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Bruce Land writes:
Students at Cornell University were given the responsibility of choosing, designing and building a microcontroller project,. This year's projects include laser pong, air guitar, an evolving neural robot, and a USB host controller.
During the last 5 weeks of the spring semester in ECE476, Microcontroller Design, students have to combine sensors, actuators, microcontrollers, and mathematical techniques to build something. Some projects are infrsstructure, such as an 8-bit color display for video games or a voice recognition scheme. Many groups built some kind of robot or musical device. All projects show a great deal of originality and work. There are over 200 projects on the page.
Pictured above is David Drew and Joanna Dai's autonomous neural robot, which is able to learn to navigate an enclosed space at the fastest possible speed without bumping into things. Another project, Guitar Legend Maker by Thidanun Saensuksopa and John Del Gaizo, is a real-instrument version of Guitar Hero. Instead of monkeying around with a 5 button faux guitar, you play a real instrument and the system detects the tone actually played, deciding whether or not it matches the riff that is being output.
What's really killer about all of these projects is that the are thoroughly documented, with full source, circuit diagrams, and a discussion of design decisions. If anything inspires you, you don't have to recreate the wheel to start working on your own ideas. ...And with the diversity and number of projects on the site, somthing's bound to inspire you.
Cornell University ECE 476 Microcontroller Design Final Projects - Link
Autonomous Directional Rotary Artificial Intelligence Navigational System - Link
Legend Maker, Train to Be a Guitar Legend - Link
