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[Reply #15 on:]

I drill between the tracks:-
http://www.thebox.myzen.co.uk/Hardware/Arduino_Sheld.html

If they had changed it you would have said it was a conspiracy to make everyone buy all their shields again. They just can't win an they?

[Reply #16 on:]

you mention buying the bare PCB's, but I've had difficulty finding them, I've seen them for the arduino itself, but not the proto shield.

http://iteadstudio.com/store/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=194&zenid=0si0mffsefd6sqvg7rfsaor6b1

http://www.robotshop.com/arduino-proto-shield-pcb.html

 

[Reply #17 on:]

I was concerned when I saw the price on robotshop, but the Itead price is quite reasonable

Thanks for the info,

Carl

[Reply #18 on:]

There are already adapters out. Still this sucks.
I did not mention to buy bare PCBs. I mentioned to have custom made PCBs. This is expensive but you get exactly what you want / pay for.

Udo

[Reply #19 on:]

I kind of have to agree with Udo on on the Uno design.
Sure the header spacing may have been an accident early on, but by the time
the Uno board was being layed out, the non standard spacing issue was well known
and so it became a conscious decision not to correct it on Uno or provide a means to allow "hackers" an easy way to adapt their Arduino Uno boards to using standard spacing.


If you look at a board like the Seeduino, it looks very clean at least to my eyes and does not look "very very ugly" to me nor does it look like it will cause any confusion to beginners as they will simply ignore the extra set of holes on the board.

The Seeduino boards work with "standard" shields but can be easily modified to work
with less expensive prototype & strip boards and can even
be plugged into a breadboard.

For me the Seeduino is the way to go over an Uno, as it has more capabilities and in my opinion is a better layout and
it typically costs less as well.

Kind of a "tastes great and less filling" kind of thing.


--- bill

[Reply #20 on:]

Sounds like there is an opportunity for some vendor or person to build and sell us an 'adapter shield' that plugs into a standard Arduino layout, but on the top has standard .1" spacing headers. One would only have to buy one and could even mix shields by stacking standard types below and the adapter on top. Such a board should be fairly inexpensive I would think?

Lefty

[Reply #21 on:]

Such boards do exist. But still they are somewhat of a pain. I vote for the Boarduino or Seeeduino approach instead. If the layout issue would have been fixed I might have considered the Uno.

Udo

[Reply #22 on:]

Well I too own a Seeeduino board and the spacing option was one of the features that sold me even though I haven't yet installed extra headers.

 I've stayed away from Uno purchase so far mostly because there was bound to be early bugs and compatibility problems (which there were some bootloader issues early I believe and the quick version ide20 vs ide21) and the fact that there weren't any USB host examples out there to take advantage of the new USB hosting capabilities.

 Which by the way brings up another great opportunity for some vendor/person to offer the Arduino community. That would be a simple shield that just has the new 8U2 chip, usb connector and support components such that when usb hosting applications show up one could utilize them with older Arduino boards. Sound useful?

Lefty

[Reply #23 on:]

For real USB support, including host support,

A really nice "Arduino" board would be a new "Mega" board based on a AT90USB1286.

To me that chip represents what a really nice  AVR based Arduino could be.

--- bill

[Reply #24 on:]

The original spacing "mistake" was back in the Ardunio Serial days, right?  That means that USB, NG, Extreme, Diecimila, and Duemilanove, all missed the same opportunity.  Not to mention the NKC and SB Freeduinos, and several other clones,
and the Mega...

It's too late.