Hello Element14 Community!

Few weeks ago, I was announced as grand prize winner which I joined with my Christmas Card with Lights and Sound. It was quite a surprise for me because there were lot of great projects.

This time Project14 competition was special, and reward also is. It consists of two parts: 400 USD basket and Multicomp Pro reward. Both parts arrived to me recently and today, I will show them up! Let’s start with my 400 USD shopping cart.

400 USD Basket

This time I made my basket by importing BOMs for my future project (or experiment to be more precise) and adding some tools to fill the 400 USD budget. BOMs are not very interesting, they contains some passives which I did not have yet (this time they include even curious resistor values), some switches, battery holder, few chips and some connectors. Most of them are cheap parts.

Let’s look at more interesting parts.

Multicomp Pro MP730679 22000 Counts DMM Buy Now

This DMM was on my wish-list. I decided to upgrade DMM because I used it quite extensively in last months and I faced boundaries with my previous DMM which was cheap Chinese unit from AliExpress. The biggest problem with my previous unit is low resolution (R), accuracy (R and V), and speed of measurements (R and C). My new DMM has all these parameters better. I did some market research and found MP730679, alias rebranded UT61E+. It basically adds one more digit, it is fast and accuracy specification come from reputable supplier.

After first days of usage, I can say that it is really good. Measurements are fast and stable (the last digit flickers very rarely). It does auto ranging very fast. 30.1kOhm resistor with 0.1% tolerance I measured as 30.09kOhm (my previous Chinese DMM measured it as 29.6kOhm :D).

It come with bag and lot of accessories. Package contains colour printed manual (fun fact is that blur images in manual show UNI-T logo instead of Multicom Pro), quite good test probes, hFE measurement adapter, adapter for (optically) isolated USB communication and batteries.

Software from Farnell store (version 1.03) do not work for me (connect button is greyscale for some reason) but on UNI-T page of UT61E+ there is newer version (2.02) which works with MP730679 as well. Communication is isolated and actual USB communication is handled by adapter and not the DMM. DMM communicate with adapter using IR LEDs (one for each direction). Software is not very intuitive. For example, range you select by clicking button like on real unit, but more suitable GUI control is combo box. It is good for logging and exporting data to file.

The only issue which I notice is capacity measurement. In theory it should support up to 220mF, but I tried to measure my 0.1F (100mF) supercap and received this crazy indication which is not described in colour printed manual, of course. But with some level of creativity I guess it means disc which on some DMM means overrange for capacity measurement, but 100mF which I as part of Experimenting with Supercapacitor measured as 118mF should be in 220mF range, I think.

Note that this DMM was RoadTested (in non-standard way), so you can read more (video) reviews here: Multicomp Pro - Digital Multimeter Tips and Tricks

Rotary Tools Buy Now

Other interesting thing in my basket are Duratool Rotary Tools. Very interesting set for quite a good price. My motivation for ordering these is depand on removing artefacts, mouse bits and panel separators from PCBs from OSHPark. Tool in this set are suitable for it, but since I have no experience, I do not know which one is best, but I tried one from Sanding section and it worked.

Even box of this toy is interesting. It is designed very smartly. You can pull bins for easier picking right tool and they move in sync. Transparent Cover of the box has lock and can be used as stand. Bottom cover hiding power cord is also openable. It is very cool unboxing experience.

At last, for less than 30 GBP it is quite affordable, I think.

Curiosity Nano Buy Now

I expanded my collection of Curiosity Nano boards by new one. This features ATtiny1627 MCU from tiny 2 family. It is younger brother of AVR128DB48 which I already had but core is the same. This one has better ADC with PGA but main reason for buying it was the physical length. AVR128DB48 is quite long and occupy over half of breadboard, so this unit I consider more breadboard friendly and this was my motivation for getting it.

CO2 Sensor Buy Now

Another cool thing in my 400 USD basket of free Farnell goods is modern CO2 sensor from Infineon. It is quite expensive. It is so expensive that even its own breakout evaluation kit is cheaper :D (prices as of 2024-03-15 at UK Farnell and Newark)

Sensor: 30 GBP / 39 USD  Buy Now  

EVKIT with the Sensor: 22 GBP / 28 USD Buy Now

Motivation text on box says that if you are sleepy, you can try vitamins or you can measure CO2. For making evaluation even more engaging, Infineon included vitamin C candy with the sensor :D

Raspberry Pi Pico W Buy Now

Some legends fit the budget as well.

NFC Tag Reader Buy Now

NFC Tag Reader I ordered as part of my previous Projet14 reward, but because of stocking issue I did not receive it originally, so now I asked it once more and now I get it.

When I was doing my NFC experiments, I always used phone as a reader, now I can make embedded device as well. I am interested if it supports reading multiple tags where there are more of them in range. I did not test it yet.

Golden Plated High Quality Pin Headers Buy Now

Samtec Pin Headers definitely are not the most cost-effective item in my basket, but I like them. Especially I like them for low-pin connectors (like three pin debug connectors on Raspberry Pi Pico) because they are much stronger than weak slim low-cost pin headers. As a bonus they have contact area plated by gold and solder area is plated by tin for easier soldering.

Tin Buy Now

Ten years ago, I thought that 100g of tin will be sufficient for rest of my hobby life, but in last years I solder more and more and my resources of tin are lowering quickly.

I already test it (when soldering pinheads to Curisoty Nano and Raspberry Pi Pico W) and it is good, but my previous tin had more rosin in it.

Multicomp Pro Reward

Now let’s look at the second part of reward: Multicomp Pro Reward. It come in very huge package (the largest package which I received from Farnell as far).

MP730889 Benchtop 55000 Counts Mulitimeter Buy Now

Benchtop multimeter I consider as an advanced version of handheld multimeter. The MP730889 offers even one more digit of resolution than already mentioned handheld MP730679 DMM. I expected it bigger. It come in quite compact box and it is not much larger than handheld DMM:

Except better resolution and accuracy, It has better display. Since it is powered from mains, it is not limited to low-power display, but instead full-color large display is there. There are more buttons. Control is slightly easier.

Package contains both UK and EU power cords, test leads (slightly worse than leads included with handheld MP730679), USB cable, some alligator clips, fuse, CD with software and color printed manual. Manual is rebranded more carefully, but device identifies with USB VID of Owon and seems like rebranded Owon XDM1041.

It has very good accuracy in all ranges and show one more digit in most ranges in comparison with handheld MP730679 described earlier. I expected it to be better in all the way, but opposite is true. I expected this device to be very fast (manual says up to 65 measurements per second) but it seems that this apply for voltage measurements only and excludes any use of auto ranging. All other measurements are much slower, some even under 1 measurement per second and when auto ranging is in progress, it takes several seconds to stabilize. Range scanning is implemented using very trivial algorithm which iterates over all ranges and spend approx. half a second on each range level, so if it has to scan 4 ranges, you wait about 2 seconds. Good part is that you see this progress on screen because it shows active range on display.

Additional feature which I expect from mains power benchtop DMM is 4-point resistance measurement, but it is not here.

DMM support some kind of logging. It seems like good candidate for long-term logging like ones which I did in Experimenting with Supercapcaitors. You can setup long intervals in the menu and number of measurements to collect. It is good as long as the value do not change a lot. If value change significantly quickly, slow auto ranging can almost brick this feature.

The benefit of this DMM can be price. For quite low price you get very accurate unit, but it is very slow, and for general purpose need, high quality handheld DMM is better choice, I think. If you need both benefits, look at more expensive benchtop DMMs, even Multicomp Pro have some better.

Multicomp Pro MP710086 Bench Power Supply Buy Now

Other part of Multicomp Pro reward is this 150W bench power supply. It supports 0 – 30V output voltage and up to 5A current and both can be set to any combination without any restriction. It also isn’t new to community. There is review from fmilburn: Multicomp Pro MP710086 DC Power Supply Review which also shows SCPI (which I did not test yet). It seems that it is rebranded Owon P4305.

Package contains two power cords (UK and EU), RS232 cable, USB cable, CD, color print manual and replacement fuse. No banana cables (which would be more useful than yet another USB cable, at least for me).

It is my first bench power supply. In Experimenting with Supercapacitors, I have to make Constant Current source in DIY way, now it is much better. Resolution is 1mV and 1mA. Except standard limits it enables over voltage and over current protection, but they seems to be quite slow. Some videos on youtube show when set output voltage higher than overvoltage protection, it turns it on and it take 400ms to shutdown. I did not test it yet. When set to 30V and 0.001A, shorting make beautiful arc and display show much higher currents than 0.001A.

Control was quite unintuitive to me for a first time, but I quickly adapted to it. I would welcome independent knobs for current and voltage instead of arrows for selecting digit cursor. I am not sure why vendor use segment-like font while device has graphical display.

It can also plot graphs of current and voltage, but it supports only full-scale vertical axis, and horizontal axis is configurable between two options: 30 and 60 seconds. For some slowly changing processes (like charging large supercap), it can be still useful.

Multicomp Pro MP740686 Soldering Station Buy Now

Last large benchtop device in Multicomp Pro bundle is soldering station. It is almost the same station which I already had. In fact, I used it for soldering my Christmas Card with Lights and Sound. Now I received European unit, previously I got US unit. I reviewed it originally here: HyperShock AMA Best Question Reward - MP740686 Soldering Station.

It is good station, but I recommend using it with different tip to tip which is provided with it by default. I used it with Buy Now tip, and it works like a charm. I tested it by soldering pin headers to Raspberry Pi Pico W and Curiosity Nano described earlier.

Multicomp Pro MP010953 Plier Buy Now

Work well. :)

Multicomp Pro MP010952 32pcs tool kit or not? Buy Now

The last item was 32pcs tool kit. The most mysterious item in the Multicomp Pro reward package. It come in quite small antistatic bag and I was not sure how 32 tools like screwdrivers and bits can fit it.

It actually resolved after opening it. It for some reason not contains tool kit, but it contains some D-SUB connector kit. I think that some mistake in Farnell warehouse happened when processing the order.

I do not worry about it much because I already have most tools from the kit. I have Duratool toolkit which contains most of them.

Conclusion

This is all my 400 USD basket and Multciomp Pro reward. Thank you Element14 and Multicomp Pro for sponsoring it. Thank Tariq for managing the contest and ordering the reward. Thank you all who contributed project to the competition and lastly, I would like to thank all who read this blog as well as all who read competition project blogs. I am looking forward for next competitions and if you want to win free Farnell basket, remember to monitor Project14 section for future competitions. It is very nice opportunity.