Easydriver problems

Hey everyone,

After recently receiving my Chinese Easydriver copies, I hooked one up to a coded arduino UNO and was messing around with a small stepper. I had wired it as per the instructions easily found around the net, using an adjustable wall power supply...

What happened next was likely due to my minimal electronics knowledge: at low power (3v) motor did nothing but vibrate somewhat, I checked all the connections and ensured it was wired correctly, then upped the voltage. Pretty much nothing happened until I hit 12v, and then noticed what I later learned was the voltage regulator glowing red and burning through itself. I unplugged the power and assume the board is now fried.

My question is whether this is a result of just stupidity when hooking the thing up, or is this somehow the cheap boards I bought?

What would have burnt out the voltage regulator? Is it possible that the colors on the wiring for the stepper were just wrong which screwed me up, and I had the wiring hooked up backwards (wrong pairs)? I thought the easydrivers were bulletproof way above 12v.

Are you sure you had the polarity correct when you connected the 12V supply? It's quite difficult to blow up voltage regulator chips unless you apply reverse voltage to them.

The same happened with mine. Under 12v there was no movement from steppers but above that it was glowing hot and stopped working. should be working up to 30V
They are so easy to burn !!! Is there a way of fixing burned easydriver?