Make:

Windell writes -

MAKEKits wrote up an article on Instructables about assembling and reprogramming our little LED Micro-Readerboards. They suggest assembling the project with a socket so that you can take the microcontroller off and reprogram it in an external programmer.

Another way to build it with a socket is how we're demonstrating here, in this test fixture for the project.

This setup has a tiny piece of perfboard that connects a 20-pin DIP ZIF socket and a socket for the 18-pin LED display. Thus, both the AVR microcontroller and the LED display are socketed, and can be easily removed. This fixture is used primarily to test programmed AVRs. Since the chips are swapped out regularly, the ZIF socket makes sense, even though it's more expensive than a regular DIP socket.

You can get the kits now @ the Maker store ($15). The LED Micro-Readerboard kit is a fun little open source soldering kit that provides an introduction to the capabilities of microcontrollers.The readerboard spells out preprogrammed messages such as "MAKE" one letter at a time on its alphanumeric LED display.- Link.