Mims' Mini Notebooks

[puretube]

for those who missed it:

http://www.diystompboxes.com/smfforum/index.php?topic=44643.0

[phaeton]

Good thing I searched before I posted.  I toadilly missed this thread- i guess that's what I get for not hanging around as much

So anyways, I was going to post that I found Forrest Mims' website where you can buy all his Engineer books.  I've got them all in print in storage in my parent's basement, but that's out of state.  It was a sad day when I went into Radio Shack about a year ago to buy them up again, only to find that they're no longer carried.  (stay tuned for more Radio Shack observations, coming up soon).

Dunno about y'all, but "Getting Started In Electronics" was exactly what I needed to read when I first picked it up in 1992.  I've gotten and read many books since, but "Getting Started" is where i got my first understandings, pieced together my first working circuits, and gave me a basis (and the self-confidence) to further study electronics in general, even if i've had to give it up in exasperation once or thrice.

Great stuff.  It won't replace the Big Iron (i.e. Horowitz and Hill) but I wholly recommend it as a primer for any n00b.

[$uperpuma]

I have the parts for the toy organ in the 555 book I think I might just make that

[R.G.]

If you add this to your HOSTS file:
127.0.0.1 popunder.PayPopup.com
it will stop those annoying pop-unders that seem to get by Firefox...

Better yet, go here:
http://www.mvps.org/winhelp2002/hosts.htm
and pick up a pre-made hosts file that's pretty inclusive of pest hosts.

[phaeton]

I have the parts for the toy organ in the 555 book I think I might just make that

Exactly!

Many years ago I dreamt of creating something like that organ, and making each note triggered by an LDR (instead of touch switch).  Mounting it in some sort of chassis (Lego Technic is the first choice) that could pull 10-key calculator tape rolls through it at various speeds, between the LDRs and a corresponding LED for each one.  Then it's just a matter of drawing dark or metallic Sharpie lines on the paper in the correct columns (the contraption could also put the dividing column lines on the paper with the help of some ball-point pen heads).

A 'player piano' concept for the 1990s!

Or something.  I think I breadboarded the organ once (and it wasn't intonated very well) but never really tried the 'player' part though.

[Seljer]

I've been thinking about the same thing for the past 2 or 3 days. But with a photocoupler connected to a sequencer a kind of ghetto Roland TB303 type thing

[RedHouse]

Hmmm, ...so... are we gonna let the link stay in this forum? or since these are currently copyrighted and still available....

[phaeton]

Hmmm, ...so... are we gonna let the link stay in this forum? or since these are currently copyrighted and still available....

What link?  I'm reading it out of the book