SimLego:
My Uno arrived today from HK, much earlier than expected.
Installation and writing/uploading 'Hello World' was totally hassle free, guess it took about ten minutes. I'm already in love! Discovering the non-standard gap between digital pins 7 and 8 was the only unpleasant surprise so far. Makes it much harder to make DIY shields on prototype boards.Now I have to study the Multiplexer/Driver Board once more to see how much is still useful. This will surely take some time...
Yes the non-standard gap can be a hassle. It was just a simple rush to market last min error that didn't get caught when they released their very first version of the arduino board. And once release into the wild they didn't want to correct it as it would make useless any shield made prior if they corrected the spacing.
However there is a pretty simple fix, use a bent 'offset header' that will align up with standard .1" spaced proto-boards:
https://www.sparkfun.com/products/9374?
Lefty