You could have each "cube" had a resistor parallel a common wire. Each cube would decrease the resistance by a calculable amount. 
I wonder how the data would be useful without a microcontroller though.

The protocol used on SDHC is different not backwards compatible.

The small cards keep going up in price. If you ever have any, DO NOT THROW THEM OUT!

I am always looking for cards <512MB.

I think you should have fuses. During a short circuit, these supplies can source many tens of amps. Not too good.

For powering up those unit, the typical approach is to put a light bulb in serial. If the light bulb glows, you have a problem.

I was just about to suggest this. It is called a dim bulb device and I use it all the time for powering up antique and questionable electronics. You can start with a low bulb and slowly go higher.

A small glow should be ok. Lighting up brightly indicates a short.

Good demonstration of how damaged components do not always fail immediately.

Smoke = damage.

Use your resistance ranges and measure it over a long period of time. For short bursts of tests, a capacitor appears to be short.

Agreed. Personally I would just go for it and fire it up.

Most likely the atmega is fried at 12v if it was connected for anything more than a few mS (at best). The absolute maximum ratings on the device is 6 or 6.5v IIRC.

showing some tests is one way, but calling it a crap design by someone that doesnt understand what they are doing is totally subjective, thats just your feelings, not the truth.

The truth seems to be that you may reduce the lifespan of some or all of the parts. If you dont protect your LEDs with resistors or some form of current limiting device, they will probably fail sooner than if you had.

Why willingly reduce the lifespan of components if it could easily and cheaply avoided?
It makes absolutely no sense to me. Datasheets do not lie. There is reason they are only rated at 20-40ma.

What do you mean the scope had a fault, that's now fixed. That sounds like
very low probability.

It is a very old scope (mostly vacuum tube).
One of the incoming AC wires was literally touching the metal outer case. It is properly insulated now
The cord I was using was not grounded 

I just fried my Duemillanove today. I connected the ground to an oscilloscope that had the case ground shorted to the AC line.

This is interesting. Were you powering the Duemilanove from the USB port on your PC?

I just did some tests on my notebook PCs. The USB shields and ground pins on the FTDI
cable seem to be isolated from the AC Mains. I don't see see how that could blow the
mains breaker.

This was on a desktop but my laptop is the same. The USB ground is connected to the mains ground.

Maybe kitty's house is mis-wired at one of the outlets? That's the only explanation for your breaker popping.

I'd call an electrician.

No miswiring AFAIK. The scope had a fault that is now fixed.

  I just fried my Duemillanove today. I connected the ground to an oscilloscope that had the case ground shorted to the AC line.

*FLASH* *POP* followed by half the room losing power

After disconnecting everything and resetting the breaker, everything was ok except the Arduino.

The FTDI is fried...

I have actually had success using drag soldering to replace the FTDI chip but it did significantly damage the board so I cannot fix it at this point.

As far as the OP's problem, if they have a small soldering iron, small solder and a flux pen, they might be able to fix it although the 8U2 has an even finer pitch than the FTDI chip. Overall, I think they will need to purchase a Arduino like I will need to.

Bad day for Arduinos I guess 

When you say "one of your UNOs" I would guess you have another. You can use that to program it with ArduinoISP.

I tried running my Uno off of 3 AA batteries that were in a rechargable battery pack directly to the jack but the lights just dimly flickered and the sketch didn't run.  Not enough juice.

Thats because the jack is regulated. You need 5.5v at the absolute minimum to get the Arduino working and need atleast 6.5v to make the "5v" line a stable 5v. The 3.5-4v of a 3 cell rechargeable pack will not be enough. It *might* work on the 5v pin.

MY UNO WAS WORKING GREAT .. BUT
SUDDENLY IT IS NOT RECOGNIZED BY MY PC...
I M HAVING TROUBLE WITH MY UNO R3. PC NOT DETECTS IT , I.E "NO DEVICE FOUND PROBLEM"
I CHANGED MY CABLE , TRIED ON OTHER PC BUT NO COMPORT , OR NO "NEW DEVICE FOUND"
WHAT IS THE PROBLEM ?

 I HAVE DONE "Loop-Back Test"
! BUT GOD KNOWS WHY NO DEVICE DETECTED IN PC ....... HELP ME GUYS'


ADVANCE THANKS !

Pretty much the causes are fried or misprogrammed USB interface chip.