• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
Build Electronic Circuits

Build Electronic Circuits

Electronics explained in a simple way

  • Start Learning
    • Basic Electronics
    • Digital Electronics
    • Circuits
    • Practical Skills
      • Printed Circuit Boards
    • Microcontrollers
      • Arduino
    • Maker Lifestyle
      • Podcast
  • About Me
  • Blog
  • Products
  • Contact
You are here: Home / Mail Archive / I made a light blink today!

I made a light blink today!

December 4, 2014 By Øyvind Nydal Dahl Leave a Comment

ATmega32u4 USB chip
But not using relays or transistors…

I used a microcontroller.

As you may or may not have noticed – I have been writing a tutorial on microcontrollers. Which you can find here by the way:

https://www.build-electronic-circuits.com/microcontroller-tutorial-part1/

And today I soldered it and programmed it with a program that makes a LED blink.

It was awesome! I still get a kick from making things like this work =)

But how do you figure out what components you need to make such a circuit?

If you read my email yesterday, I wrote about how you can use the datasheet as a powerful tool.

And it’s in the datasheet you figure out things like which components to put in a microcontroller circuit.

After I had chosen the microcontroller I wanted to use – I only needed to look up a few things in the datasheet – then I knew which components I needed.

If you are just starting out, and have never seen a datasheet before, then you will probably feel a bit overwhelmed when you look at the datasheet of a microcontroller.

But after doing it a few times, you start to know what to look for and not.

If you know you are not going to use the “Analog to Digital Converter”, then you just skip that section.

This is basically how I design circuits with chips that I don’t know how to use. I skim through the datasheet and figure it out.

So if you still haven’t seen a datasheet, then it’s time. It’s super useful when you get the hang of it.

…and if you are ready to dive into the basics of building circuits, then check out «Getting Started With Electronics» by yours truly:

https://www.build-electronic-circuits.com/products/ebook-2nd-edition/

Keep on Soldering!
Oyvind

Filed Under: Mail Archive

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

Search:

Footer

Topics

  • Basic Electronics
  • Digital Electronics
  • Circuits
  • Practical Skills
  • Microcontrollers
  • Maker Lifestyle
  • Newsletter Archive

Social:

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • YouTube

Copyright © 2021 · Ohmify AS · Terms and Conditions · Privacy Policy