Yes, it's mailbag time again. No, it's not mailbag. Monday It's actually what is it Thursday Today Oh, the week's getting away Here we go. My overflowing mailbag shelf.

Tada I'll just pick a few at random. Let's go start with the little ones. Woohoo! Using my new camera rig, look at that. I can slide it across and then pan down.

Fantastic. All right postcard and we have glacia. National Park Oh, isn't that fantastic? Beautiful look at the sunset. Look at that sort of rainbow effect over the mountains there.

Oh, absolutely stunning. Got the afternoon sun reflecting off the mountains. Ah, makes me want to be up there anyway. This one is from my mate Steve Lebson, who you've um, seen before and you've heard uh from on the ampire as well.

He was a special guest on the ampire. I'll have to link in the episode Down Below If you haven't listened to it, he works at Zyink these days. so good day Steve I'm on vacation at Glacian National Park together with Canada's uh water Waterton Lakes National Park It's UNESCO world heritage site and is international and is an International Peace Park Thought you'd like this card and be sure to ride the Red Bus if you get here I will. Indeed, it takes us, uh, 15 hours just to get to Bloody La then another.

what? Four or five to fly? Well, maybe not that much, but like 4 hours or three. four hours to fly up to? Uh Vancouver So ah, I'm envious. Thanks a lot Steve Hang on I Actually, uh, confused that with actually being in Canada it is actually of course a uh United States National Park. It's um in Montana It's right on the border there just as he says um in conjunction with uh Canada's water and uh National park right on the border south of Calgary there haven't quite been there been through Calgary north of there beautiful country and that on the front is Lake Sherborne located Northeast section of the park.

Ah, sticky geranium all dancing in the breeze, complimented by a rainbow from a passing summer shower. I'm stuck in a windowless lab. great. Next up is anonymous and uh, it's Australian Of course there's old Fred Hollows there and no name on this whatsoever, so let's crack it open.

Come on here we go. Need a better letter opener in my knife? Oh what have I got? Hey whoa, we've got a little um, jigsaw uh sort of temply thing I don't know which country we talking about Russia woohoo hi Dave I'm Veron Veron I think that's how you pronounce it anyway Russian uh I won't even pronounce it. sorry and my husband as here ASA um, he's from Iraq Bash region. big fan of your blog.

He tortures me every morning with your video. so I decided to send you a part of Russia because the Uh Cards Reading part is my favorite. Excellent! On this card you can see Sui's Vonsky Dolman and there is a puzzle in Moscow Have fun and best of luck I Guess I have to disassemble the puzzle and reassemble it. the main Russian Cathedral There you go! Thank you very much Asar and Veronica So let's have a look at So's Vonsky Dolman.

Woohoo! Oh boy, that's interesting. It's in Russian down there. but there you go. so.

Ru It's got its own website I guess it's a what is it? a seat? or with something with a hole or a cabin or something in there? um in beded in a rock? I don't know going to have to Google that? Ah, it's actually um, the Olympic Games 2014 SOI It's got nothing to do with this actual rock Googled the website and all I got was Sport and stuff. and of course I found a Wiki uh page for them. They're actually monoliths dating from the fourth millennium BC to the second millennium BC Incredibly old and out. Large and precisely cut monolith.

Fantastic. Who knew I love that sort of stuff. Next up, one from Lloyd Lewis from Phoenix Arizona Brilliant! We got ourselves a photo mailer a let's up pull score for the gifted there and we have a letter and what's a collective ter for postcards? A buttload I Don't know, but look at that. Oh beautiful Arizona Love Arizona Fantastic.

What's that? Phoenix Beautiful Grand Canyon I've been there I've only been to the South Rim I haven't been to the Uh North Rim Unfortunately, I've been to some smaller uh parts of it as well. Uh uh cheera National Monument I won't even try to pronounce that I suck. We've got a collection of caus tie more Arizona goodness fantastic and a map of Arizona Let's see where I've been So yeah! I think I've been to most of the northern part of this little map here I've been to H the Dam so I've clearly been down 93 and across 40 I've been to the Uh south rim of the Grand Canyon which looks like it's up there I've been to Flag Staff I've stayed at uh Flag Staff I think uh meteor craters out here somewhere I went to meteor uh crater just uh before Winslow um Arizona and uh I've been to the Navajo Indian reservations I've been to Monument Valley it's awesome. I've been to Paig so I've done a good lot of that northern part there.

hi Dave I'd like to thank you for all the hard work you put to together for the videos for the EV log. No worries I'm beginner. so much in what you discuss is way over my head, but to learn a little something every time I watch one of my videos? Awesome! That's all I want I Especially want to thank you for the soaring tutorials. They've been very beneficial to me and my soaring schools have improved significantly.

Awesome anyway. I Know mailbag Monday You really enjoy getting postcard so I decided to pick up a few. Fantastic thanks Lloyd Next up is electronic components worth a whopping 10 bucks from Jim Paris in Boston Massachusetts another place I haven't bloody well been Boston H here I am in my windowless lab here and a everyone sending me stuff from places I Want to be? Ah goodness sake. Anyway, we have oh no note inside.

That's it. Oh, it's a tiny little board. What do we got? No note. There's definitely no.

There's no note in there at all. So all we've got is a little board. Jeez. going to have to get the macro lens.

Looks like we have a little Ftdi um serial interface chip with a micr B connector. Yep, there we go, Jim. Sh FTX There you go. Tiny little uh serial interface board.

Excellent, thank you very much. Jim Yeah, it just uses a um ft uh 230 chip on there and it's just a configurable um breakout board for that ft uh 230x. so very neat. very compact.

there's nothing to it of course and there's heaps of info actually on Jim's website which is Jim. Sh. It's a very basic website, but if you go to FTX then there's a whole bunch of info on here of how to, uh, get the board and how to drive it and what you can do with it. Standard 0.1 in headers around the outside.

Fantastic! So that you can actually uh, plug it into a um, a uh, well, you could plug it into a breadboard I mean these ones here would short out on the one um bit or those are short out you can put on a Vera board or something that like that or you only populate the ones that you actually neat, neat and we have one from the Old Dart uh someone who wants to remain anonymous I guess could be a message there. It is her majesties and we've got two mobile phones. I'm guessing old mobile phones so let's have a look. We just tore down an old mobile phone.

a not that old. Here we go. we got a letter. What have we got? Noia some old noas.

Two old noas. look at those. I'm not familiar with those models off the bat, but oh oh, it's a slider. There we go and it's from Dick Thomas in Bradford in England I don't think I've been to Bradford have been to England but not Bradford Oh was clearing my junk box came across these phones from different Generations Quite modern I Thought they might make an interesting tear down side by side.

one is a 2G and the N80 is a 3G Well I'm not an electronic geek I'm a Linux geek but love your show as it allows me to learn something new I have little knowledge about I start watching your Kindle 3D T down. Ah and been hooked since by consumer tear down. Awesome! Thanks Dick from Dicks install. I'll call you tricky Dick Wow! I don't think you see that uh format uh much anymore in terms of like that squat, sort of really thick sort of form factor.

They're all long and like thin and you know, absolutely you know Tiny, thin but massive screens like this. you don't get like short little compact Stu duby ones like that anymore. And one is the Model 7610 made in Finland Awesome! I all my Finnish viewers. Next up Mark n from greater Manchester in the UK another one from the Old Dart Thank you very much.

he's wrapped this one up good and proper. It's really, uh, quite light so let me slice this one open. small packet rate. guess it cost more.

Of course the bigger it gets we have a letter we have Bubble Wrap ah yeah I know get a better knife. This is just my everyday carry. Ah, there we go Hi Dave I'd like to congratulate you Such a great video blog and forums I've been watching your videos and forums ever since AO 1052 Uh, overclocking debacle? Yeah, that was a while ago now Own 1102 Result: I'm sure in a previous M bag you mentioned and you like postcard? so you find one of my nearest big science oh the um LEL radio telescope a Mfield. Fantastic! Also in the box you'll find my old Geer counter Source from somewhere in Russia via eBay many years ago I think it originally dates from the ' 80s 9.

he's at a guest following the Chernobyl disaster. It's very basic and not very sensitive, but does work with a clicker and light indication. Awesome! I built a mighty ohm Geer counter kit recing Which is far better. so I bought the the old DSR b88 might make an interesting tear down.

has some interesting construction components inside seems. also. the batter's last forever has been dipped in wax so you need to warm it up to clean. Thank you very much.

Mark And there's a lovely postcard The Observatory isn't that beautiful and that's a 76 M dish for those playing along at home, There we go look at that. that's sort of uh, not what I was expecting. It runs off a single uh ablea battery there, which is rather neat. I actually like it.

It's rather uh Compact and all it's got is a buzzer on top and a light I don't even know if it's an LED Is it like a light bulb? I don't know and uh, some switch I don't know whether that's off or on? No idea. but um I did see it. Uh, give me one little beep. but I don't have anything radioactive I don't even have a uh smoke alarm? really in here I Don't think oh no, hang on no there is one up on the roof.

No put up the smoke alarm and I get zip. So I'm not even sure if that's one of the uh Radioactive type smoke alarms I'm assuming it is, but um, it's obviously either um, faulty or it's um, just not sensitive enough to detect that. So there you go that will go on the uh, tear down bench. Thank you very much.

Mark Oh buger it. What the heck Was only a single screw? Let's crack it open. Turns out that's not actually a uh light. that's the main tube down there.

and uh, if anyone knows the particular uh part number used in this thing or has got a data sheet for that puppy, please let us know. And yeah, look at the wax covering all the all the circuitry down in there. Oh man, so there's clearly, um, not much to it, just a power supply and that's uh, pretty much it. And I was able to find a review of you on YouTube of this thing.

Apparently there is a lamp in there, it does flicker, is on, down, off and up is off. and apparently, yes, it doesn't detect any background radiation. Not nearly sensitive enough and it is quite difficult to actually get a radiation source to make this thing. um, click and uh, Flicker at all.

A But if you have any ideas for a decent radiation Source I could test it with, let me know. Next up, we have Russ Miller from Portland Oregon get a Russ and uh no, it's worn off there. maybe I've had it for two Dar long sitting on the mailbag shelf. So I have no idea what's inside this thing.

It could actually take. it's quite large. it's um, couple of baggies. Oh God there's everything in here.

Check this out. Whole bunch of stuff. Russ this is not my address fer hey Dave I found your videos and blog. It is helpful help to rekindle my passion for electronics.

Awesome! So I thought I'd send you these tokens in my appreciation enclosed us some souvenirs from my current home state of Oregon another place I haven't been to. thanks for the reminder. Actually everyone's plugging their state today since we're are stickers for pronunciation here. The river is pronounced will not will it it God Just getting that one out of the way.

You might have heard that mounted Helens in Washington visible from Portland erupted 23 years ago. enclosed is some ash from that eruption. Wow awesome that that is very cool. You bet your Ash it's cool.

Also enclosed are some pictures of origin since you seem to like nature I do I love when you I think you'll like them and feel free to add this to your stop on your next visit to the US I will. I'm sure you'll love it since you love Canyon I'm sure you love hiking up the Larch Mountain Trail in the Columbia River Gorge I've heard of the Columbia River Gorge I have also enclosed a couple of old cameras ah not for turning on though for taken apart I think they still work. One of them somehow got the camera compartment door broken off so it's probably useless without duck tape. Enjoy! Thank you very much! Russell oh he's um, dust glow on the forums.

awesome thanks Russ I've got a jazzy looking uh block puzzly thing which I kind of sort of broke a little bit here and it allows you to fold stuff over like that and get different scenes of presumably um Portland there you go Portland Oregon Fantastic. Oh oh look at that! Jeez there. There's so many different things there. Terrific.

and I bet people didn't know Portland Oregon is the city of Roses there you go I did not know that, but then again, I haven't been there and don't live there, but here is a little um, what is this a brochure? Blur one of these uh uh, touristy uh things Portland Bridges they're quite proud of their Bridges there. Fister Bridge awesome Washington A Portland Entertainment Oregon Convention Center it's all happening in Oregon Mount Hood Fantastic malt Numa Falls oh look at that. that is spectacular snow. What's that white stuff? don't know about that in Australia Ah, Oregon Coast beautiful Vista House the Columbia River Gorge Fantastic.

Oh, isn't that pretty? Love the old Don Dear John Deere Tractor Fantastic. That's the uh Willamet Valley that's the one I'm going to get wrong. Yeah yeah yeah. um Mount Hood Fantastic.

They've got the long exposure there so they getting the water Rippling down through there. Fantastic. That doesn't look very high at all. Nothing.

Wow Valley Beautiful look at that. Love the sun reflecting off the off the uh that' be like it's not rock walls. They're probably like it. It's almost like mud or something.

erosion eroded away. cler. Crater Lake National Park Oh spectacular man stuck in the bloody lab I don't even have a freaking window here Timberline Lodge Oh Eastern Oregon there we go some Barren Country Central Oregon I want to go to Oregan Silver full State Park Ah, check it out. that is way too cool.

Actual ash from Mount St Helens from presumably 5 mil away, 22 M away and 250 M away. You can actually see it getting finer and finer there as as it goes out. Fantastic! thank you very much. Russ That's just awesome.

Wow! Look at these ancient digital cameras. So Crusty is powered from a couple of Aaa's there. What is that? like? a you know, 640 by 480 or something? Oh my goodness. and this one is 1.3 meixel Vivitar camera pair of Ablea batteries there.

um SD card standard SD card for its day. it's got a little LCD on top. It's actually you know it probably did the business back in the day. It's got a tripod Port it's got a USB port and uh, it's got a macro mode and ah, it's all happening at a massive 1.3 megapixels.

Woohoo! Next up, we have a T-shirt and a necklace pendant. Haven't we looked at one of those before? Hm. Anyway, it's from Liz uh bot with a silent k I guess from Grand Rapids uh MI Michigan I think it's Grand Rapids Michigan Could be wrong, but hey, what have we got from The Geek Group A real quarter crushed with a thunderbolt crushed with a thunderbolt? Okay, Project Stomper, every shrunken quarter helps. uh, secure the future largest membership based laboratory uh, and hacker space in America There you go For information how you can help and be part of our dreams, please visit the Greek The Geek Group sorry.

org Oh I think I know what these are? they? um, they they. they shrink them with a big um Electro mechanical. um uh, you know a big induction current thing? Yeah, Project Stoer High Energy Electrical impulse generator. There we go.

built in Grand Rapids Michigan by the Greek by The Geek Group Greek I Keep saying Greek Um, Stomper discharges its high en capacitor Bank into a coil of wire wrapped around a quarter which causes a rapidly changing magnetic field which in turn causes the quarter to be reshaped. Once triggered, the entire process lasts 40 micros seconds. Fantastic! I No idea how big a regular. Oh well.

there we go. that's a regular and that's a shrunken. There you go. Fantastic! The capacitor Bank holds a charge of 6,000 volts DC when discharged to full Voltage at a rate of over 100,000 amps flows into the work coil in inducing a current of about a million amps into the quarter.

Oh brilliant. This causes the work coil around the quarter to create a cascaded magnetic field within the coil. although electromagnetic induction and electrical current is induced with within the quarter. This causes opposing magnetic fields between the work oil and the quarter, resulting in a shrunken quarter.

There you go. Do slthe Geek Group.org Stomper I'm sure they got some video of that. Let me check, And there you go. One shrunken head.

Quarter dollar. Love it. There you go. It's uh, actually from Uh Mark Mcau if I'm pronouncing that correctly from um Armadale in uh Western Australia instead of Michigan and I heard you like some shirt so I ordered a shirt from The Geek Group Hacker Maker Space have been involved with for the last few years although they're located in Grand Rapids Michigan I've been volunteering my spare time working remotely from Western Australia doing systems development hope helping to improve their live broadcast system and building operations and control center or system.

Awesome! Some of the cool things have been up to Project Stomper 600 megawatt electromagnetic coin Crusher Project Gemini 200 uh Kilowatt Tesla coin coil, 12ton polyphonic musical Tesla coil and Project Jeff Al KR 350 Mar one industrial robot which will go into program to flip pancakes just for shits and giggles as you do anyway. Um yes, they do have a YouTube channel. Um, there's been talk about them on the uh Forum They do live shows and tear downs and stuff like that. so check out The Geek Group Thank you very much Mark Black's my color too.

Love it! Nice looking polo shirt. pretty funky. got the symbol on here Beauty and I might call it quits after this one. This will be the last one for today's mailbag.

Not sure how long we've been going for, but I'm sure it's uh, long enough. Oh I getting 5 minute battery warning. Jeez. Anyway, um, this one will actually, uh, take a while.

so I know it's in here I won't uh have time to play around with it but it will require oops a Um video or videos in its own right because it is a terick. There we go. Tada D EO Nano Fpga board. Oh it's tiny.

Yes, it is absolute tiny. It's a um Cyclone uh for Fpga board I From memory it's about 80 bucks or something like that. It's not, um, that expensive. They got a range I'll show you the Uh card in a minute, but uh, nice headers.

It's got a nice um, uh, laser cut, um acrylic top on it, um, standard 0.1 in header interface and uh, all sorts of other stuff and terraa. one of the major Uh players in the Fpga demo board field. So these guys really know what they're doing. and Uh this one.

I've heard it really really good things about So I Hope to be able to use this um to do some FP GA demo videos and they've got a whole range of boards. Here's the Deo Nano we've got um Cyclone 4. Of course they got Cyclone 3 Cyclone 2s um 22,000 uh logic elements equivalent 32 Meg of SD Ram doesn't have like a lot of the uh fancy stuff that some of the others have like VGA output and SD card and codec but for just uh, basic general purpose Iio, it's good enough. It's got a USB uh blaster buil in the alterior uh USB B PL Blaster so it works directly with the tools you don't have to buy the uh, separate programmer and um, you know it's got eight leads and some toggle switches and blah blah blah blah blah and uh, demo source code is all included in there and extra features it does have and 8 channel ADC and a 3 AIS accelerometer on there somewhere.

So yeah, this is, um, a really lowcost introduction to um Fpga So yeah, it's going to take uh, quite some time of of course to uh do the software I mean we got software from Altia. You get the whole thing so you don't have to download it because it's absolutely massive so you get the quietest to web Edition You get all the IP libraries and uh, all sorts of stuff on the disc. and uh, plus you get uh, the demos. so I'm sure they work really well.

I Do actually want to spend some time to do some videos on Fpgas because I haven't um covered them much on the blog before. So yeah, there we go. It's got uh, two push buttons, headers, blah blah blah ad converter. There we go.

It's got a 50 MHz oscillator on there. everything you need to get a basic um Iob based um Fpga up and running with some Uh built-in memory so you know it's even got the Uh Altera compatible uh bite B Blaster program built in. Fantastic! And there you go. National Semiconductor are quite proud that they've teamed up with this and they're showing you extoling the virtues of their linear Regulators that they've um, no doubt got on board there.

There you go and they're at 12bit ADC which they've no doubt got on there as well. Neat. And that sucker is uh, $79 us. So very cheap indeed.

You can also get it, uh, it's a bit more expensive, but you can get it from um, Artif Fruit as well, so that is. you know, for a sub 0000 Fpga demo board? Um, and but of course you know it's all about the uh, uh, demo software and everything that comes with it, how well it works as a package solution, but that'll take me quite a few hours to, uh, have a play with that no doubt. but um, big thumbs up. Let me know if you want to see some Fpga videos based on this little puppy.

So I'm quite excited to uh have this I was I was going to DW some uh VGA uh displays and uh, stuff with this uh little puppy. So even though this doesn't have the VGA um output on it, some of the other boards do of of course you can just um uh output them straight from the digital um uh iOS there um via some resistors and that's pretty much it. You can drive multiple uh uh displays off the one um fpga CU you can install multiple VGA cores and that's kind of uh one of the demo projects I uh had in mind to do so. If you do want to see some Fpga videos based on that, please let me know.

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