MEGO Is the Breadboard Prototyping Power Supply You’ve Been Waiting For

What’s the one thing every project you build requires? It’s not an Arduino, LEDs, or even resistors — it’s electricity. So why are so many of us still using 5V wall warts, hacked PC power supplies, or expensive bench top variable units? The answer is that there just aren’t many good, affordable options on the market. Fortunately, that oversight is finally being corrected thanks to the new MEGO portable power supply.

MEGO just launched on Kickstarter, and is designed specifically for the needs of electronics makers and hackers. MEGO fits in the palm of your hand, and has outputs that plug directly into the power rails of any standard-size breadboard. You can also connect jumpers to the outputs if you’re powering something else. MEGO itself can be powered and charged with a micro USB cable, or run from the battery — though they don’t specify the capacity of that battery.

Total output is up to 6 watts, and users can specify an output voltage anywhere 4V to 24V. The regulated output voltage is displayed on a digital readout, so you can be confident it’s set correctly. We would have liked to see it go as low as 3.3V, but most of those 3.3V devices will still tolerate 4V. The 6W max power is pretty low, so this won’t replace your bench top power supply if you’re working with a lot of current in your projects. But, it’s great for the microcontroller-based projects most people are doing these days.

The MEGO Kickstarter campaign is running until December 7th, and early birds can get a single unit for CA $45 (about $34 USD). Rewards are expected to ship in March 2019.