Hi all. I am looking at getting into this and was looking at a 15 project starter kit kit from Maplin (UK) for £80 which seems expensive compared to some of the none o/e kits on ebay @ less than half the price. So my question is are those much cheaper kits god value or should I go with the genuine product.
Cheers.
Dave.
Official Genuino products help fund this web site. Apart from that Maplin are very expensive...
Thanks for the reply. Its just handy that maplin are down the road and I think I will just dive in there and use cheaper parts later. Another question is the arduino website says that we In Europe do not have arduino but do have genuino but I have never even seen it as that everything still seems to be arduino so if it is labelled arduino dose that mean it is not the official product for the uk.
Thanks.
Dave.
"So if it is labelled arduino dose that mean it is not the official product for the uk."
Could be old stock, Uno R3 has been around for a while; could be counterfeit.
e-bay kits may have crappy parts too.
Thanks for the reply. I understand what your saying about the cheap kits. I don't think maplin would sell fake stuff and all of there arduino stuff is labelled as arduino not a genuino to be seen not even on the website question is do I want to pay a high price for old stock. Even an ebay search for genuino comes back with nothing (confusing) Think I might look around little first.
Arduino/Genuino naming only came out quite recently, perhaps part of the fallout from the Arduino.cc vs Aruino.org lawsuits, or perhaps just an attempt to provide distinguishment. Legit R3s will still be available for a while outside of the US. In the US, they are still called Arduino tho.
Yes I did wonder if it was a recent change. Anyway I went down the road to maplin and got it as I think if you go o/e you get less problems. Looks interesting nice guide book. I look forward to having a go at it. 
Dave.