In the development of electronic devices and control systems often need to be aware of the position of the projected system in space (the position of the display to specify portrait or landscape mode, aircraft modeling, etc.), or on the occurrence of abnormal situations in the operation of the system (shock, vibration, etc.). To solve this problem has now become possible using acceleration sensors, which are widely used in recent years. However, their application at an early stage of development is limited to the size of the sensor itself - usually acceleration sensors available in miniature surface mount package (LGA-xx), which makes it impossible to install using common tools (soldering iron).

This module is the acceleration sensor MMA7455L - a board with pre-installed sensor and external components. All control signals and power supply circuits are derived by a standard 9-pin connector with pitch 2.54 mm, which allows easy connection of sensors to an existing system or breadboard. The board has a small size 23mm x 12.7mm. With the SMD jumpers it is possible to select the source voltage (external or from the set on the board 3V voltage regulator). Also has a manual selection mode SPI using the SMD jumper on the board that allows you to not use the device select signal (provided that the SPI bus is no more devices), and accordingly release a pin of microcontroller to perform other tasks.

The MMA7455L is a Digital Output (I2C/SPI), low power, low profile capacitive micromachined accelerometer featuring signal conditioning, a low pass filter, temperature compensation, self-test, configurable to detect 0g through interrupt pins (INT1 or INT2), and pulse detect for quick motion detection. 0g offset and sensitivity are factory set and require no external devices. The 0g offset can be customer calibrated using assigned 0g registers and g-Select which allows for command selection for 3 acceleration ranges (2g/4g/8g). The MMA7455L includes a Standby Mode that makes it ideal for handheld battery powered electronics.

Typical Applications:

Cell Phone/PMP/PDA: Image Stability, Text Scroll, Motion Dialing,
Tap to Mute
HDD: Freefall Detection
Laptop PC: Freefall Detection, Anti-Theft
Pedometer
Motion Sensing, Event Recorder

Features:

Wide supply voltage, 2.16 V to 10 V (with using voltage regulator on-board)
Digital Output (I2C/SPI)
Self-Test for Z-Axis
Low Voltage Operation: 2.4 V – 3.6 V
User Assigned Registers for Offset Calibration
Programmable Threshold Interrupt Output
Level Detection for Motion Recognition (Shock, Vibration, Freefall)
Pulse Detection for Single or Double Pulse Recognition
Sensitivity (64 LSB/g @ 2g and @ 8g in 10-Bit Mode)
Selectable Sensitivity (±2g, ±4g, ±8g) for 8-bit Mode
Robust Design, High Shocks Survivability (5,000g)
Low Cost
Ability to change the address of the sensor on the bus I2C
Small board size 23mm x 12.7mm
All control signals and power supply pins on 9-pin connector with pitch 2.54 mm
3V voltage regulator on-board
With the SMD jumpers it is possible to select the source voltage (external or from the set on the board 3V voltage regulator).
mounting hole 2.1mm diameter

Documentation:

Schematic of MMA7455L module - http://www.bravekit.com/document/accelerometers/MMA7455/MMA7455%20Schematic.pdf
Assembly drawnings - http://www.bravekit.com/document/accelerometers/MMA7455/MMA7455%20Assembly.pdf
Datasheet for MMA7455L - http://www.bravekit.com/document/accelerometers/MMA7455/MMA7455L.pdf