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BigJon
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Posted by BigJon: Thu. Jan 15, 2009 - 02:05 AM
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Anyone used any of these development boards ? (http://www.inovacs.com/) I've seen lots of adverts for them, but can't seem to find any comments or reviews. A search for "inova" or "inovacs" on the forum says "no results found" which I find hard to belive ?

Any comments welcome ...

Jon.
(awaiting delivery of his very first AVR uC and developemnt board from DigiKey ... very excited :-) )

Jon Russell

Tags:

AVR Microcontrollers, megaAVR and tinyAVR
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ArnoldB
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Posted by ArnoldB: Thu. Jan 15, 2009 - 07:06 AM
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I have never heard of them before. From their web side it appears they are targeting their local market, despite the .com suffix.

If you are in the mood for some meditative music, here are some short video where they demonstrate boards.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L...

Stealing Proteus doesn't make you an engineer.

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Gold Markclawson
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Posted by clawson: Thu. Jan 15, 2009 - 10:12 AM
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Like Arnold I've never heard of them but those are some quite sexy looking boards. They may have missed a trick by not having the page translated into English or even having used a US/Europe distributor. At the right price (and I bet they can!) they could have quite a market for them.

The website IP is 218.104.136.53 and http://www.geobytes.com/ipLocato... says they are in Beijing. So does anyone here speak Chinese and can say what price they are charging?

Actually, looking at it, it looks like one of those boards is 728次 and one is 758次 - assuming this is the Chinese currency - the Yuan - then that makes them about £72-£75 (which used to be $140 but these days it's pretty much $105-$110). So maybe not as competitively priced as I first thought (but then the Chinese economy is on the up!)

Cliff

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ArnoldB
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Posted by ArnoldB: Thu. Jan 15, 2009 - 05:25 PM
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clawson wrote:
Actually, looking at it, it looks like one of those boards is 728次 and one is 758次 - assuming this is the Chinese currency - the Yuan
I see lower prices running some pages of the site through Google's language tool:

E.g. the "AVR MEga16 study board"

http://translate.google.com/tran...

Configuration 1: 95 yuan
Configuration 2: 125 yuan
Configuration 3: 140 yuan

The most expensive "AVR MEga16 Deluxe Edition board" configuration is 324 yuan.

So starting at £10! Poking the site further with Google's language tool I unfortunately get the impression they aren't prepared at all to take international orders. I don't know where the OP has seen all the advertising for these boards, since I can't find any international advertising for/from them.

BTW: hot gluing the speaker to the board http://www.inovacs.com/img/upfil... is sooooo '70th cheap transistor radio style

Stealing Proteus doesn't make you an engineer.

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Gold Markclawson
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Posted by clawson: Thu. Jan 15, 2009 - 08:48 PM
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Crikey! If you can really get that for a tenner I'd almost be tempted to buy a hundred (I'm guessing they'd be interested, even if it was an international order) and set up my own webshop selling them for £30..£40 a pop (which would still look like great value)

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Bronze MarkJohanEkdahl
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Posted by JohanEkdahl: Thu. Jan 15, 2009 - 08:53 PM
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Or we could organize a group buy. I might be interested in buying for the price Cliff speculates in...

As of January 15, 2018, Site fix-up work has begun! Now do your part and report any bugs or deficiencies here. 

No guarantees, but if we don't report problems they won't get much of  a chance to be fixed! Details/discussions at link given just above.

 

"Some questions have no answers."[C Baird] "There comes a point where the spoon-feeding has to stop and the independent thinking has to start." [C Lawson] "There are always ways to disagree, without being disagreeable."[E Weddington] "Words represent concepts. Use the wrong words, communicate the wrong concept." [J Morin] "Persistence only goes so far if you set yourself up for failure." [Kartman]

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BigJon
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Posted by BigJon: Thu. Jan 15, 2009 - 09:06 PM
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Well seeing as the advertiser is a user on here, maybe he can suggest a forum group buy, and we could do a review. If he's advertising on here, he must want people outside China to buy them ?

So, Mr "inovacs" what’s the deal ? Can we have some ? :-)

And to respond to ...

Quote:
I don't know where the OP has seen all the advertising for these boards

Looking back, it seems all the mention I've seen on other AVR sites, actually points back to AVRFreaks news ! :-) so marketing works ! I have actually only seen them on here and YouTube, but subliminally I have seen them more ! :-)

Jon Russell

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Gold Markclawson
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Posted by clawson: Thu. Jan 15, 2009 - 09:20 PM
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The only "inovacs" user I can find on here was this user with 10 posts in one thread back in July 2007:

https://www.avrfreaks.net/index.p...

but the questions seemed so basic that I wonder if it was someone involved with the company or just using one of their products. If the former they seem to have come on leaps and bounds in 18 months.

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ArnoldB
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Posted by ArnoldB: Sat. Jan 17, 2009 - 10:22 AM
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Advertising here on this site? Ah, I see. https://www.avrfreaks.net/modules...

I have bookmarked the forum, not the home page, so I didn't see this until a minute ago.

Mr. inovacs, please care to answer the following questions:

Where does inovacs take international orders? Minimum volume to order? Shipping and handling fees? Carrier used for shipping? Method of payment? English description of the differently priced configurations?

I'll send Mr. inovacas a PM, asking him to check this thread.

Stealing Proteus doesn't make you an engineer.

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Gold Markclawson
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Posted by clawson: Sat. Jan 17, 2009 - 03:02 PM
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Arnold,

I tried emailing them but got a bounce back to say their mailbox was full so I'm guessing the PM notification email will bounce in the same way.

Cliff

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ArnoldB
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Posted by ArnoldB: Sat. Jan 17, 2009 - 03:24 PM
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Yes, I am not betting the farm on getting a response. I find it interesting that they take the time to produce YouTube videos (the latest was uploaded just 21 hours ago), but it is hard or even impossible to buy.

Stealing Proteus doesn't make you an engineer.

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Gold Markclawson
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Posted by clawson: Sat. Jan 17, 2009 - 03:31 PM
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I found some sites selling them both in Yuan and also in Singapore dollars but the price was much higher (obviously?) than on their own web site

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inovacs
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Posted by inovacs: Thu. Jan 22, 2009 - 05:34 PM
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There are three AVR boards: AVR Mega16 Study board, AVR Mega8 Development board and AVR Mega16 Experiment board from Inova Electronics.

A simple introduction of these board can be found on link: http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=Fj.... As well there are several demo videos for their experimenta.

You can find how to purchase these boards in the attached file.

Contact Dr G Yao on jimyao2@hotmail.com for further details.

Attachment(s): 

PDF icon PriceList-Inovacs.pdf
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Gold Markclawson
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Posted by clawson: Thu. Jan 22, 2009 - 05:53 PM
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Thanks for the PDF - the Deluxe with all the extras still looks like an interesting prospect for beginners at $74 but what's the thinking behind including both an LPT and a USB programmer for doing ISP? Also, for those of us with ISP devices already is there a cost for just the board and the LCD (I assume you used Atmel standard ISP pinouts?) - probably no need for the cables either though I'm guessing this board does need the USB power cable?

Cliff

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ArnoldB
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Posted by ArnoldB: Thu. Jan 22, 2009 - 05:54 PM
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Edit: Funny, while I was typing this, a price list appeared.

Stealing Proteus doesn't make you an engineer.

Last Edited: Thu. Jan 22, 2009 - 06:04 PM
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Gold Markclawson
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Posted by clawson: Thu. Jan 22, 2009 - 06:00 PM
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Quote:

Just taking the last one, $74 would be around 506 Yuan. 56% more than what the website lists as the most expensive set with that board (324 Yuan).

Great minds - I was just doing the same calculation to see what the exchange rate "mark up" was. Like I say, at $74 it's still a bit of a "mugs eyeful" but not quite the same as if it had been $49

I always use htp://xe.net for exchange rates though admittedly those are bank rates, not consumer/tourist rates.

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ArnoldB
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Posted by ArnoldB: Thu. Jan 22, 2009 - 06:12 PM
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clawson wrote:
I always use htp://xe.net for exchange rates though admittedly those are bank rates, not consumer/tourist rates.
I simply type a query like
74 USD in Yuan

into the Google search entry field. Google has some funny tricks up the sleeves. They detect currency conversion requests and do the math. Another trick they have is that Google can do normal math. E.g. just type

3*pi

into Google.

Stealing Proteus doesn't make you an engineer.

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inovacs
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Posted by inovacs: Thu. Jan 22, 2009 - 06:35 PM
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There is an error on the link of my above post and I repost link of board introduction and those of other demos here:

1. Introduction of development boards from Inova Electronics:
http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=Fj...

2. Keypad interface & application video series 1: Key-press generation and Key-Code generation: http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=-h...

3. Inova Electronics: Control principle and implementation technique of dot matrix LED display
http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=2P...

4. Stepper motor drive demo
http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=By...

5. Dot matrix LED display control principle and demo
http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=Yj...

6. LED an Display control demo
http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=u3...

7. Clock/Calendar implementation
http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=bt...

Would appreciate your comments after your viewing.

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inovacs
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Posted by inovacs: Thu. Jan 22, 2009 - 07:24 PM
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The price set in my previous pdf file is based on domestic market ones, but with two considerations
1.That is set price including accessories such as USBASP and LPTISP programming devices, LCD panel and etc.
2.Covering of partial express cost. The actual express is much higher than USD 16.00, for example the first 500g, to Germany is USD22.00 and USD 8.00 for next 500g.

The minimum order is one set and, if buying more than one, you will save on postage. I would be glad to offer group purchase to my fellow members. Appreciate someone to put forward an implemental method to do so.

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BigJon
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Posted by BigJon: Thu. Jan 22, 2009 - 08:18 PM
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Well I'm interested in your "AVR MEga16 experiment board - luxurious version" (http://www.inovacs.com/product.a...). I like the fact is has lots of IO (switched, LEDs, etc). It suits the project I'm working on.

Maybe you could setup an eBay shop to make it easy to buy from you in Europe ? I'm even happy to help with setting it up and translating the descriptions ?

Maybe if there are other Freaks interested in the UK, we could group buy and save on postage ?

Jon.

Jon Russell

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seg0101
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Posted by seg0101: Thu. Jan 29, 2009 - 04:36 PM
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I'm in the UK too and I'd be interested in one of each of Inovacs AVR boards (3 in total?), but just the boards with their data CDs, a USB power lead and and the 'dupond connection wires' for the experimenters board.

I do however think Mr Inovacs needs to rethink his pricing structure so international prices more closely match his 'local' prices.

So come on Mr Inovacs - get an eBay account up and running... I'll be there like a shot!

SeG.

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