Tindie

Chances are if you have played with a few microcontrollers you will have used a CP2102 USB/UART chip on a little board to open up a serial port between your computer and your project. The Quadropus uses the CP2108 IC, the bigger sibling of the CP2102 and is capable of opening up 4 virtual serial ports instead of just one.

Each serial port has RX/TX/RTS/CTS/GND broken out to footprints for pin headers and it’s supplied with sets of different coloured header for you to solder in if required. The RX and TX on each port have activity LED’s and the Quadropus is supplied with a cable set, each terminated with a small probe hook.

There are some nice optional extra’s available for the Quadropus too, first up, you can request that all the pin headers are soldered in place for your convenience. There’s a great looking case to keep the device and cables all stashed neatly. Finally there’s a 3D-printed base which you can add as an extra, or the files are supplied for free if you want to print your own.

Compatible with all OS’s, with great driver support, we can imagine these Quadropus (Quadropi?) roaming the high seas of many electronics workbenches!

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It’s a great time for Eurorack modules; not only are people able to make expressive and impressive sounding modules – but independent sellers are making sleek devices which perform unique and useful functions! The mb’Lifter is a brand new module, which comes as a fully assembled unit which provides all of your gain and attenuation needs for smooth, level sounds when processing with effects.

The mb’Lifter takes incoming audio and CV signals and attenuates the signal for effects processing. It’s signal path can be routed in two ways depending on what you need:

Input > Amplify > Send/Return > Attenuate > Output

Input > Attenuate > Send/Return > Amplify > Output

It was designed to take a signal and prepare it for being processed, ensuring the output signal has a volume level which matches that of the input signal. At times, effects can add unwanted reduction or increase in volume which creates a balance in the mix.

The gain ranges from -18dB to +18dB giving you a good breadth to work with, plus an LED to indicate if the signal is clipping. The design files and schematic have been graciously shared by its designer – as well as a list of uses (and mis-uses) on the product page.

The mb’Lifter is created by Mario Becker who’s based in Germany

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Unless you have been completely off grid you’ve certainly heard talk of NASA’s Perseverance Rover mission on Mars and the amazing Ingenuity helicopter powered flight experiment. If you wanted to have a beautiful reminder of this amazing period of science and engineering you should take a look at this Perseverance Fridge magnet kit.

This lovely PCB has an image of the Perseverance rover’s remote sensing mast etched in a fine golden ENIG finish. On the back is a trusty CR2032 battery holder powering one ultra bright red LED and a couple of yellow LED’s which provide a pleasing backlight effect. The red LED is positioned so it emulates the “SuperCam” instrument so you can imagine Perseverance zapping rocks with it’s laser!

The kit is pretty straightforward to solder, but if you aren’t able to solder then maker Electron Village also sells a pre assembled kit and also they have a rather nice PCB with the Ingenuity helicopter here!

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Eurorack modules tend to fall into distinctive categories, such as VCAs, filters, oscillators, effects, and samplers – but the beauty of the platform is the freedom to implement new, innovative ideas. The In CV Eurorack module is a great example of this, putting one of the first minimal compositions in your setup with a simple interface and a frankly gorgeous front panel.

The In CV is a 10HP module, which is designed around Terry Riley’s In C which was composed in 1964 – cited as one of the first minimal compositions and consisting of 53 short musical phrases. It comprises of a virtual ensemble of six ‘players’ which each have a button to cycle through the 53 patterns  – with the module playback controlled by an incoming clock signal.

It comes as a completed unit, which operates with 1V/oct CV/gate outputs to trigger external devices. Please note the module emits note sequences to trigger elsewhere, no sounds are made by the device.

The front panel looks beautiful with a striking and sharp gold and black contrast of shapes. The code for the In CV is open-source, and it can be loaded with your own melodic sequences by sending it some pattern data using an Arduino.

The In CV module is designed by Joe Seggiola who’s based in Italy.

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Whilst pandemics and lockdowns are not to be cheered about, it’s wonderful to see how some people have spent some of their time. Yliadr has set the bar high by creating this wonderful new video game title Prima Materia.

Prima Materia is a platform game, available in French or English and is set around the themes of alchemy. The game is available to play for free on the itch platform but Yliadr has gone all out and created a run of classic Game Boy cartridges for people to enjoy the game on vintage hardware. Like all classic Game Boy style cartridges these can be played on the Original Game Boy, Game Boy Pocket, Colour, Game Boy Advance, and Advance SP consoles.

Yliadr shares a quick video demo with a beguiling soundtrack and it looks like the artwork and gameplay are excellent and intriguing. The limited number of cartridges are available in either the classic grey or red finish which is randomly selected on each order but you can of course select your language preference. The carts ship with a game manual and we love that over on the itch page Yliadr has provided links to download the graphic assets for this quirky and wonderful game.

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While many of us enjoy an under-the-counter dishwasher, if your dwelling didn’t come with one, you might find “Bob” the mini countertop dishwasher to be interesting. For £349.90 (~$482) + VAT, this little guy takes care of dirty dishes in a compact space, and, if not portable, could at least be moved from place to place as needed.

It seems like a neat little device, and includes a cartridge that takes care of injecting the correct amount of dish washing liquid for each load, similar to a printer cartridge… And if your techno-sense is starting to tingle a bit, it’s not a false alarm. These cartridges feature an EEPROM chip that tracks the number of washes, forcing you to buy a new one after 30 cycles.

While the cartridges can be returned to be refilled, somewhat offsetting the environmental cost, this doesn’t exactly take care of the recurring cost to your wallet. Have no fear though, dekuNukem is here with his “Bob Rewinder” renewal board/kit.

The STM32-based Rewinder board slides onto the cartridge’s interface port, and after simply applying power and pressing the “RENEW” button, it considers itself good for another 30 cycles. You can also purchase a syringe to actually refill the cassette with soap, as well as a USB-C to USB-A cable if needed.

While the board itself + syringe will run about $35, after that’s paid for the cost-per-wash price goes from 67¢ to 0.87¢, less than a penny in detergent per wash. Of course you’ll still need to pay for power and water, but depending on how much you use Bob, it’s not hard to see where this little device pays for itself. In fact, in his writeup ‘Nukem shows how it will save him over $200 per year–potentially thousands of dollars over Bob’s lifetime!

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The HC-05 is a common Bluetooth serial transceiver module that crops up and gets used in lots of projects seeking to add Bluetooth to microcontrollers. In its native form it’s not massively well suited to breadboard use and, if you are rolling your own firmware, it can lead to a tangle of wires and connectors to reflash it. This HC-05 development board from Burgess World Custom Electronics remedies all this and more with one handy product.

The development board is supplied with all the SMD soldering done and an authentic HC-05 module. This 3.3 V board has all the pins of the HC-05 broken out, including USB lines. There is an onboard programming header with the requisite 180 ohm resistors in place, in addition to the Reset and Program buttons, there are LED’s for status, link, and power.

Wrapped up in a breadboard friendly footprint this will be a pleasure to work with if you are developing and prototyping using the HC-05 module.

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Sequencing is the heart and soul of a modular setup so without one, you’d be hard pushed to make any music! The Jormungandr is a quad trigger sequencer which allows you to sequence four different sounds from one place – perfect for live performance or studio jamming.

The Jormungandr is a sequencer for up to 32 steps, the rate of which can be controlled by the clock input – with four buttons to record each element into as you go. The four sequenced elements are called upon via the trigger outputs, with buttons for writing and erasing patterns on the main panel, and individual record buttons for each element.

It’s ideal for triggering drums – with enough features to sequence a kick, snare, hihat, and a tom – but equally good for synths, samples, and other modular goodness. It comes as a completed unit with the documentation available on the seller’s GitHub page. The unit is 10 HP, 3 U and comes with screws, panel, and a manual. We can only presume the coral is not included!

The Jormungandr is sold by Yliader, who are based in France and offer a full range of fresh modular gadgets for your approval. See a demo of the unit in action below:

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In the world of factory automation, DIN rail provides an easy way to clip various electronics to an electrical panel. These can take the form of PLCs, motor controllers, connectors, and the like, and now with the Raspberry Pi being implemented for uses such as data tracking in this realm, there’s a need to secure it without having to drill custom holes.

For this purpose, check out this set of DIN mount clips for Raspberry Pi from INUX3D. Two of these 3D-printed clips screw onto the Pi, allowing it to attach to the rails with ease. While an industrial cabinet would be the obvious use for such a device, they also offer a desktop DIN rail stand, which would be ideal for testing before deployment.

As for what “DIN” stands for, it’s the Deutsches Institut für Normung, or German Institute for Standardization. Interestingly I worked in industry for many years, using the term “din rail” without knowing what the term literally meant. Of course, acronyms evolve and transcend their original meaning all the time, whatever the language. You can probably think of a few arrangements of letters that you use, but don’t quite know where they originated!

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The GameBoy is an icon of the late 20th century and its legacy lives on today in Nintendo’s latest handhelds as well as the retro gaming and chipmusic scenes. With many carts still in circulation and production, the Save Immortalizer Kit for Game Boy is here to back up your save point and keep it from being wiped through loss of internal battery power. Whether you’ve put your life into game progression or music making, this nifty piece of kit will ensure your Game Boy’s memory lives on!

Losing your save game when the battery dies is a problem many have faced, but the solution is this SRAM save chip modification. Two versions are available; one for all cartridges and a slightly cheaper one for games not compatible with an N64 Transfer Pack. A full run down of installation instructions have been provided in extensive detail – covering the various makes and models of carts (MBC1, MBC3 and MBC5).

The Save Immortalizer for Game Boys is compatible with all official hardware and is sold by Obskyr who are based in Sweden. They offer to do modifications for those who are not so comfortable with tearing apart their childhood toys with a soldering iron. Finally, you can back up your Pokemon saves and LSDJ tracks for future generations!

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