The Message Pump project from Spikenzie Labs provides you with some surface mount soldering enjoyment and a resulting device that will allow you to display messages from your computer. Lots of computers don’t have a serial port these days so the USB connection is very handy. It is available in many forms including bare board or a kit with all the required parts.

"The Message Pump A.K.A. the USB to LCD Backpack is a device that allows you to connect a LCD display directly to your computer. It uses a PIC micro-controller, to drive the LCD and a FTDI USB to serial chip to connect to your computer. Most of the parts on the Message Pump are surface mount. If you are good or OK at soldering though hole parts then building the Message Pump will should be a problem. You may just have to change your technique a bit. Look around the web and you will find lots of tutorials on how to do surface mount (SMT) soldering. The most popular part used in this project is the FTDI USB chip. People are afraid of it because it has a small pin pitch (spacing). The version used here is the SSOP-28 package. Yes, this tight spacing does make it a bit more difficult to solder but if you have not tried, I think you’d be surprised, it’s not that hard."

Via: Make