GREEN LED BADGE

Green LED Badge, retail $21.60
Manufactured by (Unknown)
Last updated 02-03-11




The Green LED Badge was purchased on Ebay, after I was looking for another product.

The Green LED Badge is remarkably easy to use; just pop two of the four included batteries in it, and program it via the three buttons on its back. It is comparable in ease to entering your initials after reaching a high score on a coin-op arcade video game like they had in the 1980s and 1990s - and probably the early-2000s too; though I have not played one of the coin-op arcade video games from this decade so I cannot confirm how high score monitoring is performed on modern equipment.

Yes, it really is that easy.

It scrolls your message in bright green LED lights on its front surface; you can have one message (118 characters & spaces).


SIZE



To use the Green LED Badge, first install two of the four included the batteries into it (see below), and then you'll be ready to rock.

On the back of the unit, there are three slim pushbutton switches: "ENTER/ON/OFF", "PAGE UP" (P-U), and "PAGE DOWN" (P-D). These switches have a noticeable clicking sound and a firm tactile sensation (a "click" sensation you can feel) when they are actuated, so there is no mistake when the switches are pressed.

Press the "ENTER/ON/OFF" button to turn the product on; press it again to turn the product off.

When the badge is on (displaying a message), pressing the P-U or P-D buttons selects input text mode ("INPUT"), display scrolling speed ("SPEED"), or LED brightness control ("LUM").

When the badge is on (displaying a message), press the "P-U" or "P-D" buttons to select input text mode ("INPUT"); press the "ENTER/ON/OFF" button, and you'll be in text entry mode.

Change the letter on the right side of the display using the "P-U" and "P-D" buttons; use the "ENTER/ON/OFF" button to lock that character into the unit's memory and move to the next. To add a space between words, simply press the "ENTER/ON/OFF" button. When you have a word with double letters (like the word "buttsnoid"), after entering the first of the doubled letters (the first "t" in this case), change the second to an "s" or a "u" and then select "t" and continue as normal. When you are finished entering your message, either press and hold the "P-D" button for three seconds or wait (do not press any buttons) for ~10 seconds. The message you entered will then automatically scroll from right to left on the unit's LED display.

Uppercase and lowercase letters, the characters above the number keys (!, @, #, $, %, ^, &, *, (, and )), the numerals 0-9, and various punctuation characters are all available.


In this example, I am inputting the phrase "PISS OFF, PISS ANT!" into the product.

To select scrolling speed, turn the unit on, press the "P-U" or "P-D" buttons until "SPEED" is scrolling on the unit's display, press the "ENTER/ON/OFF" button, and then the "P-U" or "P-D" buttons to select speeds 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, or 9. Press the "ENTER/ON/OFF" button to lock in your choise.
1 is the slowest, 9 is the fastest.

To select brightness, turn the unit on, press the "P-U" or "P-D" buttons until "LUM" is scrolling on the unit's display, press the "ENTER/ON/OFF" button, and then the "P-U" or "P-D" buttons to select brightnesses 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, or 9. Press the "ENTER/ON/OFF" button to lock in your choise.
1 is the dimmest, and 9 is the brightest.

Use the included magnet or the included safety pin to affix the Green LED Badge to a shirt, apron, jacket, or other fabric as you wish.



To remove the batteries, turn the unit upside-down so the back surface faces up. Turn the unit so the door that reads "OPEN" is on the lower left. Use an instrument like a knife blade to slide the door out. When it does come out, remove and dispose of or recycle the used-up old CR2016 cells.

Insert two new CR2016 cells into the opening of this door, orienting them so the flat sides (+) positives faces upward.

With the unit still oriented so the LEDs face down, insert (if necessary) and push in on the door until it is flush with the rest of the unit.



This is a digital scrolling badge, not a flashlight. So I won't try to whack it against a steel rod or against the concrete floor of a patio, stomp on it, try to drown it in a commode, run over it, or inflict other punishments upon it that I might inflict upon a flashlight. So this section of its web page will be rather bare, when compared to this section of the web page on a page about a flashlight.

The Green LED Badge has 13 columns of 5 bright green LEDs, for 65 LEDs total.

One of the first things I do when I test a programmable message thing is to see if there's an onboard censor, and there isn't. I input "{vulgar term for a man or woman who acts as a penis vaccume}! DOUCHEBAG! {vulgar term for male urinator/inseminator; rhymes with stick}" into the Green LED Badge, and it happily spouted off the stream of obcenities. I soon changed it back to "WWW.LEDMUSEUM.ORG!!!" just so I wouldn't forget.

So if you have garbage mouth, potty mouth, toilet tongue, sewer mouth, sewer chute, etc. you can input dirty language into the Green LED Badge and have it spew forth with the obcenities when the product is subsequently used.


Photograph of the Green LED Badge affixed to a shirt, as it might normally be used.

Because this device has a fairly strong magnet, you should excersize exteme caution when you use the badge near a heart pacemaker if you have a pacemaker implanted in your chest.

I found the unit remarkably easy to use, considering there is no computer interface or software - all of the product's functions are controlled via three buttons on the back.

The green LEDs used are bright, slighly whitish-green, not the dim, urinous yellow-green LEDs that might have been seen prior to 1995 or thereabouts.




I tried to take a photograph of the Green LED Badge while a message was scrolling, but the scrolling speed was fast enough and the camera's shutter speed was slow enough that the photograph did not come out well at all.


Spectrographic analysis
Spectrographic analysis of the LEDs in this badge.


Spectrographic analysis
Same as above; newer spectrometer software & settings used.

USB2000 spectrometer graciously donated by P.L.




Video on YouTube showing the Green LED Badge in action.

This is ~10.2 megabytes (10,426,340 bytes) in length; dial-up users please be aware.
It took 4:08 to upload at a speed of ~410Kbps.
It will take no less than forty minutes to load at 48.0Kbps.
I cannot provide it in other formats, so please do not ask.

That music you might hear is from a demo I wrote for the Commodore 64 computer in 1992.



TEST NOTES:
Sample of the Green LED Badge was purchased on Ebay and was received on 01-06-07.


UPDATE: 02-06-07
I input the message "HAPPY BIRTHDAY ANGIE!!!" and attached it to my shirt this evening, as it is my stepsister's birthday today.


UPDATE: 04-03-07
The batteries are deader than doorknobs - and I haven't even *USED* the badge since 02-06-07.


UPDATE: 01-14-08
Product has inexplicably failed; yes, I tried new batteries in it, and even metered them to ensure that a dead one wasn't inadvertantly installed with a good one.
Therefore, that dreadful "" icon will appear next to its listings on this website until or if I am able to obtain a replacement.


UPDATE: 02-03-11
Product has inexplicably come back to life; I went to perform repeat spectroscopy of it and it fired right up.
Therefore, that dreadful "" icon will now be removed from its listings on this website.





PROS:
No onboard censor
LEDs are bright enough to see in room light - they're really bright, actually
Enough space to input a large sized message (118 bytes)
Batteries it needs are a bit odd, but not unreasonably so. Should be easy to find
Easy to program even though there is no software interface



CONS:
Matrix is smaller; this results in text that is a bit harder to read
Scrolling is rougher than expected
No onboard censor


    MANUFACTURER: Unknown
    PRODUCT TYPE: Magnetic scrolling LED badge
    LAMP TYPE: Small green LED
    No. OF LAMPS: 65
    BEAM TYPE: N/A
    SWITCH TYPE: Small rubber pushbutton on/off, character up/down
    CASE MATERIAL: Plastic
    BEZEL: Plastic
    BATTERY: 2xCR2016 lithium coin cells
    CURRENT CONSUMPTION: Unknown/unable to measure
    WATER- AND PEE-RESISTANT: Light sprinkle-resistance at maximum
    SUBMERSIBLE: NO WAY HOZAY!!!
    ACCESSORIES: 4xCR2016 cells, thin bar magnet
    SIZE: 2.45"L x 1.20"W x 0.260"D
    WEIGHT: 0.6oz. fully loaded
    WARRANTY: Unknown/not stated

    PRODUCT RATING:

    Star RatingStar Rating





Green LED Badge *






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