Category acquired things

Sovtek 7474 IC

I wasn’t aware that Sovtek ever made ICs. Then again, it might not be the Sovtek which is so well known for its guitar parts and tubes and whatnot. Beyond that 7474 there (and it’s eight or so peers) I’ve also got a couple of 7410 parts.

So, where did I get them?

Well, my coworker Jeff had, sometime in the mid 90s, attended one of the local ITT Tech schools. As part of this he received a rather large toolcase which he used to store the electronics parts and tools he used. A few weeks back he told me that I could have his old breadboard, which would be quite handy as I’ve started to find my current one a bit cramped at times. Well, instead of giving me just the breadboard, he gave me the entire case full of stuff, including cables, trays of ICs, and a whole bunch of loose parts.

Tonight I spent some time cleaning out the case, throwing out all the loose resistors, electrolytic caps (I’m not stupid enough to keep mid-90s caps), bits of wire which aren’t of the heavy / pre-tinned version designed for breadboard jumpers, plastic bags, and the other hard to identify / low cost / broken parts. What was left over should be quite handy, especially because I’ve had a strong desire to do some things with discreet logic.

These parts include:

· The aforementioned ICs.
· A large handful of ceramic caps.
· Twenty or so mixed inductors.
· Loads of Pomona cables, typically for connecting to multimeters with BNC connections.
· The really nice, large breadboard.
· Lots and lots of ICs, mostly 74 series, ADCs, and opamps, many of brands I’ve never heard of.
· Mixed older optoelectronics.
· Logic probe and pulser.
· Other stuff, which I’m sure I’m forgetting, but looked useful so it wasn’t tossed…

So, this should be pretty neat. I might finally have enough parts laying around to play with doing some things with discreet logic. Now… What? It would be interesting to maybe design a small tabletop analog synth. Maybe something like the PAiA FatMan but easier to build, in a better case, possibly lower cost, and wholly open source. Hmm… After the audio switch, of course, and the (likely) for-pay project that I’m hoping to wrap up soon as well.

So, I’m really tempted to pick up a new scope. I’ve got a piece of crap Goldstar (I believe) analog scope I picked up off of eBay for $70 shipped a few years back. While it’s okay for making pretty pictures I’ve been having problems actually using it to test things. For example, when checking out the Alien DAC (photo gallery retired) I couldn’t really see the test patterns I was playing through it over the noise from the scope and probes.

I’ve been looking at one of the new Tektronix TDS1002B scopes. It is a 2-channel, 60MHz, 1GS/sec scopes with monochrome LCD display (image). It’s also got USB ports with support for dumping images to mass storage devices or printing straight to PictBridge compatible printers. (Also, the first good use I’ve heard of for PictBridge… Normally I think of it as a digital camera feature which no one really uses.)

The price for the TDS1002B from Tequipment.net is $1009.80, and I’d probably need to pick up a probe or two as well. I’m still poking around Tek’s site to see if the scope does everything I want, in particular communication with PCs to make sharing of the data easier, but it looks like it will.

Now I’ll just need to budget for it.

LEDs in the Xbox 360 Chatpad
(Click for more Xbox 360 Chatpad disassembly photos (photo gallery retired)…)

While out at lunch today we swung by Best Buy where I was both was hassled by loss prevention^†and where I acquired an Xbox 360 Messenger Kit. This small keyboard which snaps on to the bottom of the Xbox 360 controller (wired or wireless) is a pretty nice accessory and makes typing messages and filling out forms on the 360 far easier than using the on-screen keyboard.

After looking at it for a bit, I realized that the Chatpad has four data lines, leading me to wonder if it is really a USB device and if the controller contains a USB hub. So, what did I do when I got home? I tore apart my brand new Xbox 360 Chatpad (photo gallery retired).

All of the photos can be seen here (photo gallery retired), but the most notable ones are the ones which show its PIC16F883 microcontroller, the individual key LEDs for specialized keys, and plastic peg / inverted dome key design.

^† When leaving the Loss Prevention asshat demanded to see our receipts, and after questioning him briefly as to why he needed to see it, I took it out just to be nice, when he grabbed it from my hand, thoroughly checked it over compared to what I was carrying, then explained to me how it’s something he “has” to do, and that he “doesn’t check all receipts”. When asked if he picks who to check, he answered affirmatively, and when I asked why I was singled out for a subjective check he just walked away.

I’m still not quite sure how to deal with it from here, but what I should have done was simply not show the receipt and walk out the door. I’m not sure why I didn’t… Probably because I was talking with my coworkers who were standing there as well, and I couldn’t have just walked out to my car.

I partially feel like an ass for not doing what is right, and partially for having to deal with a jackass LP tool at Best Buy.