Wednesday, August 10, 2016

Review | Circuit Scribe

It's me again. Carter here. Back with another SL testing of a crazy way for you to draw electronic circuits... with a ballpoint pen. I know, you're shocked.



...You are shocked, right? Anyway keep reading and I'll give you the low-down on this fabulous product that raised nearly $700,000 on Kickstarter.

Also, a big thank-you to the folks at Electroninks Inc.! (I know, it's like a tougue-twister.) You can find them and their products at their website:



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Review - The Circuit Scribe System



What is Circuit Scribe? To put it shortly, it's a rollerball pen that writes with conductive silver ink. Limited editon 24K gold ink (not) coming soon. But it makes drawing circuits as easy a laying down a line on a piece of paper.



The Electroninks team was very generous and on the ball with sending me my review unit, it arrived just a couple days after I contacted them. So kudos to them for their speed. My review package consited of the Circuit Scribe Ultimate Kit, which includes, among other goodies,

-Workbook/Sketchbook

-Steel Sheet

-Resistors


...A bunch of modules, including:

-Dual-colored LEDs

-9V battery adapter (with included 9V battery)

-Motor

-Switches

-Jumper wires

...And more. The jumper cables let your circuit sketches become Arduino compatible, which is really cool. It makes the learning curve for basic Arduino skills far less of a challenge, without any messy breadboards to build. If you can draw it, you can power it.

But there are so many amazing elements to the kit! You can really do a lot with Circuit Scribe, depending on which kit you buy. And even if you don't use the snap-and-play modules, the conductive pen by itself has a lot of uses with standard electronic elements.


The Hardware:


When it comes to conductive inks, Circuit Scribe really sweeps away the competition. As shown in their Kickstarter video, they've really perfected the formula for a non-toxic, water-based, conductive silver ink that dries nearly instantly. This allow for the creation of circuits that connect every time and can be set up in moments.

The workbook contains a plethora of mini-lessons on how to use your pen and how the components work. Outlines on the paper let you know where to place the correct connections, but again, don't feel restricted to those lines. The beauty to Circuit Scribe is that you can put the ink anywhere and, as long as you put down a solid line and don't cross connections, it will still light up. Or beep. Or do whatever you can think of! (Except, perhaps, make you a sandwich. I'll suggest that to them for a future module.)

The steel sheet included in the kit is what allows you to hold the modules to the paper. Simply place it behind a workbook page (Or any piece of paper) and your modules will snap onto the paper with a nice, solid click. Also, the back of the sheet has a nice diagram on how each component functions.

When you've finished setting up your circuit, you can power it all using the 9V battery and snap adapter included the kit. This is an especially nice touch by the Circuit Scribe folks; not too many companies package batteries with their kits. So it was nice to find a power source included.


I've mentioned so much, and yet I feel like I've only scratched the surface of the Circuit Scribe system. Follow that link at the beginning to discover their site and all the various products they offer in this kit and beyond!


The Software:

Not much to say here. Obviously, there's no real software for this hardware-centric product, but if you intend to use this with Arduino, (Which if you have it, I recommend) you'll need the Arduino IDE. 

Oh, and the Autodesk 123D Circuits software, which lets you create virtual circuitry, works with Circuit Scribe, meaning you can set up a full circuit on your screen and make sure it works before you lay down a sing drop of ink.


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Did I convince you to grab this fantastic kit for yourself? If I did let me know in the comments below and then head on over to their Store and, as always, tell 'em Carter sent you. 

Catch you later, skaters!...



..Carter.. 

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