Friday New Product Post

It's Friday so that means another new product post where we get to talk about all the new products we have for the week. This week, we have some useful bits and even a little project we threw together to demonstrate two of our new boards.

The box of 'free kittenz' is probably one of the creepier projects we've created. It was funny to walk around the office and hear muffled sounds of kittens. Surprisingly, we got some good pictures, even though people didn't know their picture was being taken. All in all, it was a fun project and wasn't that hard to set up.

We also have a new version of our JPEG trigger as well. This new version has been revamped to work directly with the Linksprite JPEG camera we sell. It even has mounting holes for the camera so you can have a nice modular unit! The board has 3 digital and 3 analog triggers. When one of the analog or digital inputs are triggered, it tells the camera to take a picture and stores the image on the microSD card, it's that easy. Example code is included on the product page.

We have a new version of our MP3 shield that has some new features. Instead of using both the MP3 shield and a MicroSD Shield, we've combined them into the MP3 Player Shield. This board uses an on-board microSD card reader to store your MP3 files. So now you can use your Arduino as a fully-featured MP3 player, complete with a headphone jack. We even have some example code so you get get the board working right when you get it.

If your rover is having a hard time managing potholes, cracks in the pavement, or debris, maybe it's time to upgrade to some off-road wheels? Our new 120x60mm wheels will allow your vehicle to travel over some pretty rugged terrain. They easily mount to any 4mm motor shaft and can add some bling to your next project.

I know we've all wanted to have a robot voice sometime in our life. It can come in handy for certain situations (parties, karaoke, reading wedding vows, testifying in court). We now carry an IC that can modulate audio signals with special effects (robot or vibrato). The HT8950 is inexpensive and bound to entertain or severely annoy your friends.

I've always like using reed switches. They are switches that close when near a magnetic field. You can use them for contact-free or hidden switches. These new reed switches are encapsulated in plastic so they aren't as fragile as our glass reed switches. They can even be easily mounted on a PCB for reading RPM and such.

Because of some customer comments, we decided to come out with a new revision of our RN-41 Bluetooth Breakout which doesn't have the headers populated. Now you can choose how you want to populate the headers and aren't forced to use male headers on the old version. Nothing else has changed with this revision.

And finally, we have a new revision of our LMZ14203 Breakout which corrects the silkscreen issue we had on the last one. You can get up to 3A of current out of this efficient DC-to-DC step-down converter.

Well, there you have it. Products, a video, a project, and the empty promise of free kittens. What else could you ask for? Thanks for reading and we'll see you next week with more products.