Chinese Robot Kit

Kids can build robots, sure, but... which robot kit should be their first?

Lego Mindstorms? Pololu 3pi or Zumo? What would you recommend?

Every time I show my robots to elementary school kids that are really interested in building their own, I realize that I can't recommend a good starter robot kit. Why not?

I feel prospective roboteers deserve a kit that is low cost, can do two or more interesting things, is expandable, and is accompanied both by quality learning material and programming software that younger kids can understand and use.

So, I want to roll my own kit. But, where to start? Maybe... here:

I searched for a low-cost chassis and found vendors on AliExpress selling a robot kit.

It includes an Arduino clone, sensor shield, battery holder, motor driver / regulator board, motors, encoder discs, wheels, caster, and an acrylic chassis.

All for a ridiculously low price. Was it any good? Read on...

Cyber Monday 2015

Updated with lots more sales going on!

Tindie.com

Bot Thoughts

20% off - 80CFB16

• eeZee Propeller, an affordable Propeller breakout
• PIPduino, a 'duino designed to mount in your project
• eeZeeAmp LM386 with lots of features for breadboarding
• RoverMux: take control of your robot rover before it crashes

10% off - 6B54471

• Convenient eeZeePower USB or eeZeePower DC Jack versions
• ATtiny Boards: ATtiny4313, ATtiny84, ATtiny85/ATtiny13
• eeZeeMicroSD, great for breadboard Arduino and more
• Coupons good Monday, Nov 30 thru Friday, Dec 6

HackARobot

• Hackabot Nano, Arduino Robotic Kit, $30 off (coupon code : 8882BB8)

PartFusion

• 10% off all products with F3E57A2 from Black Friday to Cyber Monday

FemtoCow

30% off of selected products with 849EA4C

• usb912
• esp8266 breadboard adapter w/ FTDI, 3.3v regulator

Bobricius

30% off - 95A4EBB

• World's first Supercapacitor powered arduino LED wrist watch
• Retro wrist watch with bubble display QDSP 6064
• Blue led ring circle display wristwatch

20% off - CA268CD 
for all other products etc... best sellers

• 255-Voice PCM Sound Generator, 8 triggers, 16bit
• USB Lithium Ion coin cell battery charger LIR2032
• 5x4 charlieplexed blue 0603 led matrix

And my flagship, new 2016 model

• PicoDuino Attiny85 arduino & RGB led

limpkin

• 10% off the Mooltipass - F8BA799
• 80% off the Whistled! - FAC7006
• 50% off the ESP8266 development board - FF99903

f0086

• 20% off mini LED cube SMD - 33D0B50

nick64

10% discount - 302B08C

• 60x60mm bicolor LED matrix driver module diy kit 
• jollibot arduino-based line-follower diy kit

Pololu

Happy Thanksgiving from Pololu! Our Black Friday/Cyber Monday sale is almost here! We will be offering huge discounts on hundreds of products and automatically upgrading you to the next best price break for everything else. We will also have some great limited-quantity doorbusters. The special offers become active Wednesday morning (November 25) at midnight PST (3:00 AM EST/08:00 UTC), and the sale runs through Cyber Monday (November 30), ending at 11:59 PM PST. More information is coming soon, including a full list of the doorbusters and sale items, but for now, here is a sampling of the discounts.

Sparkfun

Cyber Monday and all its glory is nearly upon us! For this year's celebration of festively-timed discounts, we're putting a huge selection of some of this year's best-selling and most popular products on sale for one day only – from 10-40% off! Check out our Cyber Monday page to get the scoop on the day's special deals!

GHI Electronics

Let's get right to our Black Friday through Cyber Monday Sale.

• $1 Holey board
• $3 Holey Moley board (limited edition, only available during this sale)
• $8.88 mBuino mbed
• 50% OFF
  • Cerberus boards (Cerb40, Cerbuino, Cerberus)
  • G120HDR
  • G30HDR
  • FEZ Spider Mainboard
• 20% OFF
  • FEZ Reaper Tinker Kit
  • all NETMF Development Systems
  • all Raspberry PI HATs
  • BrainPad .NET

The sale is available for 4 days but the stock may not, so place your order now!
https://www.ghielectronics.com/catalog/sale

Electronics Goldmine

$5 flat rate shipping, lots of things on sale--too many to list.

Check them out here: www.goldmine-elec.com

Ham Radio Outlet

Lots of rigs on sale, check them here: hamradio.com

A Main Hobbies

Electronic kits 10% off, 15% off all else.

Particle

Today Only: Particle Sale 30% Off Your Favorite Particle Products

Ah Cyber Monday—the nerdy younger sibling of Black Friday. It’s one of our favorite shopping holidays here at Particle, and we couldn’t help but to get in on the fun. For today only we're offering 30% off some of our favorite Particle products like the Internet Button and Photon Kit. The ideal gifts to get for the engineer in your life, your favorite colleague, or, let's be honest...yourself.

Get 30% Off Now

Fixing Flaky LCD Monitor with ESR Meter

My Dell E2210H LCD monitor was really wonky.

Powering up from sleep, it would only occasionally come back to life, usually after resetting itself several times.

More often, it would power off or go into power saving mode, leaving the front panel buttons inoperative.

Occasionally it would reset or power off while operating normally.

Here's how I fixed it, using my DIY ESR test harness to find a bad capacitor without desoldering.