensors have inspired some really whacky ideas.</p><p>The barometric pressure sensor might be sensitive enough to detect the pressure waves generated by earthquakes. Or traffic, at least.</p><p>Could the fingerprint scanner be used to recognize other kinds of patterns?</p><p>Is anyone using a robotic drive train for a conveyor belt, or to operate a toy chest lid?</p><p>Surely I am not the only one who views some of these items as launch pads as well as destinations?</p><p>Now, all I have to do is start implementing some of these ideas.
Or, how about using a MEMS mic for a guitar pickup? Nah, it probably wouldn't work. Props to Pete for trying it out, though.</p></p>
scharkalvin on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red Boxtoberscharkalvinurn:uuid:3a251bee-7cd0-1801-0be4-0547cc833dd32012-08-31T15:12:14-06:00<p>Now I wonder what the Jamie bobble head looks like. Adam strapped to a rocket....Hmmm probably Jamie ducktaped to a motorcycle?</p>
TECH GEEK on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red BoxtoberTECH GEEKurn:uuid:5a1d9999-ff9f-b48f-2bc7-8d558d3bc1182012-08-31T14:35:30-06:00<p>I pitty the fool that can't see a red box in a white room, at SPARKFUN!!!</p>
RobertC. on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red BoxtoberRobertC.urn:uuid:d64408d2-9849-aea3-c917-12b249fcb0252012-08-31T13:09:11-06:00<p>can you be more specific? what products that we carry would you like to see abused?</p>
Pete-O on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red BoxtoberPete-Ourn:uuid:888022c5-bba9-dbdb-e5a8-ac6fb2989e7b2012-08-31T12:59:30-06:00<p>I pity the fool that can't see a red box in a white room.</p>
Nick Poole on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red BoxtoberNick Pooleurn:uuid:c861d689-f17a-083d-4113-1f0516c075af2012-08-31T12:52:11-06:00<p>That's the <a href="http://discoverystore.typepad.com/.a/6a00d83452f16e69e2013485bd76be970c-800wi" rel="nofollow">Adam Savage bobblehead!</a><p>I got it as a gift a while back and having it there reminds me to turn off my iron, usually...</p></p>
CF on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red BoxtoberCFurn:uuid:3e8265a7-a479-2889-f05c-cb94bedcfcfb2012-08-31T12:45:37-06:00<p>Are you planning on carrying any more propeller items? They are a bit pricy from parallax but I could see SparkFun being able to make the boards and accessories cheaper.</p>
Pelican on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red BoxtoberPelicanurn:uuid:19dcfc09-e58f-ca96-5195-fa3c8620a4b62012-08-31T12:36:45-06:00<p>I would love to see a round-up of kit abuse. That is, what kits have customers repurposed, and what have they done with them?</p>
RobertC. on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red BoxtoberRobertC.urn:uuid:c8a9fb28-88d2-4fc2-616c-0969667175d92012-08-31T11:33:51-06:00<p>Hum, that might have to come later. we're currently evaluating several different options. I'll make a note and see what happens when we get some new stuff in.</p>
Customer #261459 on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red BoxtoberCustomer #261459urn:uuid:e6a7a28e-138b-8508-5784-1d973ee75ac72012-08-31T11:22:44-06:00<p>Robert, thanks for putting out a call for suggestions. I think the 'talks' you've given on earlier products, such as the motors video, have been super.<p>One of the areas that I'd like to see covered is the Luxeon breakouts, LEDS and lenses. Some of the components don't seem to be carried any longer, but a short discussion (or product demo!) of high-intensity LEDs would be really useful.</p></p>
scharkalvin on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red Boxtoberscharkalvinurn:uuid:5a085103-4076-0be1-30ad-d497f7860dde2012-08-31T11:20:57-06:00<p>Why do you have Adam Savage tie-wrapped to a soldering station?</p>
STrRedWolf on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red BoxtoberSTrRedWolfurn:uuid:39b3a59e-4b06-8126-226f-78b2782148342012-08-31T10:45:39-06:00<p>Any effort to carry 4D System's P1-EB expansion breakout board for their displays?</p>
RobertC. on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red BoxtoberRobertC.urn:uuid:f2980503-7a82-065f-2e65-3e7e717fb8192012-08-31T10:37:32-06:00<p>nope, I was wrestling with some lions earlier and they can get a bit rough.</p>
Customer #86232 on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red BoxtoberCustomer #86232urn:uuid:2b672fa1-1dcb-8d6b-dcb5-849876f64af82012-08-31T10:26:41-06:00<p>Was that a hickey on his neck?</p>
Gizmoguy on New Product Friday: The Hunt for Red BoxtoberGizmoguyurn:uuid:bdf24e3f-7d95-f813-9fe0-d3e700f6caf32012-08-31T09:55:39-06:00<p>The new color tracking board is very cool but I think I may be most excited about the wire spool sets with the distribution box. Since I don't have a permanent workbench for my projects I have to set up and tear down each time I work on a project and this would make it faster.</p>