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QCPete

Member Since: January 28, 2009

Country: United States

Profile

Bio

I started at SparkFun in September of 2007 as an assembly technician. My experience in electronics had consisted of only running sound equipment for my band and fixing the occasional broken guitar cord. After only a few days on the production floor, my skills with a soldering iron improved dramatically, and I was building beautiful little widgets. It wasn't too long before I started wondering how all these circuit boards actually worked. Whenever I had the chance, I would walk across the hallway to the engineers and ask for 5 minutes of their time. I learned words like micro controller, source code, op amp and many more. I was hooked.

My first project was an analog headphone amp. It was something I could use as a performing musician. This has since kept me busy on week nights (and most weekends) as I've grown my own business around audio products for musicians.

While perfecting my headphone amp design, I got into other DIY projects too. Before long, I was in my front lawn with my laptop and a few servos. I was hacking my sprinkler system. With some active pressure control, I was able to make my sprinkler shoot a perfect square. My neighbors thought I was a crazy :)

Little did I know that taking this position at SparkFun would open my eyes to a new favorite creative outlet, DIY Electronics. I get super stoked about a lot of things, but from the moment I felt that initial spark of interest, I knew this was something very special. I was learning tools that would allow me to truly harness my inner inventor.

In the last few years I have focused my energy at SparkFun to designing more efficient testing equipment and providing feedback to the engineers on how we can better design for manufacturing and testing. I can hardly call it a job, because I love it so much :)

Role

QC Manager

Programming Languages

Arduino, Tera Term Scripts and Batch Files.

Associations

Rock On Audio

Universities

Incline High School (Lake Tahoe), Squaw Valley Academy, Cate High School, Golden West (Huntington Beach), Cal State Long Beach, CU Boulder, Sparkfun University

Expertise

Rocking

Interests

A nice fillet and clean layouts. DSP, particularly the Sigma Studio stuff from AD. Thermal updrafts and circling in them. Remote control Airplanes - Electric in the parking lot and Slope when the winds up.

Websites

http://www.rockonaudio.com, http://www.phillewisart.com (that's my bro!)

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Analog MEMS Microphone (VM2020) Hookup Guide

February 9, 2023

Get started with the SparkFun analog MEMS microphone breakout board! In this tutorial, we will be connecting the differential MEMS microphone to an Arduino using the WM8960 audio codec.

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The SparkFun Audio Codec Breakout - WM8960 is a low power, high quality stereo codec chock full of features. In this tutorial, some of these features by using an Arduino microcontroller to configure the audio codec and pass audio to the headphone or speaker channels.

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The SparkFun Qwiic Speaker Amp includes the Texas Instruments TPA2016D2 stereo, filter-free class-D audio power amplifier. This tutorial will help you get started and configure the amplifer settings using an Arduino microcontroller.

AzureWave Thing Plus (AW-CU488) Hookup Guide

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The SparkFun AzureWave Thing Plus is a Feather form-factor development board equipped with the AW-CU488. We'll highlight key features of the board and show you to get started with the development board. A few Arduino examples will be highlighted to connect to a WiFi router, calculate the Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) from an input microphone, output an analog signal to a speaker, and connect an Qwiic-enabled device.

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With the SparkFun MicroMod Single Pair Ethernet Function Board - ADIN1110 you can prototype and create 10BASE-T1L Ethernet connections that work in noisy environments and over exceptionally long distances of over 1 kilometer! Follow this guide to get started with this Function Board.

Getting Started with the MyoWare® 2.0 Muscle Sensor Ecosystem

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The MyoWare® 2.0 Muscle Sensor, an Arduino-compatible, all-in-one electromyography (EMG) sensor from Advancer Technologies. In this tutorial, we will go over the features and related shields to connect the sensor to a muscle group.

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The SparkFun Artemis Global Tracker combines the Artemis processor with an Iridium 9603N satellite transceiver, ZOE-M8Q GNSS transceiver, and MS8607 PHT sensor. With a clear view of the sky, this board allows you to send and receive short data messages from anywhere in the world including remote locations far beyond the reach of WiFi and GSM networks. Follow this guide to get started with the Artemis Global Tracker.

Air Velocity Sensor Breakout - FS3000 Hookup Guide

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Get started with the Air Velocity Sensor Breakout - FS3000!

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The SparkFun ProDriver utilizes Toshiba's TC78H670FTG stepper motor driver and with the latch pin connections, this new board is easier to get started with than the "Easy" Drivers. To get started, follow this hookup guide and you will be spinning stepper motors, in no time.

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Follow this tutorial to build your own custom jukebox. Note, this is designed simple and tough for use primarily with toddlers. It's also a great introduction to SparkFun's Qwiic products!

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Pi AVR Programmer HAT Hookup Guide

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This tutorial will show you how to use a headless Raspberry Pi to flash hex files onto AVR microcontrollers as a stand-alone programmer. It also tells the story about production programming challenges, how SparkFun came to this solution, and all the lessons learned along the way.

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This tutorial will guide you through assembling your Simon Tilts PTH Kit.

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Simon Says Experiments

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  • Hey 773! Thanks for your comment. I like your other use cases for sure. I can relate. Sometimes my kid is listening to music on his headphones around dinner time and misses the call. We're working on a custom molded set for him, and I'm hoping they will be more comfy for him to use during general listening.

    There is definitely room to grow this project. There always seems to be the next version on the horizon with more features :) Processing the sound to do some noise cancelling would be a fun new addition. With a slightly different setup on the signal path on the codec, you could route the mic signals to the ADC I2S "output" of the Codec, and then do some DSP on the ESP32 before combining it into the output. I would love to see how this works out, but honestly, I have been pretty impressed with the passive dampening of the larger ear-muffs.

    About those ear muffs... yes, unfortunately, those exact "smoostart" ear muffs are no longer available. Just as we launched this tutorial. But there are quite a few like them out there. I'm guessing the motherboard would need some slight tweaking to match whatever new form factor is going on inside though.

    I've also been looking at my ear muffs we use for construction that don't have any electronics in them. They just simply provide passive hearing protection. This pair I just looked up is really similar to what we have on hand for use in our house:

    Decibel Defense Professional Safety Ear Muffs

    These one's claim to have 37dB dampening, so that's even better than the smoostarts! And much cheaper than then most that have the unneeded radio/BT electronics inside. These come in two sizes - maybe the extra large would comfortably fit around my big ears.

    I was thinking about designing another version of the "motherboard" that is as small as possible (maybe oval shaped), and then you could hopefully mount it inside any of these passive ear muffs. And so the project versions continue :)

    If you do decide to build you're own, we'd love to hear about how it goes. And if you want to share, or run into any questions, please reach out in the new github discussions section of the tutorial.

    Cheers! Pete

  • Hi 065, Thanks for asking. Yes, you can connect the HPL and HPR outputs to another sound system as a "line level signal". These will act as your un-balanced (aka "single-ended") line level signal outputs.

    Note, it is common practice for a line level output (and some headphone amp outputs) to have output capacitors, however we did not include these on this breakout for optimal frequency response and size constraints. Most sound systems that you would plug into should have input capacitors, so in most cases you won't really need to add capacitors in-series to your signal. However, if you don't know if your downstream device has input capacitors, then you could add some in. Note, they will form an RC filter with the impedance of your downstream devices input, so usually it's a good idea to use large caps (47uF or 100uF), to ensure you still get good bass response.

    If you'd like to learn more about the nuances involved with plugging in headphone outputs into line level outputs, then I can recommend searching google for "headphone output as line level". There are lots of great articles on the subject.

    One more thought, if you'd like to make it a balanced audio signal (for more immunity to external noise and/or long distance), check out our SparkFun THAT 1646 OutSmarts Breakouts.

    Hope this helps and good luck with your audio project! -Pete

  • Hey 773, Nice to hear from you! Indeed, the IC is a pretty darn cool facility. Everyone on their staff, the mentors and students are all wonderful to work with. It has been an honor to work with them on this project. I'm astonished by this team's dedication and how far they have come with their engineering skills. This was one heck of a huge PCB to layout and assemble by hand!

    PS not sure if you saw saw these other posts over the past few years, but here are a couple more blogs we've done about the IC:

    Project Canary: Atmospheric Research Takes Flight

    Aerofest 2019

  • The ATMega328 has an internal oscillator. We program the fuse bits to utilize this at 8MHz. This is done in production just prior to programming the bootloader and Simon firmware. Hope this helps!

  • Thanks for your feedback. We will definitely consider the 1015 as a future project. It would be a drop in replacement on the PCB layout, and a minor addition to the Arduino Library, however, sourcing the modules (and all parts these days, really) is another challenge.

    Also, I agree, most RC airplane's are flying much faster, and so it would most likely be only useful on thermal gliders and slow slope floaters (maybe some VTPR in lighter conditions, but even those could max it out on big dives). I've decided to remove that suggestion from the description for now. I might give this a try on my Ahi and report back.

  • Hi there Kraxner, Sorry, but due to the fact that this module does clock stretching, we won't be creating python/raspi support.

    It doesn't have much (in terms of setup), so basically, you just take readings from it, and then convert that raw reading into m/s or mph.

    If you wanted to create your own simple I2C read python example, then you might be able to use this by slowing down your clock speed way down (like 5KHz or even 1KHz). It looks like some people are able to use I2C peripheral boards that do clock stretching with python in this way. Sorry for the long winded response here without the best news, but hope this helps.

  • Hi Radiohound, Sounds like a cool project! Unfortunately, we don't have any immediate plans to sell the 1015 version. Could be something down the road, but how long I really can't say.

    If you can rig up some sort of airflow intake system ahead of the sensor (that is smaller than the area of the sensor intake), you can read faster air velocities. Maybe a fun 3D printing project? However, this would take a bit of experimenting and data-intake to get accurate conversions.

    FWW, during my prototype testing on this design, I put the sensor in various PVC pipe diameters with some known air velocity sources (created by thinner pipes hooked up to oxygen flow meters and compressed air) and the readings matched the planned conversions quite nicely.

  • Hi There, Sorry for the delay in my response here, but glad to hear you got it working!

    I see you also posted an issue on the forums about the Pi not finding the boot hex file (even though you had verified it was there and had correct permissions). How did you end up resolving that issue?

  • Hi Dom, Sorry, but this mic's datasheet says it will only work from 60Hz to 20KHz. Also note, that the op amp design has an upper frequency -3dB roll off at 19.7KHz. Sounds like a cool project though. If you want to, you could try reaching out on our forums to see if anyone else might be able to recommend a mic with wider frequency response. https://forum.sparkfun.com/ Good luck! Pete

  • Hi There, Please double-check that you are using the latest driver on the CP210X. If you use an old one (or the one that windows automatically installs), then the auto-reset does not work. See this drivers section of the tutorial for more info and links.

    Hope this helps!