CNC Breakout board cheap - that will do me !

[irving2008]

It's probably all about semantics
The active ones are breakout boards, the passive ones are connector strips.

Given the cost of some of the cheaper ones, Roy's at DIY-CNC start at about £13 ? it's false economy to skimp on an item like this.

I know many are on tight budgets but one of the most important things a decent breakout board does is to amplify the PP signal to a genuine 5 volts.

Many modern computers, laptops etc run at 3.3 volts on the PP and many of the modern drivers like the Leadshine drives that Gary and ARC sell require 5 volts at the opto's to work.

Sometime they do work, just, off 3.3 volts but it's that borderline that you don't realise, and have problems that's hard to trace further down the line.

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I agree John, but Roy's PCPPS-2 (£14.5 as a kit inc P&P) or PCPPS-3 (£17.50 ditto) don't buffer the signals.

You have to go to the PBB20 (£25.50 as a kit inc P&P) or Uniport (£39 as a kit inc P&P) for that... still not a lot of money really, but then you might as well go for the OptoBoard (£41 as a kit inc P&P) and get the benefits for not much more...