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A love letter, straight from my heart - to the beautiful Light Emitting Diode! In this vlog I go deep into my collection and show some of the very first LEDs ever made, review them in context of the history of LED's, and also show some of the coolest and weirdest kinds of LEDs that you'll see around. This one is for hard-core geeks and dweebs only! Thanks for watching...
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By Fran

15 thoughts on “The first light emitting diodes”
  1. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Projet Home Studio says:

    Thanks a lot for this very interesting video. We are the maximum level on the scale of nerdism, and I love it. lol.

  2. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars A Canadian in Poland says:

    I remember the 2000s green LEDs with gallium arsenide phosphide, with 2 volts to light, that emitted a soft yellowy-green colour which seem to be hard to find now. Most greens are now the indium type that need 3 volts to light.

  3. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Goofy Rulez! says:

    Time… the great filter that separates good ideas from bad ones.

  4. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars unter mench says:

    The first LED that I encountered was in 1969. It was made by Monsanto and was very expensive. The company I was working for at the tie was thinking of using them in moving sign displays, but they were mosly a novelty because of the cost. The earliest ones that I currently have I aquired from Motorola in 1972 as a sample.
    An interesting use I have found for them is as a low voltage reference.

  5. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Rex Schneider says:

    I bought my first LED in autumn 1968 when I stopped off in London on my way for interview at Kent University. There was a component shop in Tottenham Court Road (name escapes me) that sold the first infra-red LED that I'd seen. It was in a metal case that was intended to be strapped to a heatsink and came with a quartz lens to focus the beam. I was eventually able to transmit a signal across the living room and detect it with a photodiode, but setting up was very tricky as you couldn't see where the beam was.

  6. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars 4Nanook says:

    Huh, it shows up as decidedly orange on my monitor, not red.

  7. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Matthias Wilhelm says:

    Wow,you a electronic Girl.I'm a old Freak:Pa,Keyboard,Buffet brigade,Amps and old Radio…Synths…

  8. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Audinos says:

    You're making me all nostalgic. I bought my first LED's from Radio Shack as a kid in the late 70's – "jumbo" (5mm) reds. I still have them in a large tackle box with thousands of newer ones. I also have a 70's green LED with a red die inside, although I discovered in high school electronics that, with sufficient voltage, a green LED will light up orange for a second before exploding. I had a Western Electric Trimline phone with one of those unusual green LED's behind the dial. The color was different enough that I didn't know it was an LED until I opened it up. Ill never forget my first sight of a SiC blue LED – a sky-blue color that isn't seen in newer ones. Regarding unusual shapes of 70's LED's, my favorite were the ones with a faceted top. Great memories!

  9. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars meep_ferret says:

    I remember trying to buy a color LED from a Popular Electronics ad. My dad had to write the check (I was too young for a checking account) and I got … NOTHING! Followups went nowhere, Pop 'tronics refused to intervene. A harsh lesson to learn: some things are vaporware 😞

  10. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars I.C.U. Looking says:

    So the first LED you showed was what the Terminator's eyes were made from … how interesting…lol

  11. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Randy Aivaz says:

    Great Videos, Interesting to see a Woman this into Electronics, I made my own Pedals as well. Will have to watch this Full Video when I have more time.
    Just want to put my 2 cents in, Red, then green were first colors I saw and used. Then they had Tricolor LEDs(Red if you applied DC voltage, Green if you reversed Polarity. And if AC Voltage was applied, you would get Yellow(red and green light
    combined makes yellow)). When Blue LEDs first came out, you could buy individually(Radio Shack, Digikey, wherever). I would put to use in Projects. Seem like it wasn't till a couple years later they would be found in Consumer Electronics.
    Stratmando

  12. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars daveogarf says:

    VERY Informative!

  13. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Bryan Draughn says:

    I bought one at radio shack that was green with one polarity, and red with the other. It made me very happy!

  14. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Vandalyst says:

    Who’s winning ?

  15. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars DEAN EVANS says:

    "pretty and dim ",, certainly not dim Fran.😜

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