Parallax, Inc. • BASIC Stamp HomeWork Board ver 1.1
Page 1
599 Menlo Drive, Suite 100
Rocklin, California 95765, USA
Office:
(916) 624-8333
Fax:
(916) 624-8003
General:
info@parallaxinc.com
Technical:
support@parallax.com
Web Site:
www.parallax.com
Educational:
http://www.parallax.com/html_pages/edu/
BASIC Stamp HomeWork Board
#29158 10-pack of Breadboard version
#29157 10-pack of Through-Hole version
Introduction
It’s not often that we start technical documentation with a bit of marketing punch. If you like the low cost of a
BASIC Stamp Rev. D (retails ~$34) and the idea of a half-price BASIC Stamp 2 / Board of Education (retails
~$109) then the BASIC Stamp HomeWork board is the ticket for your class. This is the least expensive way to
get a large educational group started with the BASIC Stamp.
The HomeWork Boards were created exclusively for educators to
send home with students
with these uses in
mind:
•
BASIC Stamp-related homework assignments
•
Dedicated science-fair, contest or hobby projects
•
Students who express personal interest in further developing their BASIC Stamp projects but can’t have
their own Board of Education / BS2 due to it’s higher cost
Since it’s less expensive than the Board of Education / BS2 module, can the board be used for Stamps in Class
experiments? Possibly, with the following considerations:
•
Servo connection ports for robotics are not included on the HomeWork Board. It’s possible to use
male/male headers for servo connections with a second power supply jumpered to the HomeWork
Board to control servos.
•
220 ohm resistors are built into each of the 16 I/O pins for current protection so the PBASIC interpreter
cannot be easily damaged. This protects the BASIC Stamp from over-current conditions but also
slightly changes the behavior of the Stamps in Class experiments if used on this board based on the
command being used.
•
Stamps in Class circuit pictorials do not match the HomeWork Board. Again, minor workaround once
you understand the difference between the power supply options.
•
Power supply is from a 9V battery, not the wall pack.
•
Current supply from the on-board regulator is limited to 50 mA versus the Board of Education’s amp or
more.
However, these cost-reducing limitations do not limit the use of the HomeWork Board for other projects. In fact,
the minimalist design is simple to use and entirely flexible for most projects.
