So I am an absolute moron - I have a circuit and I connected the positive and negative power supply wires of my battery to the opposite wires of my circuit! (my excuse is that it was 3 am and I was about to fall asleep) As soon as i did that, smoke came up from battery connection and I unplugged it immediately after about a half second. Now when I plug it in the correct way, everything seems to run fine for the first 2 seconds, then my Nano's POW LED will blink (same will the LED on the MPU) and the circuit will not run. Have I passed the point of no return? Is there anything I could to fix this? I just really really need this project to work soon and wouldn't want to have to completely get new parts and solder everything on a perfboard again. I'm thinking maybe only the voltage regulator is fried, does that ever happen?
Thanks...hope this gave someone a good laugh