CURRENT ISSUE
Contests
FEATURE ARTICLE
|
|
Issue #216 July 2008
Second Place Microchip 2007 Design Contest
’Net-Enabled Alarm Clock
by DJ Delorie
Unlike old-school mechanical alarm clocks that you have to set manually, DJ’s Internet-connected alarm clock provides three primary features: automatic time setting on power-up, streaming MP3 music, and remote management. The PIC24FJ64-based clock is connected to an ENC28J60 Ethernet chip, an MP3 decoder chip, an organic LED graphical display, and a 24LC512 EEPROM for storage.
Start | System Overview | Network | Display | MP3 | ADC | Memory | Power | Software | Time | Alarms | GUI | Remote Protocols | Construction & Packaging | Smart Combinations | Sources & PDF
My wife is a morning person. She gets up at the crack of dawn and goes to bed early. I’m more likely to wake at the crack of noon and work late into the night. What do we have in common? Like most people, we both use an alarm clock to make sure we get up when we need to. My old alarm clock was, well, old, and needed to be replaced. So, I recently designed an alarm clock with features to suit my high-tech lifestyle (see Photo 1).
a) b)  c)  d)  |
| Photo 1a— This is the finished clock in its wooden case. It’s ready for morning duty. The OLED display is bright during the day, but dims at night, so it’s always readable. b— Take a look at the back of the clock. The network connection enables me to manage the clock remotely. c— The finished board fits nicely in the enclosure. The OLED display is visible to the left of the circuit board for the six front switches. You can see the orange flex cable going to it. d— This is a view from above the alarm clock. You can see the circuit board that holds the tactile switches for the snooze bar and one of the two “mini-monitor”-type speakers. |
Most alarm clocks use a radio, beeper, or CD player to wake you up. My clock accesses my MP3 collection on the server in my home office via an Ethernet port. The network connection enables me to remotely manage the clock as well. I can easily set alarms and choose music from my office without waking up my wife. The clock also has a built-in GUI so I can manage it locally. Its OLED display and photocell enable it to adapt to different lighting conditions (from bright sun to pitch black).
Now you too can build a customized alarm clock. In this article, I’ll describe the design process from start to finish.
Next *| Subscription Deals |*
|
