Why Picaxe Is My Go-To Chip: Or, How to Build a Simple LED Prop

[@Saavik256]

First of all, great to see you again, Randi! Second, that's a darn neat circuit that I'd never think of! :) When it comes to blinkies, I'm still used to the ridiculous 555 + 4017 combo that ate through your batteries like a rat through a Burger King dumpster. :)

[@RandiRain]

There was a mean comment on here telling me how dumb I was for using the picaxe and instead I should have used the 555 + 4017, blah blah blah. I deleted it, mainly to save his embarrassment, and for exactly what you just said. Thank you.

[@Saavik256]

@@RandiRain Lady Rain, you are never dumb, if anything you are incredibly smart! :)

[@stevendunn264]

Thank you for your videos. I have been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and am having surgery on Dec. 13th or I would be at your show. I don't want to leave this world without letting you know how much your videos have meant to me. I get to work every saturday early to drink my coffee and watch your video. The feelings are a kin to me as an 8 year old getting up early to eat my cereal and watch Saturday morning cartoons. As a veteran of 8 years at Radio Shack in the 80's building Heath Kits, your content speaks to me. Not to mention your beauty, the magic, and comedy. Thank you for making me a very happy viewer.

[@dejongejohan]

What a heartfelt message. I wish you all the best.

[@RandiRain]

Thank you very much Steve. I'm sorry to hear about your status, I hope the best for you. You're a very nice person.

[@Saavik256]

I am keeping fingers crossed for you, Sir!

[@johnmellor6065]

Wish you all the best for the future

[@KeritechElectronics]

Dead Bug! Cool little prop, no PCB, not even a perfboard here. I like the idea of using magnet wire for connections - pretty much like how the old ferrite core memory was done. 12:46 let's play Global Thermonuclear War.

[@RandiRain]

It's definitely a quick build, and something that will probably be used once.

[@jtstaffan]

Most interesting video in a long time ! Edutainment, for sure. Also points out what many guys still refuse to understand: Chicks can do stuff ! Thank you !

[@RandiRain]

Thank you. I have some more ideas like this that I will do.

[@jayeff7900]

Dadgum, I could have been using a Picaxe for some of my Arduino projects! By the way, I was born in 1970 and my first computer was a TI-99/4A with a tape drive and Speech Synthesizer. I programmed the Heck out of that thing, and saving/restoring programs off the tape deck took about fifteen minutes. Good times!

[@RandiRain]

My Coco2 was cassette storage too. I don't want to brag, but I did upgrade to a Coco3 with a double disk drive and an auto 1200 baud modem. I was riding high then.

[@Saavik256]

Heh, I was born in 1985, and my first micro was a yugoslavian implementation of ZX Spectrum called INES. then in 1989 or 1990 I got the IBM 5160 which originally still ran CP/M before going over PC DOS, MS-DOS and finally Windows LMAO. My computing history is such a weird mess but well, that comes with growing up in former SFR Yugoslavia. :)

[@jayeff7900]

​@@RandiRain You're so Lucky, that's Awesome! I Really Wanted the peripheral expansion box, which had a disk drive in it as well as an extra 16 kilobytes of RAM. I couldn't afford it, so I just had the computer and a collection of cartridges. I got quickly bored of the cartridges so I started programming my own games, and that was challenging on a system with only 16 kilobytes of RAM. I also remember looking in the back of a Popular Science magazine and saw an ad for someone who was selling a Super Extended Basic cartridge and I bought it, and it unlocked some new sound and sprite capabilities that one would have otherwise had to write assembly to do. That was back in the mid 1980s. We grew up in such a Good Era!

[@Peterthethinker]

the PicAxe is such a wonderful MC. ,. the 08M-2 is my fave as its small. for so So many projects just a few IO is needed and this fits the bill ....

[@RandiRain]

Exactly!

[@michaeldibb]

I love Picaxe chips, I made a solar panel controller for my hot water system with one. They are easy to program in BASIC

[@RandiRain]

That's cool.

[@sideburn]

I was born in ‘69. My first computer was the trs-80 coco v1 that came with 4k. I thought I was somebody when I wrote a BASIC program that ran it out of memory lol. I used to use the cassette player output to trigger stuff. One time I modded an rc car (one of those cheap single channel ones that only make the motor reverse) and swapped the motor out with a relay connected to a 9v battery and some nichrome wire connected to a pack of firecrackers and wrote a BASIC program that sent a MOTOR ON command at midnight that lit a pack of firecrackers in my front yard on New Year’s Eve 😆

[@RandiRain]

That's cool. I built an animatronic creature, that I never skinned, and it was just the mechanics, but I used my Coco for it. I used both the relay switch for the cassette and those potentiometer joysticks to know positions of the motors.

[@sideburn]

@ oh yeah the proportional joysticks! I forgot about that. I got into Atari computers after and I pulled the board out of the coco, stuck the “audio spectrum analyzer”cartridge in it connected it to my stereo and hung it on the wall… no toy survived my bedroom 😂

[@sideburn]

@ dang were both on the same plane if we were neighbors who knows what might have happened! 😂 now we’re too oldies collecting and restoring old crap!

[@billporter6592]

Very fun !

[@RyanMercer]

🤘

[@PJamS_Vibes]

impressive :]

[@RandiRain]

Thank you.

[@ICLAIMTHISNAME]

very interesting electroonics

[@georgemartinez1720]

If you mix some Baking Soda With Achohal you can make your own spray Kicker

[@crushedcan5378]

I wonder how does the programing work. Man I would have wanted to go to at least one of those shows, they look like fun but I live to far away

[@RandiRain]

You mean getting it to the chip. It's a serial data transfer I know that. The chips have serial data transfer that you can use too.

[@twt000]

Why don't you have the TOMI Isobot robot? It should be on the wall.

[@RandiRain]

Because I only buy broken robots that I can get a good deal on, and those never have good deals.

[@valentmendes8614]

Hello Randi, I have a cosmic confrontation, but there is no sound, it is not scoring or lighting up when I hit the ship, the lamp is fine, it just doesn't have that effect, it doesn't have the effect movement, I've seen your video, but I don't have that ability of yours, I don't know what to do, I'm from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, hugs.

[@antor44]

Great video, and excellent new translations. Spanish is not perfect, but overall it is very good. Only the voice must be feminine.

[@RandiRain]

That's not me doing it. That's youtube.

[@Lion_McLionhead]

Would be surprised if baking soda didn't corrode metal.

[@RandiRain]

It can. I'm not a huge fan of it, but sometimes it doesn't matter.

[@virkotho5057]

die deutsche Übersetzung ist grausam "Spitzhacken-Splitter"? WTF?

[@RandiRain]

Blame KZbin, not me.

[@georgemartinez1720]

I don't get new Math why did they change math😅😅😅😅