I heard Radio Shack is planning to stock Arduino boards: http://blog.radioshack.com/2011/11/04/we-listened-arduino-is-coming/ We Listened: Arduino Is Coming
A few months ago, we reached out to our community and asked what DIY parts and pieces you wished you could find at your local RadioShack store. We were overwhelmed with the response, and promised to bring in a top list of suggestions from you - including Arduino. Radio Shack cares about DIY customers? I thought they were pretty much a cell phone store now, with a few components stuffed into a drawer on some back shelf. Here's the product search link: http://www.radioshack.com/search/index.jsp?kwCatId=&kw=arduino&origkw=arduino&sr=1 A whole 13 items found. A $25 and a $65 main board, an $85 development kit, and a few books and peripherals. According to the blog posting the lits of items will be expanding. But the subject of this post refers to the latest email ad from Micro Center, which includes a promotion for the Sparkfun version of the Arduino main board for $15: http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0383623 (Apparently on sale for 1/2 price, and currently showing as out of stock in Cambridge.) I get that they want to use an inexpensive device to catch people's attention, but this $15 board is probably of limited use to a new user to the platform. (Correct me if that's wrong; I haven't played with Arduinos myself; Maybe you just need to add a USB cable and some downloaded software.) They do, however, also carry starter kits in their "Robotic Kits & Electronic Parts" category: http://www.microcenter.com/search/search_results.phtml?N=4294950343 Not a bad selection of items (over 75), covering several starter kits, maybe a dozen different main boards, and a pile of peripherals. (And all of the items below were shown as in-stock locally, so they aren't just a pile of "online-only" items.) The first item in the category is a $99 Sparkfun starter kit: http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0383941 Further down is the O'Reilly "Getting Started with Arduino Kit" for $65. It includes the same main board as the one above, but fewer peripherals. Also includes "Getting Started with Arduino" book: http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0376454 And there is also the O'Reilly "Mintronics: MintDuino" for $25 which seems to be a bare chip (plus a handful of other components) and a solderless breadboard. Apparently to you need a $20 cable (http://www.sparkfun.com/products/9718) to attach it to your computer for programming, which oddly isn't included in the starter kit: http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0372915 As for the main boards I see Netduino for $35: http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0381878 Given the name I thought this would be a version with Ethernet, but instead it says, "using the .NET Micro Framework." As in Microsoft .NET? Embedded and .NET don't seem like two things that would go together. (I notice the clock rates on this family of boards are 48 MHz instead of the typical 16 MHz. To compensate for the .NET overhead?) Also interesting to see several "mini" boards that use surface mount components and have solder pads instead of connectors. Ideal for embedding into other tiny gadgets. A couple of options under $20: http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0382292 http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0356751 -Tom _______________________________________________ Hardwarehacking mailing list [email protected] http://lists.blu.org/mailman/listinfo/hardwarehacking
