Although its operating principle is really very simple, the first time you see a solar-powered​ Mendocino motor you can’t help being fascinated. It looks like it came out of a wizard’s den — hovering in mid-air and spinning on its own, apparently without any source of energy. The ​magnetically levitated electric motor, named after the Mendocino County in California, is powered by solar cells. It uses a rotor suspended on low-friction magnetic bearings.

As one of the oldest editors at Elektor I have witnessed with horror the decline of knowledge about, and precise expressivity about, passive electronics parts, in favour of just about anything that’s programmable and having more than 8 pins. However I am not frustrated at my failed attempts, even in the Elektor Labs, to help designers develop fingerspitzengefühl for the Holy Trinity of Passives, R-C-L, and lure them away from compiler errors, ISP connectors and other microcontroller woes.

In this series we have developed MQTT clients able to send messages back and forth over the internet. With the summer break behind us we take a giant leap and use a platform which allows us to store and visualize data in the Cloud. For this we use the AllThingsTalk portal...

Not so long ago, for electronics enthusiasts wishing to replace their vintage jumbo magnifying glass, the search for an affordable microscope seemed frustrating because the offer was so small. This problem has fortunately disappeared. Prices have become more democratic and performance has improved. Now it is the choice of the microscope that has become difficult. Elektor's e-store alone offers three models. And in addition, one of them has an HDMI output to connect to an external display!

Take a 7-segment digit and make the colour of each segment freely programmable. A bright idea, but why the hell didn't anyone think of it before? Seven segment digits were patented as early as 1903. Only now we can freely program the colour of each segment individually and let it change instantly according to the parameters of our choice.  The 4 RGB-displays used in this RGB clock are available in the Elektor Store. The software uses the NeoPixel Arduino library.

Join the Elektor Video Olympics with your own original video production and win one of many exciting prices. Shoot your own video covering an Elektor project of your choice. One you built yourself, or one you read about in Elektor Magazine. Never mind whether you liked or hated it, whether you tweaked it or kept it in its original form, even if you got it working or if you destroyed it. What matters is your experience on video.

In this video, developer Riemer Grootjans explains several powerful features of the SmartScope. Starting with the mobile use with a tablet, he then demonstrates I2C decoding using a multiple temperature sensor board connected to a laptop PC, hooked up to the Smartscope as a logic analyzer. Further SPI decoding is briefly showed too, as well as recorded data export and arbitrary wave generator (AWG).

It’s that time again – our September and October 2017 Elektor edition is now available for purchase! You can get your printed copy posted direct to your door for free, with no shipping costs at all, or the completely identical online version is available for instant download by GOLD and GREEN members here. This issue is packed full or things to keep you entertained, one of which is the Raspberry Pi Zero W. This article looks at the mini version of the Raspberry Pi — the Zero W — and how to not only get started with it but to make the most of all its capabilities. It also gives a practical project to put it all in to action and see what it can do. An exciting LabsProject featured in this edition is the GoNotify. This project looks at a flexible IoT sensor interface and how you can connect anything you like to the right sensor in the right place and keep an eye on it from a remote location. Definitely not a project to miss.

Elektor Business Magazine (EBM) offers innovators, electronics engineers and startup companies, essential information and insights into the latest products, research and intelligence from the industry. EBM Edition 4 / 2017 for August & September is now available and has a strong focus on LEDs, Drivers & Displays. 

It’s that time again – Elektor's July & August 2017 edition is now available for purchase! This issue is packed full of things to keep you entertained. You can get your printed copy posted direct to your door for free, with no shipping costs at all.

Huawei is backing an initiative for an AOSP (Android open source project) using ARM-based hardware and the Linaro open source collaborative engineering organization to develop the software. Their common aim: an ARM ecosystem. The new HiKey 960 dev platform from Huawei is now listed on the 96Boards website and will become available through global distribution channels. It is expected to be of interest to mobile developers and product design for markets like digital signage, point of sale (POS) and robotics.