I reported recently that Adafruit were selling off TV-B-Gone Kits at discounted rates in preparation for the the release of a revised kit, well I got news today that they have now released the New TV-B-Gone kits.  Previously European customers would receive a kit programmed to North American TV’s.  The Attiny processors on them can be reprogrammed to use UK/European codes using a USB programmer.

However the latest revision has broader appeal being pre-programmed to most regions worldwide.  This means that you can purchase the kit alone if you live elsewhere.  It’s a great kit, easy to build and fun to use. 

You may wish to add a case to your shopping list, as the kit comes bare (though functional even without), you can see my version here

Read more at….

New TV-B-Gone kit - Works in North America, Europe/UK & Asia!
adafruit

A second competition is on at Audioholics Forums this week, this time for a set of monitor speakers from Ram Electronics. 

Again I can’t enter this as it is for N.Americans (you guys and girls get all the fun).  But I know a lot of my readers are. 

Got to be in it to win it I guess so head over there and see if this one is for you….

Enter to Win: Audioengine 2 Speakers from Ram Electronics - Audioholics Home Theater Forums

Although I am not what you would call active across at the Audioholics forum I do keep an eye on them.

I spotted a couple of competitions on them, and what can I say I love to enter competitions!  Unfortunately for me this one is only open to N.America so I can’t enter, but perhaps you can.  The prize is a set of outdoor speakers from Intimus.  I don’t know too much about them, but outdoor speakers are outdoor speakers.

If you want to share the joy of some music while you entertain outdoors these may be for you.

Enter to Win: Outdoor Speakers from Aperion Audio - Audioholics Home Theater Forums

It’s hard for me to believe, but the website is one year old today.  I would have missed it myself, had it not been for the web hosting company extracting the fees from my account. 

And what a year it has been, the site has had over 45,000 unique visitors in that time and 100,s of thousands of page views.  Not a bad first year I feel.  I am also proud to say that the site has had a couple of very popular stories.

I am looking forward to building upon the library of articles on the site over the coming year and hopefully increasing the traffic to the site even more. 

I would also like to take a few moments to thank those that have contributed some brilliant articles to the site.  I have found them fascinating and I know that the readers appreciated them also.  If anyone wishes to contribute, please feel free to contact me here.  Don’t worry too much about your writing skills, Content is king, everything else can be finessed.

Most of all I would like to thank everyone who has visited and been in touch.  I hope that every visitor takes something away with them that has been useful to them. 

So please keep coming back, please keep making comments and please keep adding articles.  It’s been a highly enjoyable year for me so one more thank you to everybody!!

Gainphile has been busy again with a revision (I believe 13th) of his open baffle speakers.  The dedication to perfection is incredible!

Over at his blog there are brief details and measurements, however follow the link from there to see the full story on diyaudio.

Open baffle designs are not seen so much in commercial offerings but have some strong followers in the DIY builders community, basically they are speakers with no enclosure.

S9 Open Baffle Speakers

I like this hack, mostly because the builder took a very pragmatic approach to achieving his goal.  The RFID (Radio Frequency ID) reader used s designed to work on a serial port. 

Rather than build a circuit from the ground up to get this working on a USB port, a USB to serial adaptor was used instead. 

The end result is rough and ready, but think how much work and money was saved by using a cheap adaptor. 

Not only that but an un-needed MAX 213 was salvaged for the parts bin.  OK these can be ordered on Maxims sample program, but parts bins always need that extra piece.

Read more at….Elektronika.ba - Lazy man's USB RFID reader

You may have read already my review/build article on the TV-B-Gone Kit that I recently bought from Adafruit.  Well I spotted in my e-mail this morning that Adafruit is having a clearout.  They have a new TV-B-Gone kit in the pipeline and wish to clear through stocks of their existing kit.

Their announcement doesn’t mention too much about the new kit other than that it will include codes for all regions. The one on sale is pre-loaded with North American and Asian remote control codes. 

However if you have the USB Attiny programmer, also available from  Adafruit, you can reprogram the discounted TV-B-Gone kit with one of several firmwares available on the web.

I love my TV-B-Gone, its a great toy and every inner child will love you for treating yourself to one.  Just be careful, the temptation to switch off a football match in the bar is likely to land you in trouble!

TV-B-Gone Kit [N. America/Asia v1.1] - $15.00 : Adafruit Industries, Unique & fun DIY electronics and kits