LED Etch-a-Sketch (Full Instructable)

My LED Etch-a-Sketch is my first fully completed electronics project. When I first got into electronics I was looking for a project to start with and while browsing on Sparkfun.com I came across LED matrices and I knew I wanted to work with them. I'm not sure how the idea of an Etch-a-Sketch came about, but it seemed like a fun project a great learning opportunity.

I would like to state that during the course of this instructable I assume that the reader has a basic understanding of using AVR and programming in C.

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Step 1: Electronic Components

In order to make your LED Etch-a-Sketch you'll need:

Logic:

ATmega328p
16MHz Clock Crystal
22pF Capacitor (2x)
0.1uF Capacitor
10k Ohm Resistor

Matrix Drivers:

8x8 Common Cathode LED Matrix (4x) (Sparkfun #COM-00682)
74HC595 8-bit Shift Register (4x)
ULN2803 Darlington Driver (4x)
100 Ohm Resistor (32x)

Other:

Tilt Switch (2x) (Sparkfun #SEN-10289)
10k Ohm Potentiometer (2x)

Power:

MintyBoost Kit (Sparkfun #KIT-10094)

If you want to make the device using PCBs from Eagle files found in this instructable you will need the following additional components:

Male Right-Angle Breakaway Headers (1x) (Digikey #A34346-40-ND)
Female Right Angle Receptacle (4x) (Digikey #A35044-ND)
14-Pin Ribbon Cable 6" (Digikey #A4AAH-1406M-ND)
Female Straight Receptacle (8x) (Digikey #A26422-ND)
2x3-Pin Male Header
14-Pin Ribbon Cable 4" (Dgikey #360-2433-ND)

You should be able to find all the parts between Sparkfun and Digikey. I listed the product number for some items as they will be harder to find than others.

Hanni43 says: May 12, 2013. 5:12 PM

Thanks for taking the time to make a very detailed able, its Great, explained everything so it was Easy to understand..cant wait to get started ..Awsome....Thanks very much..