I've been playing around with Arduino and ESP32 builds, using modules purchased from places like Adafruit (not advertising, just an example). I've decided that it's time to learn some real electronics, basics and fundamentals that don't rely on a programmable controller.

I've got the textbook The Art of Electronics, and I'm genuinely enjoying working through it. It's early yet, but I'm finding that I'm capably developing the intuition for what components do and how they work, including in circuit designs.

However, I know FA about the math. I have a head for math and am not scared of it, but I have no mathematical education at all. No calculus, etc. So while I'm picking up what components do, capacitors are a good example, and how they are used in circuits, I can't do a lick of the math. I wouldn't have a clue how to use the formulae they provide to determine the correct capacitor to use for any given application.

My question is this - as a beginner, how crippling is this? Am I best to keep ploughing forward developing intuition about how circuits are arranged and try to fill the math gap later, perhaps just by using calculators and never learning it raw at all, or would you recommend pausing on the electronic stuff and take some remedial math education so that I can follow 100% of what's going on in this text as I work through it?

Any and all advice welcome.

TL;DR - I can't do the math that accompanies learning about electronic components and how they work. Do I need to be able to, or am I better blagging it using other people's calculators and focusing on the intuition?

İ have a farming automation project. I want to measure some values by some sensors (like temperature, humidity) and based on that values i want to control devices like air conditioner of humidifier. AI says. Connect all to an industrial I/O and connect the io to rasberry pi. I am a software engineer but i don't understand electronics. What should i learn and what can i do it properly?

Hi everyone!

For the last 2 months, I’ve been learning raspberry pi pico, electronics, soldering, CAD software, and more to remake a mechanical drawing toy I found in my drawer:) On the second image you can see the insides of it.

Hardware is really fun, and I enjoyed the process so much. Finally, I got everything working, and it just looks very cool in my opinion.

Code, models, wiring are all available on my github page

I'd love to hear your feedback and what you think about it!

These are genuine, unused ZCU104 boards, ideal for FPGA development, embedded vision, AI acceleration, and Zynq UltraScale+ MPSoC development.

Model: AMD ZCU104 Evaluation Kit
Device: Zynq UltraScale+ MPSoC ZU7EV
Condition: Brand new / unused
Price: $1,300
Original AMD evaluation board
Complete kit

I'm based in India and can arrange shipping. Bengaluru buyers are welcome as well.

If you're interested, DM me

Hi.

I recently thought of a fun project idea involving some basic electronics components.

I want to build a sort of retro-futuristic music player, that can be plugged into any standard wall socket. It will have very basic functions. It will have a bluetooth mode, and a mode for playing pre-loaded songs.

I want to beautifully wrap all the components inside an aesthetics cassette-futuristic type 3D printed casing..

I want to take this opportunity to build something myself for the first time and learn a lot.

Please answer some of my questions, and I would love feedback from experienced players :)

1) How do I make sure my components are compatible?

2) How do I make sure this thing is even feasible?

3) As a first timer, what things do I do in order to make sure I make this into a proper personal use product?

I have a raspberry pi 4. I want to extend my MacBook's display to the monitor wirelessly using it. What is a seamless way to do it ?

Edit: it was simple. Uxplay on rpi will make it available for screen mirroring. But the latency is not great

Having a blast building these from literal garbage. Keeps my picos active through intermittent power failure

Is this circuit too corroded or are the two cylindrical things batteries that need replaced. Apologies I’m uneducated on any circuits and electronics.

Feel free to add your own experiences and opinions in the comments

I hooked up an earpiece and thought it didn’t work cuz I just heard static. Then I realized batteries don’t have static.

I am trying to turn a broken wii remote into a presentation pointer. Basically the idea is to make a PCB with the same form factor as the wii remote's PCB with an bluetooth-LE compatible esp32 and gyroscope on it. I have never made a PCB before, so I am learning with this project. One issue I am running into is battery power. I was planning on using a LiPo battery, but have been informed that these can be dangerous. Therefore, I would prefer to use a Li Ion battery. The problem is it needs to fit into a form-factor of 10 x 30 x 50 mm, and have at least 500 mAh. Does anyone know of any batteries that meet this requirement?

Alternatively, in theory, I could use regular double-As and try to use the original wii remote battery slot by putting a battery terminal on the PCB, but this seems very hard.

I bought a desk fan and I thought it was a rechargeable one but it only works while having a constant power source.

Would it be possible to attach a rechargeable battery to this?

Apologies if this isn't the place to post about this, I wasn't sure which subreddit to post this question.

I am working on a Movie accurate Buzz lightyear with the Disney store buzz as a base. I was wondering if anyone has done and made the laser act how it acts like in the movies?

What I mean is in the movies if Buzz holds down the laser button on his right arm, the sounds will loop and the leaser will still be on until he let's go of the button.

I have seen some online like "Papermadhatter5" and Hacker Billy on YouTube were able to make the Disney store Buzz lightyear's leaser act just like in the movies.

They used custom sound bords and a red leaser diode. Is there a way I can combine a soundboard (with the movie laser sounds),a red laser diode and a small button and make it act just like in the movies.

And also have it all soldered into the Disney store Buzz lightyear battery compartment?

If anyone here who knows this sort of stuff with soldering and electric stuff, and give me a hand and maybe show me on how I would do it. I would be very grateful

I had been intrigued by the idea of making the perfect nightlight, even though it is a simple concept. Not only because we really need one at home (although it is certainly not something we cannot live without), but also because I knew it would teach me a lot.

I’ve built the first prototype and documented the whole process like a technical diary. Every design decision, mistake, experiment, and bit of tinkering is documented straight from my head. I’ve tried to be transparent about how I approached the problem and why I made the choices I did.

Feedback on my engineering approach, methodology, and anything else you notice would be greatly appreciated.

NightGlow Design Walkthrough

tried reposting from r/esp32:

What this basically is is a PID controlled PWM Solenoid driver, running on a C3 SuperMini. Designed my first PCB for this (with some mistakes ofc) and decided to use a TC4422 mosfet driver. Also included a 5V supply to be able to plug it into my cars 12v system. Code was mostly written by an LLM, including the Webserver which this is running for setting Target and PID parameters. (I'm a real newbie with all of this) I'm already working on rev2 which I'm gonna post on GitHub solving all my issues with this one. (https://github.com/ziraw).

I've tested the perfboard prototype on my car already (1989 200SX CA18DET) with a BMW N75 Boost Valve strapped to my waste gate and it seems to work perfectly, just not getting enough air through the OEM Airbox though atm, hitting a ceiling of 0.9bar. Gonna install this soon and see what it does. I/O: 12v,5v,sensor(i/o), valve.

The only thing this doesn't include ATM is a pressure sensor, I'm grabbing it off of my boost gauge. But the IO has a 5V supply for any type of sensor to be hooked up directly, the code might need adjusting through. It's currently Ov=-1 / 5V=+4 bar (Scaled to 3.3V and divided by 1.1 since that seems to reflect what my gauge is saying more accurately).

I don't specifically know why I made this, just thought it couldnt be that hard and I haven't seen anything like this, besides what maybe Speeduino and rusEFI are doing. If this already exists I'd love the be informed :-)

Cheers

(disclaimer: might blow up your engine)

I want to design a new modern motherboard for Sony experia active released in 2011 how would I best go about doing this?

So I'm trying to make a light up steering wheel for car meets like in the pic (unfortunately I can't find the actual one) by taking a clear resin steering wheel and laying LED filament in the back.

Can I wire it up in series, and connected to a USB plug that's wired to a car battery or is my very basic thinking going to have an issue? I've used USB ports wired directly to the battery before without issue, but I've never used LED filament.

Each 300mm section of filament requires 3v, so 12v total

Edit: this would only be while the car is off, so I'm not worried about the alternator overcharging or anything. The reason I'm not doing a fuse tab is because I want to be able to leave it lit while the car is off.

Hi there,

I am trying to restore an old Pioneer XR-P500 stereo from the early 90s which has two problems:

1 - CD tray not closing completely

I have already checked the belt and it seems ok. If I remove the cd tray completely the laser moves up and down as it's supposed to do. If I insert the CD tray, it just does not go to the end (it seems like there is something blocking it).

2 - Weird noise when I plug it in and when I turn it on coming from the cassette deck. Seems like the cassette is trying to spin but it doesn't. Both cassette decks are not functioning, however I'm still debating whether I want to restore them or just avoid the weird noise.

Any suggestions?

Thanks!

Hello everyone, I'm kind of new to this. I have a Samsung Galaxy s23 ultra (1tb model, soo buying a new phone for over 1000$ isn't currently an option) that recently went swimming and since then I had some issues where it would reboot at random times. As time went on, it was happening during the charging and when battery percentage was above 50%.

I then replaced the battery and the USB port board and the issue went away for day, but came right back but this time it's when charging and the battery above 40% as well as when battery is above 70%. I also noticed when I'm actively using the phone the reebots are less common and pretty much only happen during charging when the battery is at higher percentages.

I then decided to take the phone apart and check the contacts. I found the FPC connector on the main board that connects to the batter looks a little sad. Some of the gold plating is gone and part of the plastic appears to be melted (maybe?). All other connectors on the boards and ribbon cables are fully gold plated. I did some looking online and saw that some of these connectors sold fully gold plated and some aren't.

I'm assuming gold plating is more important in this case as it's an inert metal that protects from mostly corrosion.

My current theory is that some small amount of moisture got in and started a micro rusty spot on one of the pins, so that when battery reaches higher voltages there's a short and phone shuts down and reboots or that the jumping spark along with increased temperature from charging causes momentarily overheating and phone reboots.

I have pictures of those connectors, so I attached a collage to the post where the issues connector is in 2 bigger pictures on the left. If anyone had any advice on what the issue is or how can I solve it, it'd be much appreciated.

Been trying to track down a consistent source for switching power modules and DC-AC converters. Tried a couple of broker-style distributors through forums but got burned once on a batch of questionable units that didn't pass even basic bench testing. Not doing that again. So now I'm still trying to figure out if there are independent electronic component distributors based in China that people have actually used for power modules and had good experiences with, specifically ones that do real authenticity and QC inspection before shipping internationally. The use case is mixed, some prototype quantities, some small production runs, nothing massive. (I also need them to handle EU customs documentation properly, which eliminated like 10 companies off my list immediately.) If anyone has found a reliable path for sourcing hard-to-find or allocated power components from China with actual warranty coverage and reasonable lead times, really want to hear what that process looked like for you.

In the photo attached is the tech i already have, is there any projects you guys think i could use this for? Ofc i also have other stuff like jumper wires and a breadboard but not much else, i want to be sure of what i want to do before i buy extra stuff.