Recent content by mattg2k4

I'm not positive, because I know there are a wide variety of thermistors available, some with positive temp coeffecients (PTC), or negative (PTC), and they start out at different resistances at room temp as well. If the thermometer is calibratable, and your thermistor has the correct...

It looks good at first glance. I would read it online at first, then decide if you need the added convenience of a paper copy. Here's a good place to buy microcontrollers, programmers, and misc components: http://www.sparkfun.com/shop/index.php?shop=1&cat=1 Here are the rest of PIC links...

If you want to do it independent of a PC, you will want to us a microcontroller. The two most common hobbyist microcontroller brands are Microchip's PIC microcontrollers, and AVR. I personally use PIC, but AVR is also just fine. Although I've never looked at it, Myke Predko wrote some...

About resistors, you definitely want to use them. A car's voltage is not stable, and if you don't use resistors then current increases exponentially as you go past the rated forward voltage of the LED. It probably won't kill them instantly, but it will definitely shorten their lifespan. You...

Are you trying to find the LED's or the potentiometer? Ebay has pretty good prices on LED's, in the quantities you'll find there you'll end up paying about as much as you would from an online modding retailer, but you'll have a bunch of LED's left over. You can also get the potentiometer from...

Googling for "ATX pinout" will return plenty of results. In fact, this works for most major pinouts.

Just FYI, this belongs in the Network and Security forum. The electronics forum is more for circuits and wiring things. The gains that you could realize from a software program, if such a thing existed, would be minimal at best. It would probably work by cacheing data, predictive...

fat-tony: I'm not exactly sure, I kind of pulled that circuit out of nowhere since I know I've seen similar RC timer circuits but couldn't find any schematics handy. But it seems like your way would indeed make more sense. Or you could use a mosfet instead of an NPN, and then just make sure...

It's not all that hard to give up your 555 for a genuine RC timer :) There are 4 resistors, 1 cap, 1 zener, and a transistor. If you buy in any reasonable quantity from a site like digikey or jameco, then it'll cost you about $0.04, $0.10, $0.05 and $0.05 respectively, for a total of about...

You don't really *need* actual printer transfer paper, although it might be a bit easier. Just use a regular laser printer to print out your design (or a copy machine if you don't have a laser available), use an iron to transfer some toner to the board, touch it up with a sharpie, and dip it in...

http://ibiblio.org/obp/electricCircuits/ - A nice complete series of online books explaining just about everything you need to know http://www.metku.net/index.html?sect=view&n=1&path=mods/sahkooppi/index_eng - A very good basic intro to electronics if you want a slightly easier start.

There is an even easier solution that hasn't been mentioned yet, a simple RC (resistor and capacitor) timer. Incidentally, an RC timer is the basis of the 555, but if all you need to do is turn on an LED after a switch is flipped, you don't really need a 555, unless of course you want the LED...

SMPWorksForME: If you don't have anything useful to say, then it's generally better to keep quiet than to proclaim your ignorance in the open. People ask these kinds of questions so that they can get sound advice from people whose opinions they trust, so that they get the best value for their...

VNC is not going to provide you with a very satisfying solution. Even over over a 100mbit wired network, it can be laggy. It requires a decent amount of CPU time on either end, and not all of what is output to the monitor will be transmitted over VNC (at least this is how it was the last time...

Most regulators need I think about 2-3v higher on the input than you want on the output. They make low drop out regulators which would be better suited, but even those usually need at least 0.5v of headroom.