User: widgetaah

Arduino, built for hobbyist

On: Ask Slashdot: Best EEPROM Programmer For a Hobbyists?

I have used these open-source hardware boards for quite some time in a university setting.
littlebirdelectronics.com/collections/arduino

They are USB and programmed with the wiring and/or processing software (open-source, multi-platform).
wiring.org.co/download processing.org

They are cheap, robust and easy to program.