Today we learned how to build our own Arduino by understanding the basis of what makes an arduino work: The ATMega328 microprocessor chip. This chip is what allows us to program and control the arudino.

If you are used to working with the Arduino the ATMega328 chip will actually make a lot of sense and is fairly approachable to work with. The pinout on the arduino is identical to the ATmega328 chip. The only difference working with the chip is that you have to add your own resistance, capacitance, and will need an FTDI programmer to program it, this is as long as it has the bootloader already loaded on. If that is not the case you will need to take a few more steps, which we didn't walk through.

The best reason for stripping the ATMega328 from the arduino is to be able to create a smaller circuit or to be able to build your own circuit. This is great when you are trying to minimize your footprint to fit your circuit into something small, or if you are building a large install and need to use multiple circuit boards which can get pretty expensive if you are buying multiple Arduinos at around $25.00 a pop.

Below is a video of the ATMega328 blinking an LED: