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So first off I've been a software developer for more then 15 years. I've been developing commercial C# applications since Microsoft introduced .NET so that said the programming part of things I have no problem with.
What I need to learn is the electronic's part. I finally got my own Netdunio Plus 2 and have already played with it making the flashing led app and a couple of button push apps.
I've been reading lots of posts on the electronics part but have not found a good very basic beginners guide so was thinking of getting the following:
Seems like a lot of money though. My biggest concern is the toolkit. I don't want to buy something that I will later want to replace because it's not very good specifically the soldering iron.
I have no experience with electronics or soldering and would like to learn this stuff first before I go starting trying to make projects I have in my head.
I guess the first question is do you have any tools already?
The kind of things you need are screw drivers, wire cutters, long nose pliers, and wire strippers. That list makes up 95% of all the hand tools I used on these kind of projects. You many have some of these already.
Now let's talk about the two big ticket items, soldering equipment and DVM.
Let's talk DVM first; you said you were a programmer, so I assume you don't use one for work. If you did, then get a Fluke and don't look back. Otherwise look on Ebay for one of the Chinese ones. I just did a quick search and the Velleman ones look pretty good. You need something that reads AC and DC volts, and amps up to about 2.0A. Don't spend over $25 so if you replace it later with a better one you haven't wasted any money.
Soldering equipment is a very different subject. Yes there is Chinese equipment that can lower your investment cost, but it's still measured in the hundreds of dollars. Four hundred will get you a nice setup to deal with both through hold and SMT. That being said, you need a simpler solution. I recommend you set your sights on a Hakko FX888D. You should be able to bag one of these on Ebay for sub $100, meaning $99.99, hahaha.
Also keep these guys in your notebook for future reference;
I forgot to address the other part of your question. I'm holding my answer on the tool kit till you answer my question, but I can answer about the parts kit.
What you are buying is the book! They are including all the components as a convenience. You could just buy the book and go purchase all the components separately. I don't recommend that because you don't know what you are look for, when you search for parts.
I'm also projecting that you have a bit of budget. If so, then get the Complete Collection kit and devour everything you can out of that book. Read it, do it, repeat as may times a necessary!
Think of buying the parts at purchasing the text book in school, or a C# reference manual. Can you get by without it? Sure. Are you a better student with it? Abolutely!
After you have finished the book and experiments, you will have the skill set to purchase many of the components on Ebay or the like in large quantities and save money, but for now you need knowledge, not a good deal on components.
I'm your opposite. Been building circuits for almost 20 years now, but just getting into programming.
Here is my experience. As mentioned before, the DVM (Digital Volt Meter, also commonly known as a multimeter). Fluke is great. They can be pricey. The last fluke I bought was upwards of $400. But that is a process meter with a bunch of bells and whisltes that I use. For most circuit applications, what you will need is a basic AC/DC volt/amp meter that also reads resistance. Unless you are building life safety equipment or ar buying $50 components, a simple multimeter from Lowe's or Radio Shack will work. Save you a few bucks. But look to eventually get a nice fluke. Greenlee, Ideal, and Klien (you can get these at a local electrical supply house) are good meters as well. I have a Simpson 260 analog meter that I use as well. Love it, AWESOME meter, but not digital, and runs about $250.
Soldering irons. I have used the full stations and the cheap $15 irons from Lowe's. The full digital stations are nice that have the head adjustable settings, and the heat gun and all the accouterments, but with all the soldering I have done, I still go back to my old plug in $20 wand. I just got one with a couple extra tips (super fine and fine) and that has worked for me with no issues. Even recently I have built 4 maker shed prototyping shields for the netduino and built 5 MAX7219 LED matrix boards. Eventually I may buy me a nice desktop iron, but until then, I'll keep using my simple wand.
As for the kits, Bernie is right. The components included are easy to get, it just makes it easy that they have it in a nice storage case. The case is VERY nice to have. I will warn you to really look at the components and what you think you may be doing. Many kits that I look at come with parts that I have no plans to use, and in that case will sit there taking up space. The books are a great source of information.
I will say I looked at the "deluxe toolkit" with the screwdrivers and pliers and soldering iron, and I have had a few of these. Me personally, I have never been very impressed with these. I ended up building my own by buying the pliers and screwdrivers I wanted and that felt good to me. Couldn't tell you price wise which way is better, but I can tell you that when I am working on boards, I always go back to the tools I pieced together.
Thanks guys think this has helped a lot. Let's start with the Toolkit.
Yes I do have come tools so thanks for turning the light on for me duh. I do have screwdrivers and pliers and wirestrippers. I do even have a multimeter don't remember what kind it's pretty big it's digital it does ac/dc I originally bought it for my model train stuff I was doing. I kind of know how to use it but it has lots of items on the dial I have no clue what they are for LOL.
What I don't have from the kit would be:
(1) 25W Soldering Iron
(1) Solder Stand w/ Sponge
(4) 5ft Lead Free Solder Tubes
(1) Desoldering Wick
(3) 25ft Spools of Solid Core 22AWG Wire
(1) Desoldering Pump
(1) Helping Hands w/ Magnifying Glass
Which based on your feedback it looks like I should not get the kit and invest more into the Soldering iron itself and buy the other things I don't have.
The links for the 2 components kits list what's in them.
Getting a divided box to put these components in is no big deal. I guess my question is would it be cheaper for me to source these components myself or just get the kits?
As for soldering since I don't know a lot about it the following items are greek to me:
(1) Desoldering Wick
(1) Desoldering Pump
Then I read something about a active carbon filter to suck away the soldering fumes.
Most of what you don't have is the soldering equipment. My thought it wait and buy it as you needed!
Get the book and kit and get started learning. The lessons are going to create new questions in your mind, which will take you to the internet, which will teach you other new things. Somewhere along the way you are going to see people using things that make you think, hmmm, maybe I could use one of those. Then consider getting one.
You probably don't need to get started soldering, so save up your coin for now and learn the electronics. Keep you eye open for a kit or lesson about learning to solder. By then you'll know what you need.
Wick and the pump are for removing the solder once you have put it some place you don't want it, hahahaha. You will want it in time, but for now, focus on the learning. Also both of these can be had at your local Radio Shack if you get in a jam.
I am in the same boat as you and am looking for the equivalent of codeplex or stackoverflow for the electronics part of the netduino. LOL! I guess I need to become more intimate with the micro framework too.
What I struggle with is understanding how to communicate with all the add-ons and knowing what the requirements are for voltage for all of them as well. Any suggestions on a site or book to explain some of this stuff? I just got my netduino plus 2 and a starter kit from sunfounder. I've got all this stuff that I want to play with but not a clue how to start out.
MicroNoob
Would like some feed back from everyone that has started where I'm at and from the electronics experts.
If you want to learn how the components work then have you thought about using breadboard as you really only need a soldering iron if you intend to build something permanent or you are buying a kit which requires you to make it up.
Just thinking you could defer the purchase or an iron until you actually needed it. I know when I first picked up the Netduino I did not use an iron for over four months. And for the record it was a cheap iron (sub £20) and I have been using it for years. I've only recently upgraded to a temperature controlled iron.
If you are wondering about kits then have a look at the Wiki. There is a tutorial section and Dan has translated the Sparkfun inventors kit tutorials to work with the Netduino.
The above comments contains a lot of good advice on tools.
BTW - I came from the same background, software, and was a beginner with the electronics three years ago. Now I'm just a beginner with a little more knowledge
Mark is right. A breadboard is a GOD SEND! You can pick up a fairly cheap one at Radio Shack, but for around $70-100, you can get a powered breadboard off Amazon or ebay. I will be getting one of these soon. The reason is it has the power supply built in. Just plug it into the wall and you have a variable power supply right at the board to power your circuits. No need for a wall transformer or batteries trying to test your circuit.
If I had a choice of a high dollar soldering iron and a simple small breadboard or a powered breadboard and a $20 soldering iron, I would have the powered breadboard.
That brings me to one of the open questions I planned to figure out. Power both for the micro control and for the project itself.
My understanding so far is if the project is very small it can be powered off of the micro controller either from the Analog or Digital pins or from the 3.3v/5v connection which depends on how your powering the micro controller either USB or Wallwart or batteries. I also understand that it's not the best way and could be dangerous in that you could let the magic smoke out of your controller.
So my next thinking was what if I had a much larger power supply either bigger wallwart or larger batteries could I power a breadboard and power the microcontroler with the one plug. I imagine I have to limit the power going to the microcontroller but does it have power input pins? I guess this is where the powered breadboard would be handy but then if the micro controller is powered from the breadboard wouldn't you want to make sure it's now powered by the USB when your updating the code on it. I guess would be safer to unplug the powered breadboard and then plug in the USB.
But what about maybe a final project where there are batteries but you want to update it via usb then you would need to .... ok let me stop myself LOL
The more questions I think of makes me think of more questions. Way to much to learn in one post let me start learning the electronics parts first and then get back to properly powering prototypes and then final projects.
Here is how I look at it. I create a "master" power supply for all my projects. That power supply is built to be a wee bit bigger than what is needed. Example, (and I am making these numbers up), let's say the Netduino uses 5 VDC and 100mA. I have 5 LED matrix driver that uses 5VDC and 40 mA. Total, that is 300 mA. I will build a power supply that is 5 VDC and is rated at about 500 mA. This is easy using small voltage regulators, etc.The theory behind power supplies can go on for days. But the simple answer is I build an external power supply and then distribute where I need to go. Also, by building a "master" ps, if you have multiple circuits that use different voltages (i.e. 12 VDC, 5 VDC, and 3.3 VDC) you build a supply at 12 VDC and then use regulators to create the 5 and the 3.3 instead of having to build 3 different supplies.
Based on experience with a project that started with a Netduino/breadboard and then moved to a Netduino mini/pcb's, consider starting out right away making whatever drew your interest to Netduino, no matter how complex it might be. Then, break that thing into pieces/sub-units that can be brought together incrementally, and just dig in to the project, learning and solving problems along the way.
I powered my breadboards and components (including a lcd display, solenoid, etc) by grabbing power from the Netduino 5V pins using jumper wires. If you are going to go the breadboard route, get a bunch of those wires. I picked up several kinds of cheap breadboards. Most of my initial parts I got from SparkFun. These days I get most things from Digikey.
A soldering iron can be handy even when doing stuff with breadboards as sometimes parts don't come with pins or you need to put your own breakout board together for a part. Any soldering iron will work for this. Keep in mind that flux beyond what may be in the solder wire is helpful. I started out with a $20 iron.
As far as power beyond the Netduino pins, you can do a lot with cheap battery holders. Here is a 3 AA battery holder with a switch for less than $2: link. Cut a breadboard jumper wire in half and solder the two parts to the output wires on the battery holder and you have a nice breadboard power supply. Between parallel or serial battery configurations and alkaline or lithium ion batteries, it's possible to generate a lot of different voltages and capacities. Pololu is a good source for voltage regulators that are breadboard compatible. For example, with an input as low as 1.5 V, this regulator, here, can produce a 4-25V output and it's only about $10.
