Most read Gadget Master posts in the month of August 2023

I do this occasionally – let’s take a look at the most popular Gadget Master posts in the last month. It was peak Silly Season, so were any particularly silly? I don’t think so…

Among those popular in August were posts on a new version of the Arduino Nano, a story on India’s Vikram lander (from 2019) and an AI version of the Mayflower ship. But let’s take it in reverse order:

10. Help yourself and help Pimoroni in Birthday salePimoroni – the Sheffield-based “Purveyors of Maker Goods”, particularly of the Raspberry Pi variety – is celebrating its eleventh birthday, but there’s some bad news… Dubbed a ‘Plundered’ sale, you can read more about the offers here. But sadly, there’s a dark side to this pirate-themed birthday promotion.

9. Gadget in Extremis: What’s the time, Sr1 strontium optical clock?Scientists at the National Physical Laboratory (NPL) are celebrating the milestone of the first inclusion of a UK optical clock – the Sr1 strontium optical lattice clock – in the determination of International Atomic Time (TAI). NPL’s Sr1 joins a select group of optical clocks from around the world that define TAI, it has announced.

8. DevBoard Watch: Asus IoT unveils Tinker Board 3N for IIoTAsus IoT, the IoT arm of the Taiwanese technology company, has announced the Tinker Board 3N, an Arm-based single-board computer aimed at Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) applications. We’re talking industrial automation and smart factory environments, and IoT gateways and human-machine interfacing (HMI).

7. Smart Cricket Ball measures your bowling performanceIt had to come eventually, spinning its IoT way to the leg stump – an Aussie company is throwing us the googly of a Smart Cricket Ball! The Sportcor Smartball is the work of a technology start-up and the cricket ball manufacturer Kookaburra Sports, and it uses an inertial movement system.

6. Arduino powers Super Simple Electronic Component TesterCheck out this Arduino-based component tester. The device is intended to give a simple way to test transistors, resistors, capacitors, diodes and MOSFETs, and such like. It was originally developed by Markus Frejek, but the project has been continued by Karl-Heinz Kübbeler and Markus Reshke. Simply insert the relevant component, push the button, and read the displayed characteristics.

5. How to build a plant monitor with ArduinoAs a preview of his latest book, Arduino Project Handbook: 25 Practical Projects to Get You Started, Mark Geddes takes us through the project to create a simple plant monitor. “In this project I’ll introduce a new type of analog sensor that detects moisture levels. You’ll set up a light and sound alarm system (an inexpensive piezo buzzer) to tell you when your plant needs watering.”

4. Kitronik goes retro with ZIP96 Handheld Gamer for Raspberry Pi PicoWhat would you make of this one? Aimed at kids, the retro handheld gaming device is based on a Raspberry Pi Pico. It’s from Kitronik, the Nottingham-based educational technology specialists. I’m ambivalent about STEM tech for kids involved with gaming as it only encourages them to do even more, but I guess it must get their interest to start with…

3. AI Mayflower Autonomous Ship completes uncrewed Atlantic crossingThis is an interesting one I saw on the Iridium website recently: the Mayflower Autonomous Ship is an automated, uncrewed vessel designed to sail across the Atlantic without human intervention. It’s an Uncrewed Surface Vessel (USV), to give it its proper name, that sought to recreate a famous journey. And leaving Plymouth on 27 April 27 2022, it arrived safely at its destination of Plymouth Rock in Plymouth, Massachusetts on 30 June 30 2022 – 3,500 nautical miles later.

2. India’s Vikram Lander set for Saturday soft moon landing (from 2019)India is set fair to celebrate becoming the fourth country to achieve a soft moon landing, after the USA, the former Soviet Union and China. The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has announced that its Vikram Lander successfully separated from the Chandrayaan-2 Orbiter today, which means it’s heading towards the moon, scheduled to land on the on lunar surface (between 1:30am and 2:30am) on Saturday 7 September 2019.

1. Arduino Nano adds family member with Espressif-based Nano ESP32One for Gadget Masters to note: there’s a new version of the Arduino Nano – the IoT-friendly Nano ESP32 – bringing the Espressif ESP32-S3 microcontroller into the Arduino ecosystem. The Wi-Fi and Bluetooth LE capable board can be used with the Arduino IDE and MicroPython, and is aimed at IoT deployments for “advanced enterprise use cases and hobbyist engineers”.

Those are the most popular in the last month. And feel free to add any comments on these posts, and share any observations, stories or expertise. The best information comes from Below The Line!