What’s the harm in soldering IC backwards?

So I've been soldering bunch of Xronos boards in preparation for the Maker Fair, and somehow soldered time chip (DS1307) backwards.  Obviously it didn't work, although I had no problem uploading sketch. Then I felt a little heat coming from the board when I was passing my hand over it, and then I touched DS1307... and burned my finger... I'm surprised Chip didn't start smoking :) But what a pain it was desoldering it! Don't repeat my mistake, pay close attention how you orient ICs, electrolytic capacitors and diodes (yes I did diode wrong way too once, with less dramatic results, but it took a while to figure out what was wrong).

2013-09-09T13:50:52+00:00September 9th, 2013|Misc Tech|0 Comments

World’s smallest geiger counter watch

All the time I come across some really cool technology that I want to write about even tho it’s not related to Xronos Clocks. So I’m introducing “Misc Tech” category. Today I wanted  to write about world’s smallest Geiger counter: PM1208 wrist watch made by Polimaster.  I have some high resolution pictures of the insides of the watch at the end of this post if you are curious. I’ve always been fascinated by seeing “unseen” and radiation is just a thing. It all around us, it can kill us if levels are too high, but we have no way to sense it (at least not until it’s too late). So about 10 years ago I bought  wrist watch that could detect gamma rays.  Very expensive ($400) but also very cool! Quick overview of PM1208 […]

2019-02-15T11:46:30+00:00August 13th, 2013|Misc Tech|1 Comment
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