The scroll wheel may be the very best factor that occurred to the pc mouse since, properly, the pc mouse. However typically you need one thing a little bit extra tangible. For instance, with a software-defined radio setup, it doesn’t really feel proper to scroll your mouse to alter frequencies. That’s the place [Wagiminator]’ USB knob would come in useful. Marrying a 3D printed case, some addressable LEDs, a rotary encoder, and a CH552E microcontroller, the knob seems to the host working system as a standard USB keyboard. Which means most packages can use it with none particular drivers or software program.

There’s actually not a lot to the {hardware}. A customized PCB holds two WS2812’s, the tiny CPU, the encoder, and the USB plug. There are a number of random discrete parts, too, however not many. Every little thing you want is on the undertaking web page. The PCB format, the software program, the schematics, and the 3D print recordsdata. The code that does the principle work is very simple. The USB code is a little more complicated (look within the embrace listing) however actually, it isn’t as dangerous as most USB examples we’ve seen.

This undertaking is ripe for hacking. The software program is straightforward sufficient to change simply. The 3D printed case wouldn’t be exhausting to spruce up or print in numerous colours. Following the instance, this could make an affordable core for a customized keyboard peripheral that used unique keys as a substitute of a rotary encoder.

Knobs could be easy or complicated. If you would like our tackle the odd quantity management, we used sonar.