Category Archives: Hardware

Electronics Project #11: TJ-56-428 4-Digit Digital DIY Clock Take 2 | In The Lab With Jay Jay

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This post is part of my video blog and you can find more information about this video over here.

You can support this channel on Patreon: patreon.com/JohnElliotV

Silly Job Title: Wattage Warlock.

In this video we build the TJ-56-428 4-Digit Digital Clock just like we did last time.

You read that right. We made one of these before and I liked it so much that we are making one again! I get better at it this time round, I don’t make any of the mistakes I did last time.

In the introduction to this video I mention about my new Blu-ray player which I got so I could watch Colossus: The Forbin Project. Both my Blu-ray disc and my Blu-ray player are for Region B.

As I mention I have been writing for Hackaday! So that’s been keeping me busy.

The instructions for this clock are over here: TJ-56-428 4-Digit Digital DIY Clock (same as last time).

I mention about the new Learning the Art of Electronics project which we’re just about to get started with.

The microcontroller in this clock is the STC15W404AS. It comes in the kit pre-programmed and I’ve not been able to find the software anywhere. Bummer. If you know where to get the software please do let me know!

The temperature controlled resistor is a 10K NTC thermistor which seems to be used for the room temperature function (which I don’t use and didn’t calibrate).

The crystal oscillator is spec’ed as 32768 which is obviously a reference to the clock frequency. See Why do we use 32.768 kHz crystals in most circuits? We check the impedance of this device in the video using the Peak Atlas LCR45.

In the video I mention my mate Joe who helped me out last time I did this project. Thanks Joe!

We use the METCAL PS-900 Soldering Station to do our soldering.

We use the Fluke 17B+ Digital Multimeter to test the voltage on our USB power adapters.

We use the EEVblog BM2257 Digital Multimeter to check our resistors.

We use the Peak Electronic Design Atlas DCA75 Pro Semiconductor Analyzer to test the crystal (we don’t get a reading, which was expected).

We use the Peak Electronic Design Atlas LCR45 LCR Meter to test our crystal. It gives us an impedance reading at 200kHz with both real and imaginary components.

We use the Hakko CHP 3C-SA Precision Tweezers to hold our solder and poke about. At one point I drop a component lead offcut into the board and it shorted two resistors, so lucky I found it and pulled it out!

And that’s everything to know about this project!

Here’s a photo of the completed project installed next to the symbol keyboard on my desk:

Here's a photo of my clock installed on my desk next to my symbol keyboard.

Thanks very much for watching! And please remember to hit like and subscribe! :)

Following is a product I use picked at random from my collection which may appear in my videos. Clicking through on this to find and click on the green affiliate links before purchasing from eBay or AliExpress is a great way to support the channel at no cost to you. Thanks!

Yum Cha DT830B Digital MultimeterThis is an image of the product.notes

Let’s go shopping!

MPLAB PICkit 5

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I am saving my pennies so I can buy the MPLAB PICkit 5 In-Circuit Debugger and Debugger Adapter Board.

Other things I am interested in but that are a bit beyond what I’m willing to pay for at this point in time include:

I am planning to install the MPLAB X IDE, I just haven’t got around to it yet. I will do that after I have purchased the PICkit 5 programmer.

Building A Custom Zynq-7000 SoC Development Board From The Ground Up

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I have a new post on Hackaday: Building A Custom Zynq-7000 SoC Development Board From The Ground Up.

The presenter starts by designing the power system, then makes progress on power, improves the schematic, integrates DDR RAM, adds USB PHY, Ethernet PHY, and SD card, starts on HDMI, makes progress on layout, makes progress on routing, continues with routing, configures with Vivado and estimates costs, receives PCBs and components, starts the PCB assembly, adds power rail components, adds core components, connects power and does initial programming, makes an LED blink, gets the ARM APU working, troubleshoots FT2232H to JTAG, resolves FT2232H to JTAG issue, adds UART and DDR, gets HDMI working, installs PetaLinux, and at long last configures USB and Ethernet in PetaLinux.

See AMD Zynq 7000 SoCs for specs from AMD. The executive summary is that this SoC includes an ARM Cortex-A9 Based APU and an Artix-7 FPGA (or a Kintex-7 FPGA on higher models). We suppose this is an opportune time to mention that in case you missed it Xilinx was recently acquired by AMD which is why you see the AMD branding now.

Summarizing references from these videos, other videos include What your Differential Pairs Wish You Knew and How to Achieve Proper Grounding by [Rick Hartley]; books referenced include Printed Circuits Handbook 7ed and Signal and Power Integrity Simplified 3ed; courses referenced include Mixed-Signal Hardware Design with KiCad and Advanced Digital Hardware Design from [Philip Salmony]; and software used includes EasyEDA, Vivado, Vitis IDE, and Tera Term.

Mail Call #28: EEVblog BM036, Test Hook Clips, 4mm to 2mm Banana Adapter, a Book and a Movie

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This post is part of my video blog and you can find more information about this video over here.

You can support this channel on Patreon: patreon.com/JohnElliotV

In this video we see what’s come in the mail!

Also mentioned in this video:

Thanks very much for watching! And please remember to hit like and subscribe! :)

Following is a product I use picked at random from my collection which may appear in my videos. Clicking through on this to find and click on the green affiliate links before purchasing from eBay or AliExpress is a great way to support the channel at no cost to you. Thanks!

Yum Cha USB 3.0 Powered 4-Port USB HubThis is an image of the product.

Let’s go shopping!