My First Arduino

After months of doing next to nothing with my electronics, I have finally jumped back into it.  This time I have come back with an Arduino!

I started playing with micro controllers while in college... about 8 years ago... really, 8years ago... I'm getting old.

My first micro controller was a Basic Atom Pro which used a C compiler which cost around $100 if you wanted to get into longer code (50+ lines if memory serves me correctly).

I quickly ran into issues and ended up switching to standard PIC chips (by Microchip) after a coworker, an electrical engineer, gave me a bunch of his old books and programmer.  Since then, and up to now, PIC is all I have used.

Since I began hearing about Arduino a few years ago, I considered giving it a shot... however, up until someone got me a UNO this Christmas, I had never used one.

After installing the software and about 10 minutes of playing... I regretted not switching sooner!  The majority of my time spent on the PIC was figuring out how to set the bits correctly to get something to work.  With the Arduino, although that stuff is still needed, it is all behind the scenes.. and I am glad to see it go.

I have purchased a number of shields and plan on hooking up my balancing bot (or so I hope it will balance).  I will probably update the Sumo Bot also with an Arduino...

Stay tuned...

Arduino UNO, XBee, Proto and Motor Shields