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https://www.smithandedwards.co...
http://surplussales.com/
https://www.allelectronics.com...

...can be much improved by adding a little cooling fan internally

http://www.allelectronics.com/make-a-store/item/CF-392/12VDC-40MM-COOLING-FAN/1.html

Abandoned? They're still producing them in quantity. They're still useful.

What happens to tech lines that don't continue to improve?

AMD announced the end of design for Geode products

So it's over. I have a huge rack of stuff like this I keep around for its general utility or because it's irreplaceable. You just can't get Parallax USB servo controllers any more [sigh]. But once they say they're done advancing the design, it's no longer interesting from a new developments point of view. It's abandoned. Eventually somebody will come out with a design that has some similar features plus a few new and interesting ones. Sales will dwindle and they'll wind up on the remainders rack at shops like All Electronics, but only now and then. And then they're gone.

It's the circle of liiiiife.

Your Dad's out in the middle of know where.
This cable is only going to be in place 5 maybe 10 years max.

I'd just run it across the ground. To hell with the regulations, odd's are no one will ever know or care.

I have also found that lawn mowers will pass right over an Ethernet cable, and lawns will absorb them so they sink into the ground a bit and after a year are almost completely vanished.

And at a $150 replacement cost for the whole 500 Meter run (if you use good 100Mbps 8 Conductor Cat 5), who cares if it wears out or gets damaged.
  If you use 4 conductor 24 gauge phone wire for 10Mbps Ethernet it's more like $75 for 500 Meters.
https://www.allelectronics.com/

Although at 500 Meters your getting near the limit, you may need to put a router 1/2 way between and run 12v to it. To act as a signal repeater. The router could just be stuck in a paint bucket with brick on it.

Hey it ain't pretty, but it will work.

The old 50 Ohm Coax RG58/U 10Base2 cables also work great too for this sort of thing, back in the day we had the storm drains & fence lines wired up with the stuff bringing 10 Mbps internet across our neighborhood in 1987!

The problem with the kits is that they are limiting. Get one to see if you're really interested in electronics, and if so, then get a solderless breadboard system. Here's one with a triple power supply built in: http://www.allelectronics.com/cgi-bin/item/PB-4060 /105/POWERED_BREADBOARD_.html

Pre-formed jumper wires: http://www.allelectronics.com/cgi-bin/item/JW-140/ 105/140_PIECE_JUMPER_WIRE_ASSORTMENT_.html

Add a $15 DMM, then trot down to your library and grab a couple of Forest Mims books. Go nuts.

The problem with the kits is that they are limiting. Get one to see if you're really interested in electronics, and if so, then get a solderless breadboard system. Here's one with a triple power supply built in: http://www.allelectronics.com/cgi-bin/item/PB-4060 /105/POWERED_BREADBOARD_.html

Pre-formed jumper wires: http://www.allelectronics.com/cgi-bin/item/JW-140/ 105/140_PIECE_JUMPER_WIRE_ASSORTMENT_.html

Add a $15 DMM, then trot down to your library and grab a couple of Forest Mims books. Go nuts.

http://www.allelectronics.com/cgi-bin/item/PB-400/ 105/BREADBOARD,_400_CONTACTS_.html

Get yourself a couple of good project books at the library, find a local electronics shop and buy a battery holder and a few parts and some hookup wire and go to town. Smaller, cheaper, and you won't grow out of it so quick-- those 500 kits have about 485 projects that you could care less about, and after you build the ultra-simple blinky light, and AM crystal radio, electronic organ and a couple others you'll tire of it before you get your money's worth.

With a couple of these breadboards you can get some IC specs (or find them on the net) and hook up gates, counters, LEDs, Op amps, oscillator chips, transistors, etc.., and build an unlimited amount of stuff with them. You'll only grow out of it when you want to get a soldering iron and build something to keep...

I'm a 37 year old software engineer. About 3 years ago I decided I wanted to learn about electronics. I started with one of these. It was nice, and had some very nice example projects - both analog and digital. It also came with a nice supply of op-amps, transistors, resistors, capacitors, and other goodies.

The only complaint I might proffer is that I very quickly outgrew the relatively small breadboard and graduated to something like this. I was infinitely more pleased with the layout. If you enjoy it, a breadboard and a small arsenal of nicely varied resistors, transistors, caps, diodes, and other bits will be an excellent choice. If you start getting them in any significant quantity, look online. Radio Shack is nice and convenient, but does charge a bit of a markup.

Also, if you want to really blow your mind, pick up a copy of The Art of Electronics by Horowitz and Hill. It was recommended by a coworker who is an MSEE, is mind-bogglingly good, and is used in lots of college courses.

As an EE who started off with one of those 50-in-one kits when I was 8, I have a few recommendations. I had a 200-in-one, but the more impressive projects on it required so many wires it was nigh-impossible to get things to stay working. Put one in and two fall out.

You can start with one of those kits, but once you get to the point where you'll really learn what you're doing, go look for books and kits separately. Look for books by Forrest Mims III and Don Lancaster (TTL Cookbook and CMOS Cookbook are classics). Check their sites out as well.

As for parts sources, for online shopping, I'd recommend Digi-Key. Jameco is a little pricey, but they have some really interesting parts, including a lot of older stuff. All Electronics is a place I used to buy from a lot; they have a lot of manufacturer surplus parts, so it's kind of like shopping in a flea market or surplus auction. Another surplus shop is MPJA. Newark and Mouser are good places to look when you want some specific part that Digi-Key doesn't have.

For starters, you'll want to buy a modular breadboard, and one of the pre-cut wire kits for them. Or, if you want to blow some more dough, you might want to get one of the Analog Design Lab or Digital Design Lab things that has a bunch of things like power supplies, LEDs, and switches integrated into it already. Also look for parts assortments, like resistor and capacitor assortments (e.g. Digi-Key items RS125-ND and PHD1-KIT-ND). If you're going to be doing digital work, you'll probably want to get lots (20 or so) of 10K resistors (for pullups) and 0.1 uF capacitors (for decoupling).

Radio Shack is where you go as a last resort. Their selection is lousy and prices are worse.

All Electronics Corp

A fine collection of hobbyist parts and gadgets. Spec sheets online for items that they have them for. Every once in a while, I'll do a batch order of parts to fill the parts bin on the workbench. Flat-rate shipping prices for USA are fair also ($7 for any order).

You want loud? Connect a few of these fans from All Electronics. That should be enough noise for anyone.

you can get one from all electronics corp for 1.50 yes one dollar and FIF-tee cents all electronics reader then use stripesnoop (.sf.net) and you can figureout how to hook them up to a gameport/whatever on their forum check their forum

• Cons

• Pros

[some resource links from some friends of mine at the Fremont Arts Council, which puts on an annual light show by local Fremonsters in or near Seattle]

You can find incandescent "grain of wheat" lamps at www.allelectronics.com, or similar ones at Radio Shack for 2 or 3 times the price.

In some cases Christmas lights work well.

Woops, sorry, I just checked, you know how these surplus places are, they're sold out of the Lithium-6's, all they have left are the common quartz
crystals.

• All Electronics usually has good deals on power supplies and DC-DC converters.
• Meci has some great deals on DC-DC converters right now too.
• Electronics Goldmine might have some too.

Perhaps if I come up with some spare change and a bit of free time I'll hack one together. Keep an eye on Hack A Day in the next month. :)

Not to be too hacky, but it is trivial to add a good solar cell to most electronics, especially if they are built for a charger. This one looks like it uses a fairly standard power plug, which means it's probably 2.0 or 1.9 center positive. Anyone with a unit could tell you to required voltage, but I would guess 12v as it has an internal hdd. All that's left to do is find a good 12v solar cell, find a plug of the right size, chop off the end bits of the two and attach them together, and double-check that current is flowing in the right direction. Bing! You're done.

It's very easy. Check these values, of course, with the requirements of the actual hardware before you start plugging things in.

Not to be too hacky, but it is trivial to add a good solar cell to most electronics, especially if they are built for a charger. This one looks like it uses a fairly standard power plug, which means it's probably 2.0 or 1.9 center positive. Anyone with a unit could tell you to required voltage, but I would guess 12v as it has an internal hdd. All that's left to do is find a good 12v solar cell, find a plug of the right size, chop off the end bits of the two and attach them together, and double-check that current is flowing in the right direction. Bing! You're done.

It's very easy. Check these values, of course, with the requirements of the actual hardware before you start plugging things in.

By a similar name is AllElectronics out of Van Nuys (CA). There is a $6 flat shipping fee, but they have a lot of good quality items. Like lead-acid gel-cell batteries for my UPS (saved about $80 doing it this way vs. through APC), tools, parts, gadgets, barcode scanners on the cheap ($8).

* charge NiCd's in Li-ion mode, add a power switch to unit so you don't have to plug the 24v in "hot", and fill the hole on that damn piezo "siren" inside with epoxy-- it's still audible, but only if you're in the same room.

* charge NiCd's in Li-ion mode, add a power switch to unit so you don't have to plug the 24v in "hot", and fill the hole on that damn piezo "siren" inside with epoxy-- it's still audible, but only if you're in the same room.

B.G. Micro is sort of like All Electronics in that they carry a ton of surplus electronic junk, download both catalogs and enjoy! Also try American Science and Surplus for a wider variety of tech stuff, toys, labware, and millitary goods.

I've been using for a while now. When a site pulls a coupon code or something, Ben usually updates the listing, and the discussions following each posting are a helpful way to share results. "I had to put in a California ZIP code to view the item, but then I was able to order it shipped to my Michigan address." or "Make sure the CompUSA is within 4 miles of the Best Buy or they won't honor the pricematch. Get a friendly CSR and you should be golden!"

I've stopped using Pricewatch, their listings have become crammed with keyword spam and are all but useless. The "price including shipping" column was a good idea, but the quality of the listings has been terrible lately.

Actually, this research does have real world applications.

In the early parts of the industrial age it was found that a certain shape of gear teeth (both along the axle of the gear, and the tooth's profile seen edge on), removed gear slip allowing for much smoother operation, to the point where bevelled gears are used in all car transmissions today.

This research may lead to innovative and new ways to mesh gears together; for instance, I could imagine one application to allow gears with teeth numbers that aren't strictly in ratio to their diameters to mesh properly. If that were the case, then we could make transmissions and gear boxes an order of magnitude or so smaller...

No need to go to Ikea. The "custom computer cable tube" is called split loom. You can find it at most electronics stores, car/home stereo shops, auto parts stores, etc... Look under the hood of your car and you will find the manufacturer used it extensively as it is also great at reducing the heat on the cable and keeping the nasty chemicals off. Here is the first link to a place that sells it that I found on google. It does work great.

Please post any links you have to reasonably priced plug strips. (They are also called power strips.) I don't see why 12 outlets should cost about 2 dollars per outlet.

Note that a plug strip should have the outlet orientation that allows plugging in three outlet adapters without the adapter outlets interfering with each other.

All Electronics in LA and Van Nuys. You can order online or through their catalog. I have been ordering from this place since the early 90's. They concentrate on surplus consumer and industrial electronics but they also have a hefty stock of electronic supplies and a decent selection of tools, fastening hardware, gears and such. Great place if you build electronic things.

All Electronics in LA and Van Nuys. You can order online or through their catalog. I have been ordering from this place since the early 90's. They concentrate on surplus consumer and industrial electronics but they also have a hefty stock of electronic supplies and a decent selection of tools, fastening hardware, gears and such. Great place if you build electronic things.

Apache Reclamation and Electronics (Apache & 3rd Ave) - they are a litteral mechanical and electronics junkyard - big or small, they have it all (I have noted a couple of C02 lasers there, as well as some larger heavy equipment, labware, motors, pumps, hydraulics, wire, pneumatics, etc)

Equipment Exchange (515 E Grant Street - behind BOB off of 7th Street) - lots and lots of major electronic and industrial FAB equipment here - ovens, wave solder lines, industrial robots, electron microscopes, regular microscopes, and other such things. Lots of small funky stuff too (be sure to check out the basement area for real fun items).

EliTek (EMC) 3855 N. 29th Ave - mostly PC and used/surplus business equipment. Be wary, they can rip you if you don't know what you are looking at/for. I have gotten some real sweet deals though (recently, an HP LaserJet 6P, 25000 page count - cost me $100.00 - bought a toner cartridge, and got me one hell of a sweet laser printer to replace a crappy ink jet that was always clogging or running out of ink - for under $200!). Sometimes they have funky stuff come in (recently, they had a bunch of Sony 15" LCDs come in - most were broke, but I bought a couple to swap parts for $20.00 - have yet to play with them to see if I can get one working, but for $20.00 it is worth the shot!).

Ok, out in Scottsdale there is the Electronics Goldmine, mainly an online store. Also, I like All Electronics in LA for parts, too.

I know of several other places, mainly online parts stores, but most of those I haven't purchased from, so I can't reccommend them...

Rather than wasting all that time and money, and opening up your PSU, you could just do this.

Buy a relay, one that is rated to switch the amps you need on the switching side at 120volts (or 240 if you are from a third world country :) ) Make sure the "coil" voltage is 5 or 12 volts.

Simply wire the coil side to your power supply's +5 or +12 and ground, and run the hot side of the power to the pump through the switching side.

Now, was that difficult? If you want it to delay when you turn it off, use a 5V relay and get a 1farad 5V super capacitor (the kind they use for CMOS memory backup) and wire it in parallel with the coil side, noting polarity. This will hold the relay closed for quite a while when the power is turned off (up to a minute or two), assuming the coil on the relay has sufficiently high ohmage.

Total cost: About $4 in parts, and 10 minutes reading about ohm's law if you don't already know it.

It's right Here

Especially if you want to boycott X-10 on priniciple--if you're against those pop-up ads and the exploitation of large-breasted women.

If it's at all connected to your TV, VCR, or anything that connects to a cable TV system, the system may be the culprit. I had to take one of these and one of these, connected them back-to-back, and ran them inline with every cable line in my house. Evidently the cable system was wired by an idiot, and the distribution amps on the pole (or something like that) aren't very good quality.

Try it and see. I bought 50 of each of those adapters, spent 20 minutes, and went door-to-door in my apartment complex asking if they had a problem with hum on their stereo system. Sold 'em for $3 apiece. :D

If it's at all connected to your TV, VCR, or anything that connects to a cable TV system, the system may be the culprit. I had to take one of these and one of these, connected them back-to-back, and ran them inline with every cable line in my house. Evidently the cable system was wired by an idiot, and the distribution amps on the pole (or something like that) aren't very good quality.

Try it and see. I bought 50 of each of those adapters, spent 20 minutes, and went door-to-door in my apartment complex asking if they had a problem with hum on their stereo system. Sold 'em for $3 apiece. :D

http://www.allelectronics.com/cgi-bin/category.cgi ?category=220&item=CF-109&type=store

Panaflo fans are great quality and super quiet (at the expense of some airflow, but most likely you won't need it). I can't tell you about the bearing life of this fan, but I trust the Japanese built "Hydro-wave" bearing fan much more than a cheap chinese "ball bearing" fan.

http://www.allelectronics.com/cgi-bin/category.cgi ?category=220&item=CF-106&type=store is a similarily nice 60mm fan.

http://www.allelectronics.com/cgi-bin/category.cgi ?category=220&item=CF-109&type=store

Panaflo fans are great quality and super quiet (at the expense of some airflow, but most likely you won't need it). I can't tell you about the bearing life of this fan, but I trust the Japanese built "Hydro-wave" bearing fan much more than a cheap chinese "ball bearing" fan.

http://www.allelectronics.com/cgi-bin/category.cgi ?category=220&item=CF-106&type=store is a similarily nice 60mm fan.

Try this next time.

Does a similar job, but its intended for the task, so it works even better. :-)

Get her a phone dialer and soldering gun, available at most Radio Shacks. Then, look around for modification "hints," get the requisite parts from an electronic supply house, and "accidentally" leave the instructions in the package.
It's the gift that keeps on giving, and technically, it's legal.

In the letter of the law, anyway, if not the spirit.

I've bought and used these LED's before. You can find them cheap here.
I've built a few things with these and they are impressive. A solar cell, two AA rechargable batteries and one of these lights can be put to use just about anywhere.

Try All Electronics. They have it online here for $40, they also have store fronts in Van Nuys and LA. I've been mail ordering stuff from this place for well over 10 years..

Try All Electronics. They have it online here for $40, they also have store fronts in Van Nuys and LA. I've been mail ordering stuff from this place for well over 10 years..

Build the case yourself, and use a small powersupply from MPJA or All Electronics

It can be done for less than $30. Those places also have plastic and metal project cases that would probably do fine as a computer case.

As a cheap alternative to a fan controller, I've been using these PCB thermostats to control fans.

For a buck you get a little four-legged chip (fits standard 8-pin-DIP sockets) that closes a circuit when the temperature rises to around 75-80C.

Rated for 1A and 120VAC, more than enough for your average PC cooling fan. Just tack to the hottest chip(s) on your board with heatsink epoxy.

I found this site which looked promising for some of my needs in the quest to make cool gadgety add-ons to my computer.

Right at the top of the page. It took me 15 seconds on google to find it.

The All Electronics Corporation has a decent online presence. They might not have everything you want, but when they do, it's cheap. They often have things you may not know you wanted, strange assemblies pulled from unsold hardware and whatnot.

Two big options:

First is to get a temp controlled fan to start with. A lot of big fan companies make them, but they're usually sold OEM style. I picked up some nice Nidec 92mm ones from All Electronics. They only spin at about half speed until the temp gets to 70F, and they ramp up from there. Nice, quiet units, but a touch sensitive to dirty power (IE. for some reason, they refuse to run off 12V (car...) batery chargers. +)

Your other easy option would be to get something like a digidoc, which monitors temps, and can switch fans...

As if that would be so easy. After reading your postactually went to the site to look at the LCDisplay. I don't think it plugs directly into a 15-pin VGA connector, you'll have to come up with some sort of controller... but I like the idea.. if not for Winamp, there's got to be some application for it..

First off, ditch the idea of using one of those "water cooling" kits - while it sounds good at first glance, they are only meant to move heat away from the CPU, and drop the CPU temp to ambient (as other posters have noted). More experienced (and brave) OC'ers have used them to move the heat away quickly from a TEC cooler (thermoelectric peltier module) - to really drop the temperature - and this is what you want to do, really. So...

First off, get a TEC heatsink system - cheap. I am going to be a nice guy and do your research for you, since you are a photo geek, and not an electronics one, probably (maybe you are - some photo geeks are greatly into the electronics side of things as well). So, first - purchase one of these - All Electronics is a good company and I have never had a problem with an order through them.

Now, the heat sink would go on the outside of your holding tank of water (for a holding tank, use a large plastic drink cooler or something similar - or some kind of larger metal container - if metal, though, insulate it after attaching the TEC). The heatsink on this device that All Electronics sells is on the hot side. The smaller metal side is the cold side of the TEC. These units were originally meant for refrigerator coolers (in fact, if you wanted to spend a little money, you could go this route as well). You might want to mount a heatsink on the cold side (AKA a coldsink) as well, to increase the surface area of it to the water. Remember to seal the area around the holes on the tank with a good amount of silicone glue (aquarium sealant) to prevent leaks.

Now, you might find you can do without a thermostat - how? The TEC runs on about 5 to 14 VDC - and it should be pre-wired correctly for hot/cold side (call All Electronics and ask - they might even give you a data sheet or something - back of napkin type drawing) as shown in the photo - hot side on the heatsink, cold on the bare plate - but who knows, it may be reversed...

If you use a metal container for the water, you could make the metal container be the coldsink side, instead of a seperate heatsink. Now, since the voltage can be varied to run the cooler, you can select a temperature range (actually, you would be varying the input/output of the TEC) to run at. If you mount the TEC near the bottom of the container, convection may help you - or get a circulation pump (like a small fountain pump). Also, add a couple of fans to the hot side heatsink, to increase the amount of heat it can pump away - you may want to vector this heat to the outside of your darkroom (don't want your darkroom to get hot and raise the ambient temp). Or, if fans aren't enough, use a water block and water cooling through a radiator (in effect, doing partially what you originally intended, with the added addition of the peltier - however, it might be more trouble than it is worth)...

Put a thermometer in the tank, turn on the TEC to max voltage (hook it up to 12 volts, through a potentiometer or rheostat, to vary the voltage) (and optionally the circulation pump), and wait a few hours. Check the temperature - too cold? Lower the voltage of the TEC, check the temp again. Keep doing this until the needed temp is arrived at. You should be able to achieve up to a 20 degree drop in temp on the water this way. After you have gotten the temperature of the water where you want it, then leave the potentiometer/rheostat at that setting and check it again every day over a week, and note what the fluctuation is - if there is any. There may or may not be - and if there is, it may be fluctuating with the room temp, etc - but if you keep that constant, the water temp should be pretty constant as well.

If you need a thermostat, I believe Radio Shack (and others) sells an electronic one (RS Cat #910-4922 and temp probe 910-4917) that can switch a relay on and off at a set temperature. You can then use this relay to control the TEC.

I hope this helps - you should be able to do it all for less than $100.00 if you shop smart. If you need help with the electronics, ask around - maybe a friend or someone else can get it hooked up...

Worldcom - Generation Duh!