RFL robots, BlinkMs, low power LCDs

Some new stuff from SparkFun here are a few of the items I thought were interesting…

RFL Robot. This is a amazingly agile and low cost wirelessly controlled robot. The RFL robot by Active Innovations has four specially designed, independent, high-torque motors for driving, throwing, and generally being mean. We are happy to be the first online retailer to stock this exciting new product. Comes in fancy retail packaging with robot battery, charger, and 2.4GHz remote.

The idea behind RFL (Robotic Football League) is to create a league of robots and players to compete in a game of American Football. The robots can actually block, knock each other over, throw and receive a velcro football. They even talk trash to each other whenever a competitor’s IR signal is detected – Link.

BlinkM. BlinkM is a “Smart LED”, a networkable and programmable full-color RGB LED for hobbyists, industrial designers, prototypers, and experimenters. It is designed to allow the easy addition of dynamic indicators, displays, and lighting to existing or new projects. If you’ve used up all your microcontroller PWM channels controlling RGB LEDs and still want more, BlinkM is for you. BlinkM uses a high quality, high power RGB LED and a small AVR microcontroller to allow a user to digitally control an RGB LED over a simple I2C interface. Multiple BlinkMs can be stranded together on an I2C bus allowing for some amazing light displays – Link.

Monochrome LCD – A wonderfully basic monochrome LCD! This extremely low power digital display is excellent for meter read-outs and counters. Each segment is driven with a AC signal. You must drive and maintain each segment with a high/low/high signal. Display works with 0-5V and 0-3.3V signals – Link.

SparkFun Electronics – Link.