review – VoltLog

Ynvisible Ultra Low-Power Display Technology – Voltlog #375

Welcome to a new Voltlog, today we are taking a look at some pretty interesting display technology, this evaluation kit was sent to me by the company named YNVISIBLE for the purpose of this review, they developed this display technology based on Electrochromism, this is defined as the property of a material to change color when voltage is applied. I’m sure this sounds familiar because similar properties of materials are used in e-paper or e-ink displays, they both reflect ambient light but in the case of e-ink the technology is different , as e-ink display are based on electrophoretic properties.

So this is what you get inside the kit, I like how it’s put together and you can get started evaluating the technology as soon as you open the box because, besides providing you with a wide selection of display examples based on their technology, you also get some ready to go boards to drive these display units.

Before telling you more about the display technology let me quickly connect one of these to the demo board to show you how it looks. I noticed two things immediately, it does take some time for the cells to change color but it’s really simple to drive these as you can connect them directly to MCU pins and just drive them directly. For example this 3 segment display, has a 4 pin connection, one common pin and one connection for each segment. Drive it high or low to go from color to bleach state. So you start to imagine how this can enable some very low cost devices to be built.

Aneng AN888S Multimeter With Bluetooth Speaker Review & Teardown – Voltlog #374

Welcome to a new Voltlog, today we are taking a look at this true RMS auto-ranging bench multimeter unit from Aneng but as we know we typically find the Aneng meters being sold under other names, different colors so for example this one is also available under the model name ZT-5566 and ZT-5566SE which I’m not really sure but might be able to provide spoken measurement via it’s built-in speaker while the one I have here only has bluetooth speaker functionality. Yup you’ve heard that right, it’s a multimeter combined with a bluetooth speaker. This unit was provided for free by banggood.com for the purpose of this review and if you would like to order one after watching this video, please consider using the link I’ve placed in the description of the video.

This is a 20000 count meter and the dc voltage accuracy is 0.05%+3 counts, dc current 0,5%+3 counts, an update rate of 3 measurements per second, it can also do ohms, capacitance, diode, continuity, frequency, duty cycle. There is no CAT safety rating printed on this meter, they probably don’t bother with that any more but we should be able to evaluate general safety measures later in our teardown. I don’t see myself playing music through this while working on my projects but I could definitely see myself playing one of my favorite podcasts while working on some electronics, like for example TheAmpHour show which I often listen to while assembling or debugging boards.

Uni-T UT501A Insulation Tester Review & Teardown – Voltlog #372

Welcome to a new Voltlog, for today I’m going to review & teardown this Uni-T Insulation Tester, the model number is UT501A. We’re going to start with a general introduction and then continue with a teardown and presenting some real world test scenarios. If at any point you are interested in ordering one, please check out the links I’ve placed in the description below.

So, like the name implies, this meter is good for testing insulation resistance but why would you need to do that? Well you would want to test the insulation resistance of a particular circuit or piece of machinery immediately after first installation or repair or through its service life to discover potential problems before they occur.

Let’s take for example the winding of a motor, every turn of copper wire is insulated but because of stress, harsh operating environment, over time, the insulation might start to fail and by testing regularly you can start to nice if the insulation resistance starts to drop and you might be able to service that piece of equipment before catastrophic failure.

Or another good example is when you wire up the electrical installation for a new home. During the installation procedure or during the construction period, accidental damage might occur to the wiring so it’s good practice to test for insulation resistance before you start using the new installation.

Pokit Meter Review – Voltlog #371

This is a bluetooth pocket multimeter which means it doesn’t have a display, it uses a smartphone/tablet app to display the measured data and it can do almost everything that a basic meter does: it can measure ac/dc voltage but no true RMS capability on this model, ac/dc current, resistance, continuity, diodes and as a bonus it can also do data logging and it has an oscilloscope mode but with a more limited range of values & functionality given its size. I find this pretty cool, because they managed to build so many functions inside such a small package like I have not seen pocket multimeters that can do data logging so far.

Right from the start you realize why they call it a pokit meter, it’s basically the size of a small puck, less than 5cm in diameter and about 17mm thick. Inside the box you get the meter itself, a pair of J-clips, a spare fuse, a small neoprene carry case and a quick starting guide. The first thing you need to do is to remove the battery seal and you have to twist the battery cap for release and then pull on the small insulating paper which then activates the CR2032 battery.

Micsig CP2100A Best Affordable Current Probe | Voltlog #330

So this is the Micsig CP2100 series current probe, it’s my first piece of equipment from Micsig but I’ve been hearing good things about them so I kinda have high expectations for this product.

What I have here is the CP2100A variant which is rated for 800KHz bandwidth, there is also a B variant which is rated for up to 2MHz in the latest revision, that one is a bit more expensive and I would only recommend getting it if you really need that bandwidth, otherwise there shouldn’t be any other difference between the two models. I don’t know if I mentioned this already but obviously it can measure AC and DC, it has two ranges, 10A and 100A. There is a zero function on the module for automatic zero adjustment and you can also do manual offset adjustments with these arrow keys.

Micsig specs this as 3% ±50mA accuracy for the 10A range and 4% ±50mA for the 100A range but from what I’ve been reading on the forums, this is actually better than the spec, you can pretty much measure down to 50mA without having to worry about that ±50mA but we’ll put that to a test later. Included below you see a set of images from the teardown.

Fix Microscope Ring Light Reflections With These Projector Lamps | Voltlog #327

You’ve no doubt seen this before on the channel, it’s the trinocular microscope that I have reviewed in Voltlog #282 and I’ve also done a bunch of follow-up videos since then on how to improve the camera system. This comes equipped with an LED ring lamp to illuminate the working surface if you’ve used a setup like this for soldering you’ve no doubt experienced the reflections you get from shiny surface likes the PCB material, especially when you start adding flux into the mix. I’ll overlay some images so you can get a sense of what I’m talking about but basically, since the ring light is shining light right from where the barlow lens is, there are these annoying reflections.

Today I want to show you an alternative lighting system that will help go around that problem. This is a system with individual gooseneck LED lamps. Having this flexible gooseneck tube allows you to position the lamps at an angle that would avoid those nasty reflections.

Voltlog #292 – Hayear Full HD 34MP Microscope Camera Review HY-1139

Welcome to a new Voltlog, you might recognize this, the trinocular microscope which I reviewed in Voltlog #282, it’s a great tool to have especially if you start to feel your eyesight is getting weaker but also if you have good eyesight you can’t possibly solder 0402 passives comfortably or you can’t spot very small problems on soldering joints without something like this.

However I had an issue with the camera, the image is too black and so far there has been no solution provided by Banggood but I am still in contact with them and they’ve told me they are working with the supplier to find a solution but due to the whole Coronavirus (COVID-19) issue, there’s been delays.

So I’ve asked them to send another camera for review, it’s a Hayear branded microscope camera, it’s capable of up to 2K at 30fps and 1080P at 60fps, it has HDMI and USB 2.0 output as well as SD card storage support. The USB output is capable of 1080P at 30fps but that’s okay, cause I will be using this on it’s HDMI output on the 1080p 60fps setting.

Voltlog #290 – Riden RD6006 Output Noise Using Recommended Power Supply NVVV S-400-60

Welcome to a new Voltlog, this will be a rather short video cause I will only be addressing one short subject regarding the Riden RD6006 ripple noise. In my review of this power supply in Voltlog #284 I did measure the output ripple but that was measured while using a transformer to power the unit.

That transformer has very little output noise so the results we obtain can be considered best case scenarios but this may vary in practice, especially if you are using the recommended switch mode power supply. The output of that power supply may not be as clean as the one from the transformer so in this video I’m going to measure the output noise with the switch mode power supply installed.

I’m using the recommended NVVV 400W 60V 6.6A rated power supply, this is what RuiDeng officially recommends to use with their power supply kit. In Voltlog 284 part 3 I took a look inside this power supply so I will link that video on screen if you want to check it out.

Voltlog #285 – Is a Cheap Cordless Power Drill Any Good?

Is a cheap cordless power drill any good? That is a question I’ve been asking myself for a while now because I was in the market for a cordless power drill. I can get a well known brand like Makita which sells a kit with two 18V 3Ah batteries, the drill and a charger for about $200. The thing is I’m using a tool like this maybe once every 3-4 months for a couple of drills, generally soft materials or maybe to assemble some new piece of furniture and I don’t feel like spending $200 for a tool that’s not going to be used and worked for that money.

So I started looking at alternatives, there are the clones of Makitas and Dewalts available for probably less than half the price of the genuine stuff but why go that route? I don’t care about what’s written on the label and the color of the drill. One thing I care about is the shipping of the item, preferably I would like something that can be ordered and shipped from the EU for fast delivery and no additional taxes being paid for customs.

So I started looking at Chinese brands, this particular model got my attention on banggood.com, they call this a 36V cordless drill, it comes with two batteries and it’s available from a warehouse in the EU.

Voltlog #284 – Riden RD6006 Power Supply Review

Welcome to a new Voltlog, if you’ve been watching the channel for a while you might know I’m a fan of the gopher power supply units, I think they are great value for money, they’re simple and they have good specs, in fact I reviewed their latest revision in Voltlog #255 and it had very low noise at the output, even though it is a switch mode power supply. They’re pretty compact, they don’t take up much space on the bench so what’s there not to like about these?

But in recent years there’s been another company which has slowly built-up a name among hobbyists due to their really low priced power supply modules, the name of the company is RuiDeng and they’ve been selling these compact switch mode power supply modules for $20 to $30 for years. They were not great specs, the quality was not great, you needed an external power supply unit but they had a bunch of functionality built into that color TFT display and they were cheap so everyone gave them a try

Now RuiDeng has developed and released a new model RD6006 which resembles a real bench power supply. It has a bigger front panel and it comes with a separate enclosure and power supply unit which are optional.