Other Components
| A-to-B USB cable: This is used to connect your Arduino to your PC so that it has power and can be programmed. As you will learn in Lab 0, it can also be used to send text from the Arduino back to your PC, which will be useful for debugging. |  |
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| Breadboard: Also called a solderless breadboard, this allows you to construct temporary circuits by pushing wires into the holes, as opposed to soldering together a more permanent circuit board. Behind the holes are strips of metal that electrically connect groups of holes together as if they were a single wire, as shown in the second picture to the right. The long strips on the sides of the breadboard are typically used to provide power to parts by connecting them to power (5 V) and ground (0 V). Many years ago, before solderless breadboards were invented, people would build circuits by attaching components and wires to wooden boards, some of which were literally cutting boards used for slicing bread. The Wikipedia page for breadboards has a lot of great pictures of breadboards and the circuit construction techniques that preceded them. |
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| Jumper wires: These are the wires that you will use to create electrical connections between your microcontroller, breadboard, and other parts. Your kit has two types, short M-to-M and long M-to-F, which both come in many colors. They all do exactly the same thing: create an electrical connection between two points. |  |
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| Battery pack: This battery pack takes 4x alkaline AA batteries and allows you to power your Arduino without having a PC (or USB charger) attached. Although it seems wasteful, you should not use rechargeable batteries (NiCad or NiMH), as their voltage (1.2 V, vs. 1.5 V for alkaline batteries) is not enough to power the Arduino and its voltage regulator. You should also not use the battery pack at the same time you are using the USB cable. |
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LEDs  |
Resistors  |
Switches  |
Potentiometers  |
Photoresistors  |
RGB LEDs  |
Pizeo buzzers  |
Buttons  |
Servo motors  |
X/Y joystick  |
Touch sensor  |
7-segment display  |
Ultrasonic rangefinder  |
Rotary encoder  |
Character LCD  |
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