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Ask HN: What are the best Arduino starter projects?
My arduino Duemilanove arrived today, and now I'm on the hunt for things to build with it. I've seen a lot of things online, but I'm wondering... What are the best projects to start with?
- andrewljohnson 18y agoI'd just like to clear the air and ask the question on everyone's mind.... wtf are you talking about sir?
- jfarmer 18y agoThis, I guess: http://www.arduino.cc/en/Main/ArduinoBoardDuemilanove http://www.arduino.cc/en/Main/ArduinoBoardDuemilanove
- theoneill 18y agothe question on everyone's mind Well, at least everyone who's never heard of either Arduino or Google.
- icey 18y agohttp://letmegooglethatforyou.com/?q=arduino&l=1 http://letmegooglethatforyou.com/?q=arduino&l=1
- bprater 18y agoYou know how the Kitt car had the eyeball that looked right-and-left? Very straight-forward, terrific starter project. Grab 8 LEDs, some resistors and you are good to go.
- larrywright 18y agoThat's a great idea, and sure t amuse my kids as well. Thanks
- nixme 18y agoMake has a whole directory of projects: http://blog.makezine.com/archive/arduino/ http://blog.makezine.com/archive/arduino/ For quick prototypes using Ruby, check out RAD: http://rad.rubyforge.org/ http://rad.rubyforge.org/
- speek 18y agoWhat are the extents of your experiences with soldering/electronic components?
- larrywright 18y agoMy soldering skills are a bit rusty, but I know my way around electronics.
- chrisconley 18y agoThe Arduino site itself has a ton of great examples that helped me get started: http://arduino.cc/en/Tutorial/HomePage http://arduino.cc/en/Tutorial/HomePage
- enomar 18y agoThat depends entirely on your skill level. If you're not skilled at building circuits, start my making various configurations of LEDs blink. Making full RGB displays is pretty neat (and easy) to do with Arduino's pulse width modulation feature. http://video.aol.com/video-detail/arduino-pwm-rgb-led-mood-light/3708580823 http://video.aol.com/video-detail/arduino-pwm-rgb-led-mood-l...
- dws 18y agoGetting an LED to blink is a great first step. You'll work through most of the technology stack to get there.
- larrywright 18y agoThat is in fact my first project, I'm looking for things beyond that.
- jws 18y agoI would suggest it is whatever feeds your dreams. Many things are possible, the only caution is to make your first step doable. How about you tell us what you think would be cool and we could suggest how big the first step should be? (For reference if you need help getting started: things I've made from Arduinos... analog meter display for a bank for T1 network loads cylon pumpkin (laugh, but eventually everyone makes one) ambient light sensitive LED, using the same LED for sensing as making light (pretty nifty trick, makes me wonder my more electronics don't do it. No need for blinding indicators in a dark room) 2d ultrasonic anemometer weather station wireless network from ISM band ASK radios (worked, but integrated solutions are probably better) DC power controller/rationer for solar powered unmanned remote telemetry system DC motor controller for http://8ball.lunarware.com (not online yet) Multichannel temperature monitor for a cranky air conditioner (lots of data, no idea how to interpret, a lesson there somehwere) Tiny LED xmas tree for my daughter, red LED ornament blinks secret message in morse code Multi channel servo controller from a PWM LED driver. USB low speed interface with just a couple pins and resistors. )
- streety 18y agoambient light sensitive LED, using the same LED for sensing as making light (pretty nifty trick, makes me wonder my more electronics don't do it. No need for blinding indicators in a dark room) I've recently bought an arduino and have been playing around with it. I'm definitely a novice when it comes to electronics but I would love to know how that works. Do you have writeups online for any of these projects?
- jws 18y agoI think I wrote this: http://www.arduino.cc/playground/Learning/LEDSensor http://www.arduino.cc/playground/Learning/LEDSensor The key points are remembering that there is capacitance on the pins of the microcontroller, and that while forcing an electron across from P to N emits a photon, absorbing a photon lets an electron back from N to P if it wants to go.
- deleted 18y ago[deleted]
- dbr 18y agoSomething simple. For my first project, I bought a ultrasonic sensor and a bar graph led and output the distance sensed on it. Focus on getting accustomed to the hardware you're working with before you try too challenging.
- raamdev 18y agoThe book "Making Things Talk" (O'Reilly) is a great way to start: http://oreilly.com/catalog/9780596510510/ http://oreilly.com/catalog/9780596510510/
- larrywright 18y agoI've seen that before, but I'd forgotten about it. Thanks
- markessien 18y agoWell, I'm working on something ambitious with the Arduino, and you may be interested in also working on the same project, but maybe as your second project. Anyone who is interested in getting into hardware hacking from a programmer perspective on something that I find pretty cool should send me an email at markessien at gmail com, and I'll send you a notification when I have the stuff online (3-4 weeks).
- nick5768 18y agohttp://www.ladyada.net/learn/arduino/ http://www.ladyada.net/learn/arduino/ I would also suggest browsing the rest of her site as it is a treasure trove of information related to electronics.
- larrywright 18y agoThat was very helpful - thanks!
- minimee 18y agoany arduino starter kit with Ethernet ???
- larrywright 18y agoI don't think so. There is one with Bluetooth however.