News Archives - June, 2009

The whole ‘duino thing is just so much to say, we’ve got to do it three times. Blame Jerome, our intern…

We’ve got Freeduino version 2.2 back from the assembly line today, and all tests out beeeautifully! New features include an SMD-mounted 16MHz crystal, better power-consumption circuit routing (for battery-operated projects), and “hacking pads” for using the FTDI “Bit-Bang” method of burning bootloaders (instructions in the manual).

It’s 100% Arduino-compatible, made in Canada, and back in stock!

Hi there forks! We hope everyone out there is enjoying their first week of summer. School is wrapping up, the sun is out, and WATCH OUT, A FREAK SNOW STORM! I kid, I kid. But this is Calgary, so you never know.

Over the course of the next summer months we’re aiming to roll out some additional features and content. While most of that is still in the works and I probably shouldn’t be talking about it too much, we have something small to show off. We often get requests from people asking about the best places to find websites devoted to BEAM, resources for DIY projects, or even interesting sites we stumble across in our voyages across the intertubes. And thus we present… Community Links! This new page can be found by clicking on the big ol’ “Resources” button at the top, and then “Community Links” link (…huh?) on the lower left-hand side.  It documents a handful of the neat web pages we frequently visit, as well as connections to our Twitter and YouTube accounts. We hope it’ll help you to discover something new and interesting.

But don’t fear, I wouldn’t leave you without showing some sort of product love and appreciation.  We’ve just marked down both the GM18 and GM19 gearmotors from $19.75 to $15.95. They’ll now save you $3.80, and are at the same price as all our other metal gearmotors too. That about wraps things up - have a great weekend!

Edit: Looks like we just got in a shipment of various PICAXE items. Most notably the Serial Download Cable is now available. Oh, and do you remember the PICAXE 28X1 and 40X1 ICs, and how they were discontinued and dead? Well, now they’re undead. Zombie microcontrollers, if you will. Don’t ask me how or why, but they’re back in stock and can be ordered any time.

Hi All.

We’ve been having such fun with the PumLantern shells, we thought we’d share the love. Download the zipfile with several file formats under “resources” for the K PL kit!

It’s released under the Creative-Commons Attribution Share-Alike 2.5 Canada license.

We use a laser to cut ours out, but there’s nothing saying a steady hand with an X-Acto blade wouldn’t do the same thing.

Let us know if you do anything with the design. We’d love to see what you come up with!

Well folks, it’s that magical time where we give you some special insight into what’s new n’ happenin’ in the world of Solarbotics. We’ll start off by sending our congrats to everyone who participated in the recent Make:KW Arduino 201 meetup. We were proud to sponsor the event by donating some L298 Compact Motor Driver kits, which were promptly put to good use. If you hail from the Waterloo, Ontario area go check out makekw.org to see if you can get in on future events.

In other news, we just got in a big ol’ batch of new Solarbotics catalogues!  While it only features some of the massive amounts of content here on the website, it might be perfect for those of you who enjoy sitting back and flipping through the pages. If you’d like to check it out yourself, the easiest way would be to download the 1.8MB PDF version. (Edit: You may also want to take a look at the USD or CAD price lists) “But we want real, physical pages!!”, you bellow in my general direction. Well, we have you covered there too. Simply fill out and submit this catalogue request form, and we’ll send one in your direction at no charge.

On a closing note, we’ve just received an absolute TON of new goodies from both Sparkfun and Arduino. While some of it will be making it’s way over here shortly, go check out the latest news post at HVW Technologies to see everything we’ve brought in. Mr Dave has been working around the clock to get all that content done up and online, so show your appreciation by sending us him all sorts of cookies. He likes cookies.

WOW! What a week! Most of us have returned from Maker Faire, where we had a fantastic time. We met a lot of great people, saw loads of neat projects and displays, and got a chance to take in some beautiful California weather.  We’re absolutely exhausted after an insanely long and busy weekend, but we’re slowly getting back into the groove. We’ve resumed processing and filling orders as well as answering emails and other inquiries.

Did you miss the chance to go to Maker Faire? Don’t worry, we have a bunch of neat treats to cheer you up like…

The Nunchucky! This is a cool little breakout board for the Nintendo Wii’s Nunchuck controller. It features:

• Two sets of interface pads
• Includes both 4 Pin male and 4 pin female headers
• Lock notches so your Nunchuck “clicks” in and won’t let loose!
• Tie-down Holes for securing ribbon-cable extensions

Try putting it to work with your favourite flavour of Arduino - we’d love to see what you come up with!

And our other treat for all y’alls…

The PumLantern! That’s right - this is a brand new Solarbotics kit. It’s been in the works for the last few months, but we wanted to make sure we had it ready before releasing it into the wild. It’s made as a replacement for our now dead and obsolete HexPummer. That popular kit has served us well for many years, but we decided it was time for a facelift and redesign. The new kit is very similar to the old - it’s a solar powered light gadget that charges all day and blinks away four LEDs all night. And just like the HexPummer Lantern we had earlier in the year, the PumLantern also comes with a Japanese-style lantern to make it that much prettier. What’s different between the old and the new? The new uses a more compact design and implements a few cost reducing changes. We’ve passed that directly on to you, so that the PumLantern’s price knocks a few dollars off that of the HexPummer Lantern.

…

What, isn’t that enough? Oh, alright - we have something just for those of you who want, nay NEED some sort of Bay Area Maker Faire 2009 memorabilia. Only for the next few weeks we’ll make available the same limited edition lantern theme set that we brought to the Maker Faire itself. You better nab it soon - these guys aren’t going to be around for very long.

PS- We’d like to send a quick shout out to the fine folks at OnlineMetals.com in appreciation for lending us their wonderful pallet wrap during breakdown. Thanks a bunch Amber and gentlemen!