What is snapVCC?

snapVCC is a highly portable and convenient power supply for your electronics projects. It’s designed to fit right on a 9V battery and give you 3.3V or 5V power wherever you need it.

What can you do with snapVCC?

Many circuits require a regulated 3.3 or 5 volt power supply. The 9V battery is an easily available power supply option. A common way to power circuits using a 9V battery is to use a Linear regulator IC circuit to drop the voltage down, as shown below.

snapVCC eliminates this additional circuit by putting the regulator right on top of the 9V battery.

Also, since snapVCC uses a buck converter, it’s more efficient than using a linear regulator.

In an emergency you could even charge a simple (non-smart) phone with snapVCC.

(The above uses a home-made USB adapter cable.)

Specifications

• Texas Instruments TPS560200 buck converter with 500 mA output current
• 3.3 V / 5 V output, switchable via jumper
• P-MOSFET for reverse polarity protection
• Power indicator low power LED
• Tiny form factor, sits on top of a 9V battery
• Power headers are standard .1” pitch
• Comes with a jumper cable for plugging into a breadboard

Features

snapVCC uses a buck converter for efficient regulation of battery voltage. snapVCC has an LED power indicator, reverse polarity protection, and you can switch between 3.3V and 5V by just switching a jumper.

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Open Source

snapVCC is an Open Source hardware project. All design files for this project can be found on the electronut GitHub repository.

Manufacturing Plan

snapVCC has gone through several rounds of prototyping that has improved the design and efficiency of the product.

And now, snapVCC is ready for production.

The research on components and pricing is done, and production quotes are in from Seeed Studio in Shenzen. The groundwork for manufacturing is over. All that’s needed now to bring snapVCC to life is your support!

Creator

snapVCC is the creation of Mahesh Venkitachalam, Indie hardware maker, electronics hacker, and author of Python Playground (No Starch Press, USA). He maintains electronut.in, a popular blog on electronics and programming.