Universal Component PC Board with 780 Holes

Comments about RadioShack Universal Component PC Board with 780 Holes:

The hole spacing is stanard .1". I haven't measured the hole diameters.

This board also has two traces that "snake" along the board between connected pads to create power and ground busses. The DIP IC's stradle these busses, and there are two additional holes connected to each pin of the IC.

I used a dremel to cut the trace so that I could have a 12 volt and a 5 volt bus, as well as ground. Then I used red, green and black sharpie markers on the non-copper side to mark where they are located to help with laying out components.

Comments about RadioShack Universal Component PC Board with 780 Holes:

This breadboard and its smaller sibling, 276-150 are two of the best Radio Shack products. I am a 40+ year EE and never use solderless breadboards. These are better in performance, quick and easy to build and wire, and permanent if you want them to be. Price is cheap so I keep a couple around all the time. If you are in a Boston area Radio Shack and they are all gone, I've probably been by. When you're done experimenting you have a circuit to keep forever. Even if you just stick it in a drawer, you can always get back to it. With a solderless breadboard you need to re-collect the parts and pretty much start from scratch. And the parts and wires fall out easily. Check our some of my projects using them at www.djerickson.comTrue they aren't great for RF or high speed digital, but for analog, audio, DC, GP circuitry, simple micros, quick test fixtures etc. they are great. Better than wire-wrappping since the wiring is low profile. Easy to use with IC sockets and socket pins (machine contact preferred) to allow quickly substituting components. Work well with DIP or .1" components and DIP modules. I use 30 AWG solid wire (wire-wrap style) and solder, and 0.1" crimp and poke (Molex or Amp MT) or IDC style connectors. Love 'em.

Comments about RadioShack Universal Component PC Board with 780 Holes:

This is such a simple item. Radio Shack gives a useless spec like the total number of holes (?!?) but can't give the hole size or spacing; an actually useful spec? Wait, packages at Radio Shack don't have that info anymore, either. Sheesh.

Comments about RadioShack Universal Component PC Board with 780 Holes:

This product meets Radio Shack's standards of adequate performance. For high performance choose another vendor. But let's face it, where else are you gonna find a universal component PC board with 780 holes on a Saturday night at 8:00 p.m.?

Comments about RadioShack Universal Component PC Board with 780 Holes:

The snaked rail traces make it very difficult to follow.
Best used with DIP IC's where the power and ground pins are consistent.

Also, the number of holes out from each pin is very limited.

Comments about RadioShack Universal Component PC Board with 780 Holes:

The board has five rows of connected holes. ICs straddle two rows each.[...]

Comments about RadioShack Universal Component PC Board with 780 Holes:

Prototyping

Comments about RadioShack Universal Component PC Board with 780 Holes:

I used this for a small project and it worked out just fine. I did have a bit of trouble making clean solder joints on the 'copper' side.

Comments about RadioShack Universal Component PC Board with 780 Holes:

Sure would be nice if they would list the hole size! I think they are .042 but can't tell for sure.

Comments about RadioShack Universal Component PC Board with 780 Holes:

The boards are useful when taking a small project from the breadboard stage to a final use. They are particularly convenient for projects using five to eight integrated circuits. I do wish the traces were tinned instead of being bare copper.