Every electronics engineer knows that SMD is the future: PTH will fade-out, eventually.
But for prototyping and breadboarding, SMD can be a pain.

Adapters are the answer. I designed a few to show you.
Let me know what you think and which are your favorite.

An adapter for SOIC8: standard width and wide ( f.i. AT45DB161 is a wide variant)
If it's just for a quick proto, direct soldering to the pads is one way to go. But it's not a very solid construction.

Using a double-row header, that's better huh ?

As an alternative: use pins at the end only ......

.... and use solder blobs for the other connections

Using a header AND socket: you can re-use the adapter and chip in another project.
(I would do so with the AT90PWM3 f.i.)

See how much space it saves on the protoboard !

This connector on the short side is the ISP connector. Yep, my own standard :-)

All adapters have two of these bars. They are intended as powerbars, and you can simply connect any pin with a solder-blob to one of these bars.
There are two locations where you can add decoupling capacitors, nice and tight close to the chip. Layout for 0805 or 1206. They are located at the rear side of the adapterboard.

So what's next ?

These are my plans:
1. A strip where you can solder an adapter to and use it on a breadboard
2. Adapters for TQFP, maybe also for SSOP.

Cheers

Nard


Contact ? Send your email to adapterfreak @  the domain you see in the addressbar of your browser. Or use PM on www.avrfreaks.net. My username is Plons

Update:
This is what a BreadBoardStrip could look like. Just cut it to the length you need.

Don't use the standard header-pins (as shown on the right) as connector to the breadboard.

Here an impression of how a BreadBoardAdapter would be used

Why does it have such long pins ?
It was used as a ribboncable adapter.
But as you can see: the method works :-)

Rear View:

two decoupling capacitors
0805 / 1206 in combined
layout; connected
to the two powerbars

A 90 degree angled double header like this is an option when you prefer flatmount.
I am still working on a different solution. If you have any tips ? Please let me know.

How about this: I squeezed a header in, but soldering it will be a precise job. I will add some solder guides to make that easier

Rev3: added solder-tabs