What's a good Arduino starter kit?

[dentaku]

I've been looking at Arduino starter kits that have a bunch of basic stuff in a box and maybe some tutorials and such.
This one seems like it's got lots of fun stuff included with it for a decent price.
http://www.adafruit.com/products/170

Are there any that you people think is better or maybe at a better price?
The official kit has a 16x2 LCD that looks interesting http://store.qkits.com/moreinfo.cfm/K000007 but the Adafruit one seems like it's got more fun stuff included with it for a better price even without the LCD.

I'll probably end up getting 2 breadboard friendly MIDI jacks at the same time because I might be new at electronics but at least I know about MIDI and synths
Besides, I'm just better with software/code than hardware anyway.

[Stonent]

I bought this:  http://www.amazon.com/Starter-Kit-Newsite-Uno-Breadboard/dp/B0051QHPJM/ref=sr_sp-atf_title_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1374373173&sr=8-1&keywords=newsite+arduino+r3 and
I bought a Seeedstudio kit... It had a few capacitors, jumper wires, a small breadboard,  an extremely tiny servo, a tricolor LED, reed switch, some resistor and a potentiometer.

http://www.seeedstudio.com/depot/arduino-sidekick-basic-kit-p-775.html

It was useful for the jumper wires and the breadboard, but both of those can be purchased for pretty cheap.

I'd consider buying a bunch of sensors. You can get 2 PIR sensors for about $3 total, ultrasonic distance sensors are pretty cheap as well (both from Aliexpress)

If you want to do some LED matrices, you'd probably want some 74xx595 chips, those turn serial data into parallel so one pin can control several LEDs.

$85 seems a bit high, you can buy all those items separately fairly cheap maybe $20 or $30 (not including the Arduino) total if you don't mind waiting 3 weeks from China. But it's convenient to get them all together.

[Bored@Work]

Best Arduino starter kit? Any kind of Arduino and a hammer.

[Abstr7ct]

I would recommend taking a look at Sparkfun's Inventor Kit for Arduino:

https://www.sparkfun.com/products/11227

[Dave]

Best Arduino starter kit? Any kind of Arduino and a hammer.

Don't forget the HammerDuino™ shield. Arduino people wouldn't know how to use the hammer by itself.

[dentaku]

That one does have some nice stuff included in it. The clear red breadboard looks like it would put a strain on your eyes though.
It's almost an identical kit to the Adafruit one and the same price.

I would recommend taking a look at Sparkfun's Inventor Kit for Arduino:

https://www.sparkfun.com/products/11227

[Telequipment]

I wouldn't even know to start so keep well away from the subject, about Pic is where I got to  still got a headache.

[hlavac]

Best Arduino starter kit? Any kind of Arduino and a hammer.

+1. Arduino makes you into a "user", not a "designer". You will have no idea how it works and you will expect everything to be handed to you on a silver plate.
Doing something that does not have a library already done ready to use will seem to be so unsurmountably hard to you compared to what you did so far because of all the learning you have skipped that you will just give up. It makes you into a dream customer of the IP pushers lobby and you will never really own any of your designs...

[c4757p]

Arduino is a starter kit. Then you move on.

[tcbetka]

Yeah...I wouldn't at ALL say it's fair to criticize the Arduino library in that fashion. For one thing, it is intended to be a fairly quick "prototyping" library, but that doesn't mean it isn't usable for other purposes. The other thing is that for anyone involved in large-scale software development projects, it's very naive to think that you WON'T be using some sort of third-party software library in the project. If your employer purchases some type of library, then you'll be using that library. If it costs less to purchase code to do what you need it to, than it does to write it all in-house, guess which way you'll be going much of the time? Bottom line--don't think that the Arduino stuff is bad, just because you didn't write it all. Hey if you want to write every single line from scratch in C or (God forbid) Assembly...go for it. Just don't expect to get paid for all that work, when it might be much faster (and thus ultimately cheaper) to purchase some third-party stuff. The other thing about using the Arduino stuff is that it's pretty simple in most cases, and allows you to express ideas pretty quickly most of the time. Then, if you must go write your own code, at least you've got some concrete ideas to work with.

One other thing--although still admittedly limited (but growing steadily), my experience with the Arduino libraries is that they are getting more robust as time passes. But anyone is free to grab the 8-bit MCU of choice and have at it, if they feel the urge to do so. I started out that way a couple years ago, but quickly came to the realization that there just isn't enough time in the day to write each and every line of code myself...and still get things done on a consistently predictable timetable, in terms of deliverables.

Your mileage may vary of course.

TB

[Dave]

Arduino is a starter kit. Then you move on.

The sad reality is that most people don't.

[Phroon]

Best Arduino starter kit? Any kind of Arduino and a hammer.

+1. Arduino makes you into a "user", not a "designer". You will have no idea how it works and you will expect everything to be handed to you on a silver plate.
Doing something that does not have a library already done ready to use will seem to be so unsurmountably hard to you compared to what you did so far because of all the learning you have skipped that you will just give up. It makes you into a dream customer of the IP pushers lobby and you will never really own any of your designs...

Hack a Day had a wonderful response to attitudes like this: How the arduino won? This is how we can kill it.  Here's the meat:

One reason attributed to the popularity of the Arduino is the hostile attitude from “old school” hackers. If someone shows up and excitedly says “look, I made an RGB mood lamp with an Arduino”, we shouldn’t scream in their faces how stupid they are for such a massive overkill. We shouldn’t ignore them either. That will only send them back to the Arduino forums with their tails between their legs to do yet, another copy/paste project. We should pat them on the back and say “Hey, great job! You know I’ll bet we could make a cheap circuit with a 555 that would pull that same effect off quite nicely and it would only cost $1. Here, check out this schematic.”

Embrace them, educate them, and the Arduino will no longer be their only tool.

[Phroon]

So, to answer the original question, the Adafruit and Sparkfun kits are a nice collection of starter parts.

One of those will get you started but once you are looking to move beyond Arduino and into the world of microcontrollers I'd suggest picking up some ATmega target boards (with ZIF socket) and a programmer.  If a ATmega is overkill for your project they have ATtiny target boards that work with the 2313s and also the 25/45/85 series with an additional wire.  Of course you could always make one yourself.  Not everything will be done for you like in the Arduino environment, but you have the potential to learn a lot more about how things really work.

And as far as learning goes there's a lot of AVR resources:

• Blink an LED with an AVR - basic bootstrapping article
• Resources for getting started with AVRs - a few years old so software recommendations are dated but the rest is good
• AVR Freaks forum - wonderful tutorial section
• ATmega48A/PA/88A/PA/168A/PA/328/P Complete - the datasheet for the ATmega328P, you'll be referring to this a lot as you program.

Have fun, ask questions, learn a lot and don't be dissuaded about Arduino.  It is a wonderful stepping stone as long as you use it as that, the first step on your journey through microcontrollers, you'll have a lot of project opportunities open up.

[dentaku]

I know there are people who think you should do everything from scratch by yourself but allot of people start by modifying other people's stuff first.
Since I'm more comfortable with software and code I figured I'd see what Arduinos could do for me.

It's the same with synths. Some people want to be completely analog whether it be full on geeky modular synths or actual keyboards and some people use only virtual instruments.
I like a mixture of both. The new Prophet 12, for example, uses digital sound sources but has analog filters and it's the most impressive instrument in many years.
I like learning how analog synths work but I probably don't want to build my own sequencer when I could use MIDI from my computer to control them instead (unless it's a drum machine in which a standalone hand built hardware sequencer might be a fun project).

Having a deep understanding of everything you're using is great for professionals building "products" but some people just like hacking stuff and building things out of recycled free junk.
 

So, to answer the original question, the Adafruit and Sparkfun kits are a nice collection of starter parts.

One of those will get you started but once you are looking to move beyond Arduino and into the world of microcontrollers I'd suggest picking up some ATmega target boards (with ZIF socket) and a programmer.  If a ATmega is overkill for your project they have ATtiny target boards that work with the 2313s and also the 25/45/85 series with an additional wire.  Of course you could always make one yourself.  Not everything will be done for you like in the Arduino environment, but you have the potential to learn a lot more about how things really work.

And as far as learning goes there's a lot of AVR resources:

• Blink an LED with an AVR - basic bootstrapping article
• Resources for getting started with AVRs - a few years old so software recommendations are dated but the rest is good
• AVR Freaks forum - wonderful tutorial section
• ATmega48A/PA/88A/PA/168A/PA/328/P Complete - the datasheet for the ATmega328P, you'll be referring to this a lot as you program.

Have fun, ask questions, learn a lot and don't be dissuaded about Arduino.  It is a wonderful stepping stone as long as you use it as that, the first step on your journey through microcontrollers, you'll have a lot of project opportunities open up.

[tcbetka]

One other point to not regarding Arduino stuff, is that it's all open. So that means that you can easily open the source files for whatever you're working on, and have a look at how things are being done. For example, say you're learning to write to and read from an SD card using SPI. Have a look inside the libraries/SPI directory, and open SPI.cpp. You can see how things are being done, and learn from it. So the information is there--it's up to the person using it to learn from it. There's no reason not to, as long as a person makes the effort to do so.

Also, there is enough criticism of the Arduino code out there that a person can find out what others thing is *wrong* with the Arduino libraries. And that is but another way to learn about programming MCUs through the use of the Arduino code.

TB

[madires]

+1. Arduino makes you into a "user", not a "designer". You will have no idea how it works and you will expect everything to be handed to you on a silver plate.
Doing something that does not have a library already done ready to use will seem to be so unsurmountably hard to you compared to what you did so far because of all the learning you have skipped that you will just give up. It makes you into a dream customer of the IP pushers lobby and you will never really own any of your designs...

Before someone becomes an expert he/she starts as a user. I did, you did, everyone else did. In another thread about learning electronics there's a great quote about frustrating beginners with equations and math. The same applies here. If you tell a beginner to read the MCU's datasheet and learn assembler first it won't take long to get him frustrated and look for another hobby/career. Having fun is essential for motivation. And with that the beginner will start to look at the internals in more detail and maybe learn about processor architecture and assembler. Otherwise it would be like saying: you've to learn to build and repair a car before you may drive one.

[Radio Tech]

Before someone becomes an expert he/she starts as a user. I did, you did, everyone else did. In another thread about learning electronics there's a great quote about frustrating beginners with equations and math. The same applies here. If you tell a beginner to read the MCU's datasheet and learn assembler first it won't take long to get him frustrated and look for another hobby/career. Having fun is essential for motivation. And with that the beginner will start to look at the internals in more detail and maybe learn about processor architecture and assembler. Otherwise it would be like saying: you've to learn to built and repair a car before you may drive one.

To me, that is very well said.  Everyone started at one time or another.  Like myself, I am just starting in pic programming and have no idea what I am doing.  I asked some question on another forum (that I would not dare to ask here) and I was handed links to the manuals on the pic I was working with.  This was over a month ago.
So after giving up a few times and watching countless youtube vids where folks are just talking about it and not really showing how and reading lots of datasheets, This past saturday I read and programmed my first pic. (16F884). This was via setting the pic on a bread board and connecting what I needed. was crude yes, but it worked.

[jancumps]

I asked some question on another forum (that I would not dare to ask here) ...

You don't have to do that. Just ignore (or enjoy) the witty remarks. You'll get it answered here anyway.

[free_electron]

Best Arduino starter kit? Any kind of Arduino and a hammer.

the 'Deluxe' version comes with a box of hammers and an instruction booklet : "How to efficiently Widlarize your Arduino"

[tcbetka]

Great post madires. Very well-said indeed. I am just now (hopefully) coming out of that effect, after struggling for the last year or two learning how to program AVR microcontrollers "from scratch." There are many things I still have to scratch my head at--like debugging interrupts and such. For me the Arduino stuff just puts the fun back in it, because it takes relatively little effort to make something work. So I find that I spend more time learning about building stuff than I do learning about "learning" how to program an MCU.

This is a process, and any process takes time. Your mind only learns what it is ready to learn, so if using an Arduino helps improve your learning by making the actual programming part easier...then so much the better. The people who want to dive deeper, will. The people who don't care to do that, will likely move on to something else. If everyone did though, there wouldn't be much work out there for the people who really put a lot of time into becoming great embedded developers...

TB

[Abstr7ct]

My experience was going straight to working with low-level microcontrollers, which is a PIC16F690 chip and MPLAB assembler, without bothering with platforms like Arduino. In a matter of 4 months, I was able to write a program that acts as a basic arithmetic calculator. With a PIC18 chip, a 16×2 LCD display screen and a keypad, I was able to add, subtract, multiply and divide. The program was over 250 lines and was written using MikroC IDE. However, I never used the built-in functions except a function that communicates with the LCD screen and another function for converting from Float data type to String data type. But I'm not going to lie, I used another previously written program as a reference to write mine, so there was some work of re-engineering; improving what the reference program lacked in. This is because I wasn't used to write a program with all these lines, functions and interconnections.

Anyway, what I want to deliver in my post, is that you can start hard from the point of zero, that's going straight to the low levels. With an excellent book and rich references on the internet, just in a matter of weeks you would be able to write small programs for a low-level microcontroller and you would become familiar with reading the datasheet to extract what you need out of it. And of course, with time you would be become more and more experienced and it only takes a few months to start working on 'interesting' projects other than blinking an LED or driving a simple DC motor. From there, when you go to high-level platforms like Arduino, it would look silly in terms of its difficulty as you've become knowledgeable of how these microcontroller chips work from inside and how things like interrupts, SPI and I2C communications work from inside and on the code level. The situation would be different if you started directly from a high level point down to a low level point.

[TheWelly888]

I have just ordered one of these kits for only 46 GBP from this lot: http://www.rapidonline.com/Electronic-Components/Make-Getting-Started-With-Arduino-Kit-73-4628

[MatCat]

I certainly feel that the Arduino got too heavy an attack here, who says one has to start from the lowest point in EVERYTHING?   Coming from the software world it would be impossible to think that you are going to program everything from scratch from the ground up, I.E. let's say you write a piece of business software for Windows, hell because you are on Windows that is already forcing you to use Microsoft code already!   As things inherently become more complex the building blocks become more encapsulated, I.E. 20 years ago if you where going to write a game for the computer you would be doing it yourself from scratch, today you pick the engine you want to use as a base, use your favourite 3D modelling program, then fire up your skills on some scripting language like LUA to make the magic, very little real code is ever written, often what is written is the menu and UI structure on top of the 3D engine.

It was the Arduino that got me into electronics because as a programmer by profession the idea of something I could program is what appealed to me, the basic concepts of electronics followed as I experimented.   Sure you can work an RGB LED with a 555, but I see no point in that when I can use a simple AVR to do it and program it however I like (Though I still recommend one learns how a 555 works anyway).

One thing I DONT like about a lot of the AVR community is how they like to just buy brand new Arduinos and use them permanently in a project, a 328p cost about $1.50 to $2 individually and only need a minimal amount of parts to get them running.

Now to the OP:  My recommendation is get an Arduino UNO, then to go and get some actual AVR chips, my recommendation are the ATTINY85, ATTINY2313, ATMEGA328P, ATMEGA1284P, some 16MHz crystals to run those chips, 22pf caps for the crystals, , along with that get yourself a resistor kit, electrolytic cap kit, ceramic cap kit, some random but useful things like 555 chips, 595 and 165 shift registers, some diodes, transistors, push buttons, and really you will have everything you need to do just about anything.  Quite literally how I started!  I went to Radio Shack and bought a resistor kit with 500 resistors, similar cap kits, transistor kits, etc and just started learning them all, I read through about 3 separate electronics books (2 of them had nothing to do with MCU's at all) and did all of it sequentially through the book to learn all of the basic concepts and just branched off from there.

[Dave]

One thing I DONT like about a lot of the AVR community is how they like to just buy brand new Arduinos and use them permanently in a project, a 328p cost about $1.50 to $2 individually and only need a minimal amount of parts to get them running.

The 'tArduino community buys new dev boards over and over. AVR communuty knows how to program and use the chips the way they were intended.

[jancumps]

Don't bang your head. Both are doing electronics. 

[smugtronix]

As a beginner, I have mixed feelings about Arduino.  I am far more comfortable with hardware than I am with software, so I would never use the Arduino shield system for final projects, nor would I buy a new devboard for every project I start. I would much rather design my own PCB, concentrating more on the hardware side. The Arduino software library, however, is conducive to the kind of work I do (audio electronics), as there are often excellent building blocks for commonly used subsystems . I would rather modify an existing MIDI control stack than write a new one from scratch. I realize that there are many instances when using the Arduino libraries are completely inappropriate, and I also realize that I will eventually need to learn to write proper code.

[jancumps]

As a beginner, I have mixed feelings about Arduino.  I am far more comfortable with hardware than I am with software, so I would never use the Arduino shield system for final projects, nor would I buy a new devboard for every project I start. I would much rather design my own PCB, concentrating more on the hardware side. The Arduino software library, however, is conducive to the kind of work I do (audio electronics), as there are often excellent building blocks for commonly used subsystems . I would rather modify an existing MIDI control stack than write a new one from scratch. I realize that there are many instances when using the Arduino libraries are completely inappropriate, and I also realize that I will eventually need to learn to write proper code.

you would require a similar amount of software if you didn't use an Arduino. Once you go with a programmable device, you end up coding - with or without dev board.

[smugtronix]

I'm aware of that. By "learning to write proper code", I mean completely writing something from scratch.

[perfect_disturbance]

Personally I've never bought into the arduino (platform or dev board) is to high level for "real engineers" argument. To me it sounds an awful lot like the real programmers argument. http://xkcd.com/378/ . Personally I think arduino is a great tool for alot situations. My general rule is use the highest level of abstraction possible. If you are programming with butterflies you better have a really good reason.

[dentaku]

I guess I just feel that I'll actually get something accomplished if I can work with something that I can control with software because that's more my kinda thing.

I still haven't gotten anything. This weekend I was going to go buy an OSEPP basic starter kit at a real store but they weren't open on Saturday. It's 3 hours away so I guess I'll have to order online because I probably won't be in the city any time soon.
Something that comes with an LCD and some shift registers with some good documentation all in the same package would be nice.

[MrAureliusR]

Best Arduino starter kit? Any kind of Arduino and a hammer.

+2. It's true that we started out "using" other things, so yes we were originally "users", but that's not the point. As someone else mentioned, Arduino users never seem to move on. I'm not even that experienced and people who use Arduinos always seem to have the wrong attitude... instead of getting out the soldering iron and some veroboard "Is there a shield for that?" "When I grew up, I loved LEGO... now using an Arduino is like learning electronics, but it's like LEGO! Awesome!" 

[MatCat]

Best Arduino starter kit? Any kind of Arduino and a hammer.

+2. It's true that we started out "using" other things, so yes we were originally "users", but that's not the point. As someone else mentioned, Arduino users never seem to move on. I'm not even that experienced and people who use Arduinos always seem to have the wrong attitude... instead of getting out the soldering iron and some veroboard "Is there a shield for that?" "When I grew up, I loved LEGO... now using an Arduino is like learning electronics, but it's like LEGO! Awesome!" 

Basically why I said what I said earlier, but you can't discount the learning because of it's format, and then there are those that only want a lego experience too.  Personally I am the type that when I decide to get into something I am going to learn from it to the fullest extent, and I wouldn't be happy or satisfied if I did not feel like I learned exactly how what I was messing with worked, but not everyone is like that either.   I know for me personally I don't think I really would of gotten into electronics without the arduino, I mean I always had a back of the mind interest in electronics, and it took something like the arduino to finally get me to take that step from back of the mind interest to actual hands on, and ultimately it wasn't even the electronics hardware itself that got me, but the programming part of it, since my profession was programming, I always wanted to learn to program hardware but didn't have the knowledge, hardware, or money until the arduino to make it happen, and of course what good is programming a chip if you have no idea how to interface it to something, so bobs your uncle I found the door to electronics .

I think having the semi-mainstream things like arduinos are only a good thing in the long run, sure your mainstream customer base really doesn't get it more then the lego concept, but thats ok because for some statistic of those there are those like me who really open the door into the full world behind it, and not just to electronics, but programming too, there are plenty of people I see with plenty of electronics experience but are just getting into MCU's with no programming experience, and for those things like the Arduino IDE have it;s place to get people up and running and not barraging someone with no practical programming experience with assembly or straight up C/C++ code.

[jancumps]

I wonder how many mechanical engineers have been inspired by Lego in their youth...

[madires]

Someone can correct me if I am wrong, but, is the Arduino not just a Atmel Microcontroller wrapped in a convenient software programming environment with a standardised (sort of) hardware layout?

That describes it quite well. And if someone doesn't like the IDE he can Asm or C it directly.

Just the sort of thing that could be accessible to people with a lack of hardware experience. A gateway to further learning or just sufficiently flexible to meet a wide variety of needs. It is cheap and well supported with a thriving community.

Exactly! It's a great starting point for playing with MCUs.

I am mystified as to why so many people think there is something wrong with that.

Maybe black and white thinking?

[Stonent]

It's a prototyping environment but it's cool to see all you can do with MCUs.

Once you've got a project, there's nothing wrong with you peeking inside the header files and seeing what you can pull out and use, then wrap it all up into a night tight program written in AVR C and flash that into another AVR and take your Arduino to your next project.

[sync]

As someone else mentioned, Arduino users never seem to move on. I'm not even that experienced and people who use Arduinos always seem to have the wrong attitude... instead of getting out the soldering iron and some veroboard "Is there a shield for that?" "When I grew up, I loved LEGO... now using an Arduino is like learning electronics, but it's like LEGO! Awesome!" 

I'm an Arduino user. But i'm soldering for more than 30 years. I designed and build Z80 systems ages ago. Programming in machine code. No stinking assembler. Is that hardcore enough?

For me Ardunio is just an easy to use environment. It has it's limitations, but then i just use plain C in it. No problem. Maybe i will switch to a plain C environment some day. But until now i'm to lazy to do this. Atmel Studio is not an option, because i'm not a windows user.

And nothing against that LEGOism. Arduino is not solely about learning electronics.

[dentaku]

"Is there a shield for that?" 

That's actually something that I don't like about the Arduino world.
I just want something that can help me control hardware through software, I don't feel like buying all kinds of extra hardware to attach to it and not learn how it actually works.

If I had an analog synth I would want one that has MIDI ports so I can control it through software too. It's the same thing.

[victor]

I got this kit on eBay.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=181128993867&ssPageName=ADME:X:RTQ:US:1123

I liked it, now I will probably look for buying some standalone Atmega, I don't want to buy a arduino board for every project.

[madires]

I got this kit on eBay.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=181128993867&ssPageName=ADME:X:RTQ:US:1123

I liked it, now I will probably look for buying some standalone Atmega, I don't want to buy a arduino board for every project.

Looks like a decent kit! Maybe also get more resistors (pull-up/down and for the 7-segments). If you need high clock rates, like 16 or 20MHz, also buy some crystals and 22pF ceramic caps for the stand-alone ATmegas. And don't forget the programmer! Yes, you could use the Arduino as ISP programmer, but something like the Diamex ALL AVR (around EUR 32) is much better, since it's faster and also supports PDI and TPI.

[Crazy Ape]

I got this kit on eBay.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=181128993867&ssPageName=ADME:X:RTQ:US:1123

I liked it, now I will probably look for buying some standalone Atmega, I don't want to buy a arduino board for every project.

Looks like a decent kit! Maybe also get more resistors (pull-up/down and for the 7-segments). If you need high clock rates, like 16 or 20MHz, also buy some crystals and 22pF ceramic caps for the stand-alone ATmegas. And don't forget the programmer! Yes, you could use the Arduino as ISP programmer, but something like the Diamex ALL AVR (around EUR 32) is much better, since it's faster and also supports PDI and TPI.

I never had a problem with the USBasp type ISP programmers when working with any ATmega based projects.

Just $1.65, and the catch is, you have to buy two at that price.
Actually, it's just one for $3.29, they're calling the cable the second item, still cheap though.
http://www.aliexpress.com/item/1LOT-1pcs-usbasp-1pcs-download-line-New-USBASP-USBISP-AVR-Programmer-USB-ATMEGA8-ATMEGA128-Support-Win7/1098657589.html

[madires]

I never had a problem with the USBasp type ISP programmers when working with any ATmega based projects.

Just $1.65, and the catch is, you have to buy two at that price.
Actually, it's just one for $3.29, they're calling the cable the second item, still cheap though.
http://www.aliexpress.com/item/1LOT-1pcs-usbasp-1pcs-download-line-New-USBASP-USBISP-AVR-Programmer-USB-ATMEGA8-ATMEGA128-Support-Win7/1098657589.html

Nice give-away for an electronics shop. Buy 10 ATmegas a get one programmer for free :-)

[MatCat]

It's a good little kit for getting started, but I would also get a good kit of passives (resistors, ceramic caps, electrolytic caps, diodes, etc), if you are going to get any actual AVR chips for making your own boards or breadboarding you will also want 16MHz crystals and 22pf caps for the crystals as well, 10k resistors for reset pull up, etc.

This reminds me, I have a servo and PWM tester I should be working on (using an AVR of course ).

[MrAureliusR]

Upon further thought, I'd like to change (somewhat) my comments from earlier.

What I DO like about Arduino, and Raspberry Pi (I own an RPi for full disclosure) is that they do, indeed, get young people more interested in electronics. As my generation is now hardwired to want instant gratification, these provide a gateway as others have mentioned, to have something 'just work'. And yes, this can be a great way to get into more advanced stuff. I was browsing the SparkFun website the other day and I was actually thinking about trying to get an Arduino to play with. However I don't like the shields idea -- the whole point, at least to me, should be to provide a simple base to build off of. If you want more digital I/O, don't buy a Gertboard (for the RPi), wire your own!! You'll learn tons more doing it yourself than just buying a shield.

Particularly with elementary-aged children, I think RPi and Arduino could easily help solve a huge problem that's been growing as the 'disposable' generation matures. People throw away broken electronics because nothing is user-serviceable. That's why I love the concept of websites like iFixit, because it encourages people to try and fix it themselves (thus saving landfill space, and increasing recycling and reuse) and also saves you the money of buying a new whatever. Children LOVE electronics, and when you have a 'turnkey' solution like the RPi and Arduino which take like 10 minutes to set up a working project, the amazement and wonder in their faces is priceless. I'm going to be volunteering at a Youth Centre and I've been thinking about bringing some electronics along to try and stir up some interest. The kids will be from ages 11-17 if I remember correctly. Perfect age to get them interested in electronics!

Anyway, back to my main point. I believe that Arduinos can be good for the above reasons, when used as a 'jumping-off' point to build a project, or for quick prototyping. What I dislike is that they seem to become a crutch. As others have mentioned, people just stick with their Arduinos and shields, never progressing, simply following tutorials that tell you 'stick wire A in slot B' to get something working and never comprehending the basic, fundamental concepts that underpin all electronics. If these were used in their proper manner, I think it would spark interest to the point where people will end up devouring books on electronics, and wanting to solder their own. There's nothing wrong with 'dabbling' in electronics, buying an Arduino, and making an LED flash, getting bored and shelving it, but when I see kids making robots out of fully pre-assembled boards, and downloading the firmware already compiled, and simply copying it over -- that's what gets me upset. That's where I think Arduinos and the like are causing problems, rather than fixing them.

What needs to change is basically, people using these products need more guidance! I know personally that my interest was sparked as a child watching my dad fix electronics on his workbench. All the different tools, and wires, and soldering irons, intrigued me and that passion has never left me. Finding Dave's blog has simply re-sparked that passion and pushed me down the path I was going to take eventually anyway -- going to college for EE. However, I think that if all my electronics learning had involved pre-assembled boards and no reading/soldering, I wouldn't have been as interested and probably would have gotten bored and stopped tinkering.

Sorry for the long post, I'm just trying to articulate myself well.

[MatCat]

In a perfect EE world everyone would love electronics and want to devour the knowledge, in reality only a few will, a lot will have a small interest, some enough to just play with the building blocks provided.  It is the one thing the Arduino has brought to electronics in a way is that ability to either use it at the simplest level, or take it to the deepest level, and one of the reasons why it is so popular.  Personally I don't really care for the shield concept either, heck most of the time my Arduino UNO is being used as an ISP  because I build all of my MCU projects onto a single contained board with the chip best suited for the job and the required hardware to do the project, but that is me, I see a lot of people go and make a project where there is an entire Arduino UNO board running something an ATTINY85 could of done, or even *GASP* a 555 chip.

What I really love is to see people actually learn how the things that drive modern life around them work, as the world gets more complex so must the knowledge of those that live in it, otherwise it's not going to last very long .

[Mandelbrot]

I'm relatively new with electronics (starting my Junior year in EE and CompE soon). I started out building gates and very simple logic circuits with only transistors but I was getting discouraged because I hit a roadblock and didn't know what resources I should turn to. However, I started using an Arduino Uno that I borrowed from my mechanical engineering sister and then things started picking up. I never used any shields for it partially because the things I was trying to do only took a few transistors and resistors anyway. I have to say that being able to build something that actually worked was a lot more encouraging than what I had done previously. I built a robot that drove using two continuous rotation servos and I kept adding more things to it, like digital light sensing with transistors and a solar cell out of a garden lamp, using the Arduino as a platform. Eventually I hit the point where I didn't feel there was much more to do with that project, but I definitely learned a bunch about electronics from it and had a great time while I was at it.

I'm actually using an Atmega microcontroller with the Arduino bootloader in my linear power supply project for a digital display right now. I've programmed PICs in C and in assembly, but being that I don't currently have a programmer and I already had to buy many tools and supplies for this project, being able to use an Arduino as an ISP was a bonus.

I think Arduino is a great stepping stone and a great way to make fast prototypes. The people that only use the shields and don't bother to figure out what's actually happening probably wouldn't learn more without an Arduino because they would just get bored and give up. Not everyone wants to be an engineer, some people just want to fool around and have fun with electronics as a hobby. I don't think there is anything wrong with that.

Anyway, back on topic! I think that some LEDs, transistors, resistors, capacitors, potentiometers, some jumper wire and a few breadboards are enough for a starter kit. Maybe get some analog sensors, some micro switches and some servos/motors because moving things are cool. I looked at some kits but if it were me, I'd just buy the parts I wanted separately.
-edit: Although, that LCD kit in the first post does seem pretty cool...

Hope I was helpful!

-Ryan

[TheWelly888]

I have just ordered one of these kits for only 46 GBP from this lot: http://www.rapidonline.com/Electronic-Components/Make-Getting-Started-With-Arduino-Kit-73-4628

It arrived on Wednesday and I read the book during breaks at work. I then had a play and realised that the Arduino is basically a microcontroller breadboard. If (like me) you already own a large stock of electronic components such as resistors etc and have a pile of ex-equipment stuff such as motors & relays then the absolute minimum to buy in order to start is the Arduino Uno board and a USB cable to connect the PC to the board! There's of course masses of resources on the official Arduino website.

[victor]

Does anyone knows if there is any better IDE for arduino?

I wish I could use xCode for that but I don't think it is possible, it will certainly not recognize the arduino C alike syntax.

I like the arduino "C" language, and how it is possible to encapsulate code in a little class/library.
But the IDE really sucks, poor indentation no code completion at all.

[rdl]

There seems to be many alternatives.

http://playground.arduino.cc/Main/DevelopmentTools

[MatCat]

If you want the full AVR experience you will need AVR Studio by Atmel.

[jakehiltz]

I dont understand what the issue is with the Arduino IDE. It is a great place to start and I have been using Arduino boards for years now and have never had a single issue with the IDE. You should check out the new IDE , it has a few extra features.

[victor]

I dont understand what the issue is with the Arduino IDE. It is a great place to start and I have been using Arduino boards for years now and have never had a single issue with the IDE. You should check out the new IDE , it has a few extra features.

Don't get me wrong, it was ideal when I first got my arduino and just wanted to play with it straight away, I didn't want to setup a fricking AVR IDE, I just wanted to burn and run code. So it is really nice because of that, pretty much plug n play and ready to go, no distractions.

But it really lacks a good editor, no code completion, very little syntax highlighting,  indenting code is very frustrating there. There's not even a ruler with the number lines.

These are my main complains.

[zapta]

Best Arduino starter kit? Any kind of Arduino and a hammer.

I don't understand the hate. The Arduino eco system is a great way to introduce people to the world of embedded programming and C/C++.  I wish it was available when I started years ago to play with microprocessors (I used to write 6800 machine code on paper and then enter it into RAM with hex keyboard and hardware loader I built from 74xxx logic).  I greatly appreciate the availability of Arduino boards, IDE, shields, peripherals, libraries and sample sketches, it's pure awesomeness.

[rob77]

any AVR arduino board is a good starting point - including the very simple "IDE" - it's convenient for beginners and does the job.

later on one will find the included IDE very limiting and the arduino libraries very slow  - and that's the point in time when should start using virtually any IDE for C/C++ along with  AVR GCC + avrdude (or any other programmer), study the AVR datasheets and start writing his own code optimized for the application instead of using the arduino libraries.

[zapta]

later on one will find the included IDE very limiting and the arduino libraries very slow  - and that's the point in time when should start using virtually any IDE for C/C++ along with  AVR GCC + avrdude (or any other programmer), study the AVR datasheets and start writing his own code optimized for the application instead of using the arduino libraries.

You can skip the Arduino libraries and do direct I/O even from the Arduino IDE. The libraries are optional and you can also mix libraries for some functions and direct I/O for others.

The advantage of the Arduino IDE is the one package installation of the entire tool chain on all three major operating systems and it has an option for using external editor (never tried it).

Having simple toolchain installation is important for open source projects because it makes it much easier for others to replicate your development environment.