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Easy? Not so... this is not a beginner's kit, there are surface mount components, and if this is your first time soldering, it's gonna be a rough day. Sparkfu
by veemjeem 14y ago
Easy? Not so... this is not a beginner's kit, there are surface mount components, and if this is your first time soldering, it's gonna be a rough day.
Sparkfun does a really good job of making their kits easy. If you look closely at them, the boards that require diodes and electrolytic capacitors have a picture printed on the pcb that make it really obvious what the polarity is. The gertboard pcb doesn't have any of these. If you solder a led backwards, you're SOL. So if you haven't seen a diode or led before, you probably shouldn't pick the gertboard as a first project.
You can buy the arduino as a kit, but most people who are just starting out with electronics will get one prebuilt so they don't accidentally stick their atmega chip in backwards.
- tcdent 14y agoI don't see anything but through-hole components here, and I don't think anyone would encourage a beginner to dive into a surface mounted design as their first project. http://www.element14.com/community/themes/images/raspberrypi/gertboard_400straight.gif http://www.element14.com/community/themes/images/raspberrypi...
- veemjeem 14y agoThat's because your picture is too small to see the surface mount stuff :-) See this larger picture: http://www.raspberrypi.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/image002.png http://www.raspberrypi.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/image0... Or read the assembly manual where they teach how to solder surface mount components. There's a bunch of resistors & capacitors all over the board that happen to be surface mount. http://www.element14.com/community/servlet/JiveServlet/downloadBody/48916-102-1-256003/Gertboard_Assembly_Manual_Rev1.1_F.pdf http://www.element14.com/community/servlet/JiveServlet/downl...
- jberryman 14y agoAh, well I retract my statement, but only because of the SMD parts.