I wrote a tutorial a while ago on how to hand solder fine pitched LGA/QFN chips using perfboards. While The technique illustrated works well with low pin count chips, for many people it is still a rather daunting task to…
Neal from SchmartBoard sent me an MSP430F5172 development board to check out. This board, according to the website, was co-designed with the University of Colorado for itw educational needs. It is actually just a breakout board for TI’s MSP430F5172 mixed…
Neal at Schmartboard sent me a 0.65mm pitch Arduino prototyping shield kit a few weeks ago. I had meant to do a review right away, but then thought it would probably be even better if I built a real project…
For a lot of electronics enthusiasts and DIYers, hand-soldering SMT components can be a great challenge. And given the trend of component miniaturization, a lot of ICs no longer come with DIP packaging. Soldering such small components by hand without…