LED Panel Lamp Is A Great Way To Use Protoboard

It’s now possible to source chip-on-board LED modules that have huge light output in a simple, easy to use package. However they can have major power requirements, and cheaper modules are also susceptible to dead spots.  [Heliox] put together a great LED lamp design the old-school way, showing there’s more …read more

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Bottom of the Barrel Connector: Tell Us Your Socket Hacks

Sometimes you get an epiphany for a project that will change the world. A simple device, on a custom circuit board with inexpensive parts that will disrupt the status quo and make you a billion dollars in no time. Then there are the times where you need to throw scraps of copper at a prototyping board and strangle nine-volts out by any means necessary.

This is about the latter. In one of our Hack Chats, [Morning.Star] shared a couple of images wherein a barrel connector was needed, but there was no time to wait for one in the mail. Necessity …read more

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Evaluating the Unusual and Innovative Perf+ Protoboard

Back in 2015 [Ben Wang] attempted to re-invent the protoboard with the Perf+. Not long afterward, some improvements (more convenient hole size and better solder mask among others) yielded an updated version which I purchased. It’s an interesting concept and after making my first board with it here are my thoughts on what it does well, what it’s like to use, and what place it might have in a workshop.

Perf+ Overview

The Perf+ is two-sided perfboard with a twist. In the image to the left, each column of individual holes has a bus running alongside. Each hole can selectively …read more

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