Velleman
I have this love-hate-relationship with Velleman Kits. There are relatively cheap, interesting and easy to build, but they have a couple of disadvantages:
- Most (LED) kits need a 9V batteries, which is expensive and lasts like 60 seconds
- The documentation is not that great and schematics are not always provided
- It is not open source, which means no eagle files or other things
- If it uses a micro-controller, there is no source code or connectors to reprogram the controller
- They use PIC, which I do not care much about... (sorry)
I build a few though and it was fun to make them.
Running Microbug (MK127)
3D X-MAS Tree (MK130)
SMD X-MAS Tree (MK142)
Halloween Pumpkin (MK145)
Shaking Dice (MK150)
60-LED Multi-Effect Star (MK170)