Archive

Author Archive

mikroElektronika ARM development tools

May 28th, 2012 No comments

Recently mikroElektronika has been so kind to send us a couple of samples of their latest ARM development tool series.

The latest mikroElektronika ARM development tool series


mikroElektronika is known for their broad range of development boards especially in the PIC series where the most common board is their EasyPIC board. Now they have done it again and come up with a new product line – the ARM series.
Read more…

Categories: ARM, Development boards, Reviews, Tools Tags:

Review: ChipKIT Uno32

May 26th, 2012 11 comments

Name: ChipKIT Uno32
Distributor: Farnell
Price: £18.94 ~ $30

Evaluation Type: Development Board, PIC32
Application you used the part in: Arduino form-factored development/prototyping
Was everything in the box required?: The box only contains the board itself, nothing else
What were the biggest problems encountered?: Shield compatibility with other Arduino shields (should be 3.3V compatible)

Read more…

Categories: ARM, Development boards, Reviews Tags:

Review: STM32F4-DISCOVERY

April 6th, 2012 43 comments

Name: STM32F4-DISCOVERY
Distributor: DigiKey
Price: ~$20

Evaluation Type: Development Board, ARM Cortex-M4
Application you used the part in: QuadCopter
Was everything in the box required?: The box only contains the board itself, nothing else
What were the biggest problems encountered?: It is hard to find a good but inexpensive or free compiler

Read more…

Categories: ARM, Development boards, Reviews Tags:

QuadCopters – How to get started

March 27th, 2012 143 comments

I have been watching different videos of QuadCopters recently and I’ve been pretty amused. The way they fly and the way they control their movements is unbelievable – it almost looks like a bug.

If you don’t know what a QuadCopter is, you should definitely have a look at the video below where some advanced features of cooperating Quadcopters are displayed:

So I decided to start reading some more about the materials behind these QuadCopters and how they manage to stabilize in the air.

In this blog post I will try to describe the different steps I have been thru to plan, design and build the prototype of my QuadCopter. There will be coming some more blog posts later on describing how to get the QuadCopter running, programming it, tuning it etc.

This blog post is divided into 3 parts

  1. What is a QuadCopter
    1. Brushless motors
    2. Propellers
    3. Roll, Pitch and Yaw
    4. ESC – Electronic Speed Controller
    5. Battery
    6. The frame
    7. Frame configuration
    8. Inertial Measurement Unit
    9. Controller electronics
  2. Initial decisions
    1. Theoretical calculator
  3. Conclusion

Read more…

Categories: Guides, Multirotors, TKJ Electronics Tags:

Giving away 6 free CeBIT eTickets

February 28th, 2012 No comments

Are you going to CeBIT 2012 but are still missing the tickets?
We have been given quite an amount of tickets from different vendors. So we would like to see you there too and would therefor like to offer you a free ticket (?34 normally).

If you are interested in this limited offer please send us an email at: mail@tkjelectronics.dk
The tickets will be given on a first serve basis.

Categories: TKJ Electronics Tags:

Winner of the "Project Idea" contest

February 21st, 2012 2 comments

STM32F4DISCOVERY Board

Yesterday our “Project Idea” contest ended and we have spent the day reading all the project ideas from you.
Some of them were more advanced than others but we have received a great number of project ideas and would like to thank you all for participating.

So now we are ready to present the winning Project Idea:


Project Title: Use of a Micro controller in a 50MHz to 1GHz spectrum analyser project.

This project idea was sent to us by Roberto Savo, an RF Electronics Engineer from South Africa.


Read more…

Categories: TKJ Electronics Tags:

Raspberry Pi – a BeagleBoard competitor

February 18th, 2012 No comments

Soon a BeagleBoard competitor will be released – the Raspberry Pi.

Raspberry Pi - Embedded ARM11 Computer


The Raspberry Pi is a small credit card sized ARM11 embedded computer, capable of running embedded Linux or WinCE.
When released it is supposed to be available in two models, where the biggest difference is the ethernet connector.

The first model, which comes with 128MB RAM, 1x USB but no ethernet will be priced at $25.
That’s an insane price for an embedded computer capable of doing HD video by using the onboard HDMI connector.

The second model, which comes with 256MB RAM, 2x USB and also ethernet, will be priced at $35.
And most of the times embedded applications requires some kind of internet connection as almost everything in this world becomes online. So why not spend those $10 extra to get the ethernet capability too.

The Raspberry Pi is expected to be sold in the end of February, though the initial stock is limited to around 10.000pcs so you have to be fast. Hopefully we will be able to do a review of the board soon.

Via: Raspberry Pi

Categories: ARM, Development boards, Raspberry Pi Tags:

"Project Idea" contest – win a STM32F4DISCOVERY kit

January 15th, 2012 No comments

STM32F4DISCOVERY Board

It is going very well with us, TKJ Electronics. We have a lot of ongoing projects and try as much as possible to update the blog with information about these projects.
Though we thought it would be very interesting to get some feedback from all of you brainy guys out there too, so why not make a contest about it ? and as announced previously there will of course be a price.

So instead of it being us publishing information about our projects all the time we would like to know more about your project ideas or what projects you would like to see designed.

The only requirements for the project ideas are the following

  • The project should include some kind of microprocessor (PIC, AVR, Arduino, mbed, LPC, STM32, other ARM etc.)
  • The project should be affordable with a budget of $200 – this is just the electronics cost for use in the development (not the target price)
  • The project can?t be something we already have done, but it is ok to use parts of our previous projects
  • The project idea description should be at least 75 words

Read more…

Categories: TKJ Electronics Tags:

"Project Idea" contest – 16. January 2012

January 11th, 2012 No comments

We will soon be holding a contest about project ideas, as we would like to get some feedback from all of you brainy guys out there – and of course there will be a price.

So instead of it being us that makes the ideas for new projects all the time we would like to know what you think and what projects you would like to see designed.

At the 16. January 2012 the contest will be opened and everyone is free to enter with their project idea.
The only requirements for the project idea are the following

  • The project should include some kind of microprocessor (PIC, AVR, Arduino, mbed, LPC, STM32, other ARM etc.)
  • The project should be affordable with a budget of $200.
  • The project can’t be something we already have done, but it is ok to use parts of our previous projects

At the 20. February 2012, about 5 weeks later, we will close the contest and select the best idea. The author of the best idea will win the new STM32F4 Cortex-M4 Discovery Kit from ST Microelectronics.

You can read more about the winning price (kit) in our webshop: STM32F4DISCOVERY

Categories: TKJ Electronics Tags:

Webshop – Grand Opening

January 4th, 2012 No comments

Hello fellow blog-readers.

Tonight is a big and great day for TKJ Electronics because we can finally announce the grand opening of our awaited Webshop: SHOP.TKJElectronics.dk

The webshop for now currently contains primarily our Arduino NXT Shield at a price of $43.00 excl. VAT and also our mbed Periphiral Board at a price of $33.50 excl. VAT.

Besides of that the shop also contains some of the standard components and tools needed when doing development – Breadboards, wires, pin headers and LEDs.
There will definitely be more products in the future – but lets say, this is reasonable beginning 🙂



Due to the delayed opening we would like to offer you a $10-off coupon for the products found in the Development boards category (including our boards). The coupon is valid thru January 2012 and it can be used as many times you like.

When checking out please type in the following Discount Code: GRAND-OPENING

Thank you very much for your patience and see you soon in the webstore.
Happy New Year!

 
The TKJ Electronics staff

Categories: TKJ Electronics Tags: