Product Hacking

Notes on Programming with Microsoft Foundation Classes

228 2500 5d ac affect analog became bmuid boy cabinet charging china compactflash cute disease edpno faces faire folder furniture glue harvesting injection jacks lang larsen lighting love members meter misc moto motor pirate powerpc previewed produced productcode rebel repels searchtools sha shirt shots snap solder specs staples students surplus tripod urban verified wins worst xbox

2010-Jul-22: How to construct an IR Blaster to replace a broken or lost one. [9318]
2010-Jul-05: Virtual Breadboard is an interesting attempt to do project prototyping in a virtual environment and facilitate real prototype development. [9279]
2010-Jul-05: The Seeed Depot has a micro-controller with LAN interface they call the PIC 33F Web Platform for less than $40. [9278]
2010-Jul-01: Leaking electrolytic capacitors have been a problem in computers and other home electronics. Dell got hit pretty hard by this in the 2005-2007 period and perhaps as many as 97% of some of their OptiPlex machines failed due to this. [9272]
2010-Jun-30: A project to build a face tracking robot head, complete with software in Python using the OpenCV library. [9264] [1]
2010-Jun-25: A new development board for a TI MSP430 controller chip called the Launchpad is being sold by TI for the very low price of $4.30 a piece. Looks like you can order up to three of these at this price. A nice idea, pity they didn't put a small Veroboard prototyping area on these for wiring up a few discrete components. [9248]
2010-Jun-25: Getting some basic digital IO happening over a USB connection using some low cost devices from FTDI and their BitBang mode. Updated to drive some LEDs. Updated again to drive an LCD status display. [9125]
2010-Jun-20: Firmware hacks are starting to appear for the Panasonic GH1 and GF1. [9219] [1]
2010-Jun-20: A DIY tablet kit, now you can build your own replacement for an iPad, of course for only slightly less cost you get a lot fewer features... reminds me a bit of the old days of HeathKit. [9218]
2010-Jun-15: The LPCXpresso micro controller is based on an ARM processor, and for about $30 from DigiKey packs enough power to even generate video signals. [9197]
2010-Jun-11: Building a Direct to Garment (DTG) printer out of a used inkjet. Now what happens when you wash the t-shirt? [9191]
2010-Jun-11: The MIDIbox Hardware Platform brings a modular set of components to the DIY MIDI music industry, some of these are available as kits and have been used to implement some big projects like this Station MIDI controller. [9189] [1]
2010-Jun-08: How to convert a SIM card into a microSIM card by a bit of careful cutting. Discussed here on Slashdot. A small gadget called Cut My SIM has now been built to simplify this process. [9104]
2010-Jun-08: Slashdot discusses hacking Canon point-and-shoot cameras, there is now software (called CHDK) that can do this without having to re-flash the camera allowing for safe experimentation. There is now a project to improve the firmware of the Canon 5D Mark II DSLR. There is now a book called The Canon Camera Hackers Manual (ISBN: 9781933952581) for those who would like to read about this. [6061] [1]
2010-May-28: A DIY tablet with a carbon fiber shell. [9137]
2010-May-07: A rather nice looking 8-drive NAS box that is home built. [9107] [1]
2010-Apr-07: The Newcastle Maker Faire 2010. [9060]
2010-Mar-26: A new version of the Arduino, the Arduino Nano 3 makes things smaller, faster and more easily used. [9031]
2010-Mar-11: Using an Arduino to interface to an iPod. [9010]
2010-Mar-04: IKEA makes a number of pieces of furniture that have 19-inch dimensions that can be misused to hold rack mount equipment. It's a pity they saved material by building legs that are only solid for the first and last 2 inches. [8990]
2010-Feb-10: Skewworks is making an operating system for the Arduino that can provide a GUI interface. Not really that amazing since the Arduino processor is probably way faster than the old 6502. [8967]
2010-Feb-05: The arduino can be used from Python. [8952]
2010-Jan-08: How to add the Apple in-line headphone remote control to a set of regular headphones. [8892]
2009-Dec-28: The Make 2009 guide to open source hardware. Discussed here on Slashdot. [8881]
2009-Dec-28: Another product that is intended to be hacked: the Chumby "clock radio" replacement. The main web page is here. An Aug'07 the Chumby was getting ready to ship to customers. An initial look at one is here from Engadget. Ross Rubin writes out Chumby. LinuxDevices.com has more information on this. A new version of the Chumby, perhaps with a $100 price tag, may appear in late '09. This was added to their web store in Nov'09 at $99.95, it is called the Chumby One (I guess the first version must have been the Chumby Zero), progress is being made but you still cannot buy one in Canada. The Chumby One gets reviewed by Engadget. A kit of Chumby's guts is now available so you can build it into your own projects. The Chumby One gets taken to pieces in this ifixit teardown. [1444]
2009-Dec-25: The Barnes and Nobel Nook got dissected and rooted by NookDevs within days of shipping. What's rather neat about this hardware is that they are using microSD cards (rather than built in flash chips) to store the operating system and any user-downloaded data. This makes modifying the system somewhat easier as you can just pull out the microSD card to read/write it with a PC. The 1.1 update to the Nook firmware does not affect the first rook hack. [8841] [1]
2009-Dec-04: Touchscreen gloves that you can use your iPhone with may be as simple as a bit of gold thread. [8819]
2009-Nov-24: TI's eZ430-Chronos is a wireless development platform that is contained in a sports watch, and at $49 might become a popular toy. [8792]
2009-Nov-13: Altera makes FPGAs and offers a USB attached BeMicro evaluation board and software. [8746]
2009-Oct-31: From the instructables, a guide to creating printed circuit boards with an inkjet printer. [8683]
2009-Oct-20: How to connect a PS/2 keyboard to an iPhone. [8632]
2009-Oct-13: The WikiReader from OpenMoko is a portable device with a black and white touchscreen LCD display that is usable in bright sunlight. While this product is sold pre-loaded as a dedicated Wikipedia device it is based on Open Source software and so might well be modifiable for other purposes. At only $99 it could displace a lot of the e-book reader market. [8626]
2009-Sep-28: The Zipit Z2 Wireless Messenger can now run a Linux distro. [8571]
2009-Sep-22: TI calculators are a favorite of hobbyist hackers, to the point that a group factored the digital key used by TI to sign operating system binaries. [8549]
2009-Aug-08: Slashdot discusses electronic circuit simulation software options. [8385]
2009-Jul-17: How to use the Arduino as part of a data logger. [8297]
2009-Jul-04: IKEAhacker explores how a little cutting, drilling or filling can make IKEA stuff more useful. I've modified a couple of my IKEA things in the past, sometimes their construction techniques can throw you a curve ball... [8233]
2009-Jun-23: allpinouts.com will be a Wiki for documenting the pin outs of all types of connectors. Discussed here on Slashdot. [8178]
2009-Jun-22: A home-made CNC router goes for its first spin, writing with a sharpie marker. [8177]
2009-Jun-11: MakerBot Industries is selling their CupCake CNC rapid prototyping machine that builds parts out of molten plastic. Priced at $750 as a kit or $2500 ready to go. [8119]
2009-Jun-07: Building a WiFi radio out of the ASUS WL-520gU router. Mentioned here on Engadget. This uses OpenWRT as the Linux operating system. It shows how to add a serial port to the router, uses it to drive an LCD display and uses a SYBA USB Stereo Audio Adapter to add the audio outputs. [8093]
2009-Jun-05: A mini-laptop made out of a PSP and 360 Chatpad. [8083]
2009-May-25: The Arduino controller is even showing up in amateur unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) like this BlimpDuino. The Paparazzi Project seeks to create an open-sourced autopilot system. [8036]
2009-May-13: A hand-held coil-gun that can be battery powered. A guide to building your own. [7958]
2009-May-02: Computer Shopper discusses how to replace a laptop's screen. [7933]
2009-May-01: Using an iPhone as a controller for a radio controlled plane. The basic idea is simple (and rather smart), gut a Linksys WRT54GL router and use that as the receiver and control module on the plane and then fly the plane via a WiFi link. [7920]
2009-Apr-24: The Aday5E-NCS1 from Aware Electronics is a micro controller based on an X86 core running at 133MHz with ethernet and running Linux. [7904]
2009-Apr-22: The Robard RB-100 is a micro controller based on the Vortex86DX which is an x86 system on a chip. For $255 it delivers a lot of IO in a small package. More details and discussion here. [7897]
2009-Apr-22: The Steampunk Segway, cute, very cute! [7896]
2009-Apr-21: The Meggy Jr RGB is a small game platform based on the Arduino. This is a kit that you solder together and then write the code for. Steven Read has built a Donkey Kong clone that runs on this. [7224]
2009-Apr-17: Some information and pictures on a 100W LED module that is designed for use in street lights. There are also a number of little LED projects on this page. [7879]
2009-Apr-07: Addonics' USB to NAS adapter is quite literally a small black box that will take any USB drive and make it into a NAS drive for $55. I would guess it must contain a small Linux-based computer so its likely someone will get to hacking this soon (like the old NSLU2). The PogoPlug (reviewed here) is another attempt at the same thing, though for somewhat more than Addonics. [7337] [1]
2009-Mar-30: The 6502 returns in the form of a TV-Computer that Maker SHED thinks has potential for hacking. [7810]
2009-Mar-29: This Slashdot article asks about how to get a prototype circuit board built. Turns out there are quite a lot of circuit board manufacturers that offer low volume (typically about a 3 board minimum) one-off production services. These include:
- Express PCB
- PCB123
- Olimex
- 4PCB - Advanced Circuits
- BatchPCB
- EURO Circuits
- Pad2Pad
- EzPCB
As well, some suggestions on other prototyping sources (cases, plastics, machine parts) were made. [7798]
2009-Mar-27: The Tweet-a-watt project adds wireless (by XBee radio link) reporting of power usage to an off-the-shelf Kill-a-Watt power meter. Discussed here on Slashdot. [7796]
2009-Mar-21: The Arduino Nano is a small 16MHz embedded micro controller, for when you need some brains in a project. Getting Started with Arduino by Massimo Banzi ISBN: 9780596155513, is a short book on the Arduino platform. An open source BlackBerry built out of various Arduino parts, including wireless connection via XBee. [6188]
2009-Mar-20: A dutch man has built his own solar panel for less than commercial equivalents. [7748] [1]
2009-Mar-16: Converting an ATX power supply into a stand alone power supply for lab use. [7732]
2009-Mar-03: A hardware approach to making a computer boot from different drives at the flick of a switch. The idea here is to just use a multiple position, multiple pole rotary switch to send power to only one out of several SATA connected drives. [7676]
2009-Mar-01: A rather amusing automatic sandwich maker, the bread "auger" works quite well for extracting slices from the loaf, but the cheese dispenser needs more work. [7660]
2009-Feb-27: Printable Electronics are starting to get to point where they can be used for some real devices. This sort of process would be great for hobby electronics too, when will we see this happen? [7655]
2009-Feb-27: The SunCat battery, just wrap some flexible solar cell around a battery to give it a built-in trickle charge capability. Of course this would work better if the battery had a flat, thin, rectangular shape. [7654]
2009-Feb-27: China is starting to take the concept of product hacking commercial, calling it Shanzai. [7652]
2009-Feb-15: Reverse engineering a USB toy control protocol. [7588]
2009-Feb-13: Google's Android gets hooked up with an E-Ink display this is running on a Beagle Board (using an OMAP processor). This was done by the Moto Development Group. [7570]
2009-Feb-12: Make Magazine are taking a shot at a television version, this is shown on PBS and they are making episodes available for torrent download (see legaltorrents.com). The first episode was reasonably interesting, reminding me a bit of the old Junkyard Wars - except without the competition. [7428] [1]
2009-Feb-12: The Literacy Bridge sub-$10 audio computer might make an inexpensive micro-controller. [7564]
2009-Jan-31: The MakerSHED has a good collection of Arduino products here, these include various pre-assembled and kit controller boards, interface shield boards and accessories like serial to USB cables. [7515]
2009-Jan-24: The Make Controller Kit combines a microcontroller with a lot of IO, including ethernet. [7484]
2009-Jan-22: Neuros is adding support for the Wiimote to their LINK. [7474] [1] [2]
2009-Jan-20: Using an AC current clamp to measure whole house power consumption. This uses an ioBridge module to digitize the data and publish it to the internet. The ioBridge module has four IO ports which can be adapted to do various things - they have a few different adapters here. [7459]
2009-Jan-17: Sony makes a number of products that use Linux, this area of their site lists these products and provides source code. One such product is their DSC-G3 digital camera, which gets discussed here on Slashdot. [7451]
2009-Jan-09: BugLabs are introducing some new modules, including a keyboard. [7419]
2009-Jan-03: Using a BASIC Stamp to add a network interface to an old washing machine to allow remote monitoring of wash status. [7408]
2008-Dec-26: Using the USB NerdKit to build a servo controlled water squirter. This includes some information on PWM control of servos and using MOSFET transistors for heavy load switching. [7397]
2008-Dec-21: Hacking a cell phone into a blood cell analyzer to quickly test blood samples in the field for disease such as malaria and HIV. [7379] [1]
2008-Dec-04: A window-cleaning robot prototype that actually sucks itself onto the glass. [7297]
2008-Nov-10: A project to add a trigger to a bicycle that will trigger the induction vehicle sensor coils at traffic lights. [7187]
2008-Oct-28: An open-source portable game console development system based on the Arduino. [7113]
2008-Oct-26: Implanting a 3G radio into an Aigo P8860 and getting it to run Android. [7099]
2008-Oct-24: Slashdot discusses open source hardware, in particular the Arduino controller project (which was featured in this Wired article). [7083]
2008-Oct-23: Source for gears, axles and such includes a couple of recommendations for McMaster-Carr. [7079]
2008-Oct-17: Elmo Live! gets stripped, now what creations can be based on him? [7036]
2008-Oct-17: The Alaris 30 Desktop 3D Printer would be a great way of creating small custom project cases, of course its probably super expensive as no price is mentioned and the supplies won't be cheap. But in another 5 years perhaps? These devices could be used to make small metal parts through the lost wax process, so they are potentially a game-changing device in the design to manufacturing world. [7035]
2008-Sep-26: Build a web server on a business card sized PCB (discussed here on Slashdot). This uses a micro-SD card to hold the files that the web server will serve up. Sparkfun Electronics has a similar, pre-built, Mini-Web PIC Development Board for about $40, the main difference is that it only has 128Kbytes of on-board storage for the web pages - though if you were using this to implement parts of a home control system that would not be an issue. Another possibility are the EZ Web Lynx devices. [6929]
2008-Sep-18: Using a Nintendo DS to control a Canon DSLR. [6876] [1]
2008-Sep-17: Neuros is releasing a new version of their OSD device, this adds support for HD video encoding (including recording 720p from component inputs) and is built around a mini-ITX sized motherboard and enclosure. For the $250 price its actually pretty good value just for the case, power supply and motherboard alone. Note, this is not a general purpose motherboard, but does have a processor with 256MB or RAM and flash built in along with 100MHz LAN and hard disk interface so could well be used for other sorts of computer appliances. A good look at the inside of the device is here. The Neuros OSD 2.0 wiki has more information. [6868] [1] [2]
2008-Sep-15: Some GPS navigation devices can be unlocked to reveal functions of the PDAs they are built on. [6858]
2008-Sep-13: In this project the modder combines a 15 inch LCD monitor with a complete mini-ITX system to produce an all-in-one computer. [6844] [1]
2008-Sep-09: E Ink makes it to the cover of Esquire magazine. One man opens up his Esquire to see how this was done and intends to hack this further. More information about this here. [6813]
2008-Aug-27: The Beagle Board is a small but powerful 3x3 inch micro controller type system which includes video output (S-Video and DVI-D). [6754]
2008-Aug-18: HP has released a development kit to enable users to hack their HP 20b business calculator. [6698]
2008-Aug-17: A little balancing robot (micro-Segway) that you can build. [6696]
2008-Aug-13: HackMii has developed a DVD player for the Wii. [6677]
2008-Aug-10: Zazzle will print and sell T-Shirts and other items (such as large prints) with text and graphics designed by you. They have standard prices for each item and you set a royalty rate which is then use to determine the final price. [6656]
2008-Aug-01: One attempt at building your own 9-cell super capacity battery pack for the MSI Wind. [6620]
2008-Jul-20: How to make a USB charging cable for a Palm TX out of a dead wall power adapter and an old USB cable. [6547] [1]
2008-Jul-18: Someone has gone to the effort of getting Windows 3.1 to run on the Nokia N810. [6543]
2008-Jul-16: Add stick on knobs to your LCD panel to give it controls with a "real" feel. [6528]
2008-Jul-16: What could you do with an old satellite dish? I like the radio telescope idea. [6527]
2008-Jul-09: SMD device soldering using a hot air soldering gun. [6501]
2008-Jul-09: The Aurora open source DJ mixer includes both audio and lighting controls. [6497]
2008-Jul-03: The Roku Netflix Player is starting to receive some attention, a portion of its code is available as open source. [6480]
2008-Jul-01: Netgear are embracing the open source model more directly with their WGR614L router. [6463] [1]
2008-Jun-26: The Image Fulgurator, projects graffiti onto other peoples photos as they take them. [6438]
2008-Jun-24: It appears that the MacBook Air SuperDrive can be hacked to allow it to work with anything by replacing its IDE to USB bridge. [6419]
2008-Jun-23: The Midify board adds a MIDI port to the Nintendo DS hand-held game machine. [6409] [1]
2008-May-30: Using an Ikea Helmer filing cabinet as a massive computer case. [6260]
2008-May-29: The Corkboard Mac, a Mac laptop that suffered case damage, so got dissected and reassembled on a cork board. If used as something like a digital photo frame this would classify as a product hack, but if the components and wires were arranged with a bit more thought this could be viewed as art. One wonders how much RF interference something like this causes. [6253] [1]
2008-May-20: Mike's Flying Bike, a project to turn bicycle into simulated airplane control system to control the Google Earth flight simulator. [6195]
2008-May-18: An excellent alligator skin Xbox 360 case mod. A bit like the Monster book of Monsters in the Harry Potter movies. I wonder if there are teeth in the drive tray? [6183]
2008-May-12: Finally a use for old floppy disks, the Data Storm (discussed here on Slashdot) would be right at home on Junkyard Wars. [6133] [1]
2008-May-04: In WiFi pirate radio Dan's Data discusses the possibility of home grown public WiFi mesh networks based on inexpensive solar powered WiFi hardware. Plenty of links to related materials. [6043] [1]
2008-May-04: LED Throwies are an electronic form of urban graffiti. In their original form they are just an LED, a small battery and a magnet or putty to stick them to a surface. Lots of other forms exist. [6042]
2008-May-03: Futurlec has a number of development boards for microcontroller projects that are quite reasonably priced. They also have components and various interface module boards. [6041]
2008-May-03: The MiniOn ARM microcontroller programming system. [6039]
2008-Apr-30: Fixing a dead USB Flash Drive, in this case the drive stopped functioning because some of the memory chip's pins had come unsoldered. Initially the author did not realize this was the problem and had just opened up the drive to see what it looked like. After it had been poked and prodded by various people it became obvious that one side of the memory chip was not soldered in place any more. Then the author actually soldered it back on and found the drive to be working again and the data to be intact. [6010]
2008-Apr-10: A Chumby hack to give it a VGA screen. Yikes, a lot of work! Even to soldering under a microscope. This includes a section on making a nice fancy bezel out of clear acrylic plastic. [5758]
2008-Apr-04: Hacking an old Minolta SLR lens to work with modern Sony Alpha series cameras, pretty amazing. [5542]
2008-Mar-25: Using the Lumex Graphic LCD, a black and white 128x64 pixel LCD based on the KS108 controller chip. [5330]
2008-Mar-15: Engadget asks: How would you change Chumby?" [5282]
2008-Mar-12: How to build The Electronic Post-It Note out of a microcontroller, trackpad and an LCD module. Though for abut 30% more one could buy a Nokia N800 instead, put that wouldn't give you as many experience points. [5258]
2008-Feb-28: A project to build your own geotagger for a Nikon D200, this is based on a SiRF Star III GPS module. This is a seemingly simple project because the Nikon's firmware already includes the ability to read GPS NMEA formatted data from the camera's external interface port and embed it into the EXIF data area of the photos. [5180] [1]
2008-Feb-27: Hacking the Everex CloudBook has started, the first steps are to dissect and inspect one. [5174] [1]
2008-Feb-26: One Eee user has hacked it by upgrading the processor to a Pentium-M. [5170] [1]
2008-Feb-24: Simple infra red head lamps could foil common security camera systems. Or at least mark the wearer as a person of significance (and quickly lead to a close encounter with a tac team). [5146] [1]
2008-Feb-16: The Chumby is now available for the general public to purchase. But it is still only for sale to addresses in the USA. [5104]
2008-Feb-09: NASA's guides to wiring, soldering and other assembly processes. Can you make your hacks meet NASA's standards? [5073]
2008-Feb-08: Build your own motion activated home event recorder camera. [5065]
2008-Feb-05: Using a USB interface to drive traditional analog dial gauges from a PC. [5035] [1]
2008-Feb-01: Peggy is a LED pegboard display kit from the Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories. Its a 12x15 inch circuit board that, if fully populated, will hold 625 LEDs in a 25x25 matrix. The intent of this is to use it to build custom LED signs. The design also allows one to save time and materials by only installing the LEDs that are needed for a specific sign. [5028]
2008-Jan-21: Here is an Eee PC that has been extensively hacked to include GPS, Bluetooth, 802.11n, an FM transmitter, modem and SDHC card reading. [4971] [1]
2008-Jan-20: Some information about hacking the XO laptop. [4965]
2008-Jan-17: Build your own night vision system out of old camcorder parts. [4717]
2008-Jan-16: Using ball bearings to control a beat sequencer. Pretty cool until someone bumps your table and the balls go flying. [4711] [1]
2008-Jan-14: How to load Ubuntu Linux onto an OLPC. [4673] [1]
2008-Jan-13: A Linux Qtopia environment can be installed on the Archos 5 and the 604WiFi personal media players. [4654]
2008-Jan-13: TimeSys makes LinuxLink, which provides processor specific kernels, distros, toolchains, documentation and support to help get commercial embedded systems using Linux faster. [4667] [1]
2008-Jan-13: Fun with hot glue and a bit-o-solder, build your own spy cam glasses out of a pair of solar shield sunglasses and a commercial mini-camera. [4664]
2008-Jan-12: I came across this How to Build a Panoramic Tripod Head article after recently having seen a demo of a professional (I think from Manfrotto) pano head given by a friend of mine. This do it yourself model catches the essence of the professional design and should cost a lot less than the $400 for the real thing. The one thing it is missing is a way to adjust for the position of the len's nodal point by changing the length of the "arm", according to my friend one of the key things to getting professional panos is to get the nodal point of the lens centered on the axis of rotation - unfortunately the nodal position changes with the lens (and on a zoom lens it changes with the focal length) so it can be quite tricky to get this right. However, its supposed to be worth the pain. One approach for the wood mount would be to set up a couple of camera mount points for predetermined focal lengths. [4662] [1]
2008-Jan-10: Google's Android platform has been hacked to run on some real hardward, typically a number of Sharp devices. [4635] [1]
2008-Jan-09: Some people are not content with just modifying existing products, one French radio amateur even makes his own vacuum tubes. [4618]
2008-Jan-08: A video from CES showing some of the Bug Labs products. [4611]
2008-Jan-06: Bug Labs announces the pricing and availability of the BUGbase and BUGmodules. [4589]
2008-Jan-06: Adding an internal (well, nearly) USB flash drive to a PSP. This also needs an additional interface board to allow the drive to act as a USB host as the PSP can only act as a USB slave - which makes this hack more significant than it appears at first glance. [4588]
2007-Dec-05: CafePress will print and sell T-Shirts (and other things like bumper stickers or even books) you design (either for your own needs or to the public). [4395]
2007-Dec-04: Adding an internal Bluetooth module to the ASUS Eee PC. The basis of this hack has also been used to add a 16GB flash drive as well as a Bluetooth module to an Eee. Really, it would make sense for ASUS (or other manufacturers) to include a small empty bay inside the laptop with a couple of USB jacks in it for internal expansion. [4204]
2007-Dec-03: The 2007 Christmas gift guide from MAKE. This has quite a few micro controllers in it. [4385]
2007-Nov-25: The P2P Foundation has a page about Product Hacking. [4191]
2007-Nov-21: Bug Labs is looking to make a series of u-build-it DIY gadgets, more coverage on what these modules do here. Some 3D photo renders that give a better idea of how Bug Labs is intending their modules to interconnect. Engadget takes a look at some actual pre-production modules. [1476]
2007-Nov-14: Here's a hands on look at the Chumby from Engadget. While the display is a bit small, this could make a nice photo frame combined with alarm clock, MP3 player and other functions. [4150] [1]
2007-Nov-13: This book ripper is a specialized type of scanner designed to make scanning the contents of a bound book relatively painless. I would think someone should be able to make such a jig in a home shop (or out of Lego) for a lot less. [4142] [1]
2007-Nov-09: Consumers are starting to think about fixing gadgets, discussed here on Slashdot. But what about small and large appliances? [4058]
2007-Nov-07: A 3D LED cube, perhaps its art or perhaps a useful future visualization technology? [4043]
2007-Nov-05: LinuxDevices takes a short look at the BugLabs stuff, this gets discussed here on Slashdot. [4026]
2007-Nov-05: The Last Starfighter arcade cabinet built at last. They apparently have a copy of the game for download too. [4025]
2007-Nov-02: The BUGbase and BUGmodules from Bug Labs get some hands-on treatment. [3914]
2007-Oct-26: Tern makes small programmable controllers, with options for flash card storage and ethernet. [3510]
2007-Oct-25: The GP-3 PC I/O Board Kit from AWC is a serial-interfaced, general-purpose IO controller, with 10-bit A/D input and PWM output. [3509]
2007-Oct-21: Embedded Works makes a variety of wireless communications modules for all sorts of applications. They also have developer kits. [3482] [1]
2007-Oct-19: The EM-X270 module from Compulab is a Xscale CPU module that can be used as the basis for handheld devices. [3471]
2007-Oct-17: The Chumby finally goes on sale. A product that was designed to be hacked. [3457]
2007-Oct-17: An electro magnetic (home web site) can crusher. This demonstrates magneforming (the application of magnetic pressures) - something similar might make for a good science fair project. [3456]
2007-Oct-14: Beating brownouts: building a super UPS discusses building a large capacity UPS out of an inverter. For about the $400 price this article quotes the Noma 1800W unit from Canadian Tire is claimed to be capable of providing a 200W load with power for about 2 hours. [3442]
2007-Oct-04: A-WIT Technologies makes some C-Stamp modules as well as some BlueTooth interface modules. [2536] [1]
2007-Oct-04: Here's how one person took the BlueTooth receiver out of one set of wireless headphones (that had broken) and transplanted it into another conventional headset to make it wireless. This is not the first time this has been done, but its useful to see how to do this in case you ever want to try. [2533]
2007-Oct-02: A comparison of the various PDA (mobile) platforms from the perspective of which would be most suitable for a hobbyist to write software for. [2425]
2007-Sep-21: Make your own stereoscopic display out of an old ViewMaster slide display [2237]
2007-Sep-18: Ponoko is a you-design it and we-build it operation, you upload plans and they will build and potentially sell the finished product. [2151]
2007-Sep-14: An attempt to implement RFC2324, the internet coffee machine. [1890]
2007-Sep-07: EasySync has USB to serial converters and more interesting stuff like USB dataloggers and oscilloscopes [1465]
2007-Sep-01: Some people do some amazing product hacking, this project involved salvaging fpga chips from some surplus or defective HDTV video processing equipment and then building a system to allow them to be used as a hardware based SHA-1 cracking machine. According to the comments this is about 2000 times as fast as an Athlon 3400 class processor. [1480]
2007-Aug-31: The Crowd Spirit product development project is entering beta. [1479]
Make your own liquid magnets, and make a ferro-fluid display. [5929]
Putting a HEPC (Home Entertainment PC) into a used VCR case to make it blend in with the rest of the entertainment equipment. [5859]
The Ethernut is a open-source hardware/software project which has produced an embedded controller type module that is ethernet attached. According to this Slashdot article, the Contiki OS has been ported to run on it. [5858]
The XPort, an embedded web server for control purposes, packaged in a 10/100baseT socket [5857]
Build your own LCD video projector [5856]
new embeddable Linux modules on the way [5855]
ACER NT-150 Set top box hacking [5854]
Bar tenders around the world must be running scared. [5728]
3D printers, for prototypes and limited production runs [5727]
The Segway hits its first hurdle, trips and falls... in San Francisco. [5726]
Converting an old manual typewriter to a computer keyboard [5725]
Boschs is an IA-32 chipset software emulator, to allow one to run PC software on things that might not be PCs [5724]
Sources for parts for building robots around Calgary [5723]
Portelligent sells tear-down and reverse engineering reports on various consumer electronic devices [5722]
How computers are really built (which explains why some of the fittings are so hard to get a tool into). [5598]
Call before you dig in Alberta, the alberta1call.com website allows you to skip the call and just fill out the request from the web, a great way to do it. [5597]
Watching earthquakes from space [5596]
Digital set-top boxes can do more than just decode lots of channels. They can be controlled from afar... [5595]
Got a spare decade? Watch Pitch drip. [5593]
How to build a stereoscopic projection system [5592]
Some neat hacks based on the Sampo DVD players, including adding a hard drive to one. [5591]
Fun with home-built Tesla coils. [5590]
a tutorial on capacitors and how they work [5589]
harvesting capacitors from disposible cameras to power a gauss gun [5588]
Building a video pong game (microPONG) out of an 8-bit micro controller chip, pretty impressive especially the hack to get the video output working. This is a follow up to an earlier project called microSCOPE, which makes a low bandwidth oscilloscope out of an 8 bit controller (the 12f675). [1478]
A built-it-yourself clone of the Segway is being built [1477]
Garmin is opening up access to their APIs [1475] [1]
The ybox is an open hardware and software project for an internet connected set-top box (seen here on Engadget) created by the Uncommon Projects group. This uses a rather neat embedded processor chip called the Propeller P8X32A-D40 (data sheet here), which contains eight separate processors in a 40-pin DIP package along with shared RAM and IO (including the ability to drive TV or VGA video). The Hydra game console is based on the Propeller chip as well. The YBox2 takes the concept even further. But when are they going to add a DVI or VGA output? A VGA port can be added to a YBox2, here it is used to run a graphics demo. [1474]
Solar-powered beambots, little robots that follow the sun which you can build from scrap parts. [1473]
While hardly "hacking" this article discusses adding a second hard drive to expand a Series3 Tivo by using the external eSATA port. This has been verified to take a Tivo up to 1TB. [1472]
Slashdot discusses creating a homebrew industrial process monitor [1471]
Turn the empties from your soda or six-pack habbit into a solar air heater. While the "pipes" that are formed by the cans may look like they function by heating on the outside and then transferring that heat into the air that rises up inside them I suspect this is probably not the case and the hot air that comes out the top is really just air that flowed over the outside of the cans between the cans and the glass. The presence of cans will serve to restrict airflow up the box and allow more time for heat exchange to take place. The use of black paint intended for BBQs is probably a good idea. [1470]
Using a CNC hot-air gun to draw on toast. [1469]
The MAKE blog's Open Source Hardware introduction [1468]
The DLink DNS-323 is a two-drive SATA NAS unit that is Linux based and can be modified by a user, the dns323.info web site has a product hacking wiki [1467]
Adding a USB port to the Sweex LB000021, a Linux based router [1466]
Apples Apple TV is getting hacked a lot, now OS X has been made to run on it (discussed here on Slashdot). In July'07 it was hacked to allow for storage expansion by attaching USB drives. [1464]
Build your own laptop battery [1463]
How to build a solid-state A/V switcher from Engadget, this is based around a Bus-switch IC from Digi-Key (part #568-3619-5-ND). [1462]
A GSM radio modem board with a built in Python interpreter and the ability to upload and run Python scripts on it. This is intended for radio-remote control applications. [1461]
Build your own ECG (electrocardiograph) device, not a particularly good one and potentially unsafe as it is connected to a computer for recording and display. The comments section has some good discussion and alternative suggestions though. [1460]
Use an old floppy drive edge connector to interface an SD flash card to homebrew projects for storage [1459]
add a datalogger to a Delorme Tripmate GPS, this uses a PUC16F88 to record via the RS-232 interface (with a MAX233 for interfacing) and stores the data to a 24LC1025 serial EEPROM. [1458]
Engadget's guide to combining GPS data with satellite photos [1457]
Using HP ink cartridges for do-it-yourself printers [1456]
The Olympus M:Robe MP3 player has been hacked to run Linux, announced on the unofficial M:Robe fan site. [1455]
Robotbooks.com has a good selection of robot kits, including Lego Mindstorms [1454]
A really good little USB to general analogue/digital IO project based on the PIC18F4550 microcontroller [1453]
Build your own USB controlled gun to keep office coworkers at bay [1452]
The RobotShop has lots of robotic gear, kits, parts and working devices. [1451]
How to consolize an arcade game, talks about the process of taking an old commercial arcade game and extracting its guts to hook up to a TV in your living room [1450]
The Access Pro Tool Kit from Zoozen, lots and lots of wierd screw driver bits. [1449]
Building your own LCD-screen based graphics tablet [1448]
A five dollar eeprom programmer [1447]
How to build your own USB cable for the new 2GB iPod Shuffle. Three other things, Apple should have used a standard mini-USB connector (like is found on some cell phones), or else they should have used a regular USB plug like memory sticks do. The third thing is that cable manufacturers should sell some short (as in just a few inches long) USB cables of various types for applications like this where the device is going to sit right beside the computer. [1446]
A user-built docking station for the Dell Axim, a pretty amazing job! [1445]
A USB attached thermometer project [1443]
Engadget how-to: Make a simple sound mixer, if you have multiple computers, let them share one sound system. [1442]
The Neuros OSD Linux Media Recorder is a commercial product designed to be hacked, the first limited production run is being sold by ThinkGeek. This is discussed here on Slashdot. It appears here on Engadget. Linuxlookup examines this from the developers perspective. The New York Times gave it some coverage (discussed here on Slashdot) while discussing how open source hardware could be beneficial to consumers. [1441]
How to make a component video switch out of a computer KVM switch [1440]
Doing evil things with the Staples Easy Button [1439]
Rewiring house phone lines to carry VOIP phone [1438]
building a DTMF detector for home automation [1437]
The OpenCircuits wiki includes PCB footprints and projects [1436]
A GPS datalogger evaluation kit, uses SD cards for storage of the log data, from Spark Fun Electronics who also have a lot of PIC programmers, development and prototype boards. [1435]
Bluetooth headset teardown guide [1434]
ROCKbox is a open source firmware replacement for a number of commercial MP3 players, Sandisk wants a version for their new hardware too. [1433]
Build a USB charger that is powered by 2-AA batteries (the parts and board are available in kit form) [1432]
Building a flash drive into a Lego brick [1431]
Building an IR Remote Control for your computer [1430]
Adding RFID to an electric deadbolt, from the book: RFID Toys, by Amal Graafstra, ISBN: 0471771961. [1429]
A portable magnetic card reader [1428]
CNC Zone is a site dedicated to DIY home computer controlled machine tools [1427]
Building a switch mode power supply for an iPod [1426]
Turn an old HP pen plotter into a vinyl cutter [1425]
The 2006 Maker Faire [1424]
Building a super dock for an iPod [1423]
Modifing the ZipIt wireless messenging device to add a mini-SD clot and RS-232. [1422]
The Brain Assailant, a little circuit that emmits a short chirp at a random interval about every few minutes. You build this, then hide it in the office of your worst enemy and wait for the men in white coats to haul him off to the asylum. [1421]
The NOVA television show has an episode called "The Great Robot Race" about the DARPA Grand Challenge, which is really about hacking cars to run autonomously [1420]
Building a wireless infra-red motion sensor (uses a TX433 for the wireless transmitter) [1419]
An open source project for a network attached MP3 streamer [1418]
Turn a disposable camera into a slave flash [1417]
How to add radio remote control capability (using RF transmitter and receiver modules made by Laipac Technologies) to microcontroller projects, also mentions manchester encoding to reduce the error rate. [1416]
Build your own reflow soldering tool for changing surface-mount components. [1415]
Make your Pixma printer print CDRs [1414]
Controlling a cheap color LCD [1413]
Using a Nintendo Dual Screen as a virtual terminal, by installing some VNC-like software [1412]
How to replace motherboard components, not for the faint of heart! [1411]
Using an LED for sensing light [1410]
Commodore 64 computers are showing up in embedded games, these can be modified to fully functioning C64s [1409]
Digitally reading analog gauges, (original artical) using edge extraction and the Hough transform [1408]
A Slashdot discussion of low voltage power adapters, why are these not standardized? It certainly would make a lot of sense to have a low power DC plug standard so that you could plug any of your portable electronics into the same wall power adapter - making travel with gadgets a lot simpler! [1407] [1]
A nice little build it yourself wireless music player, this one is based on a Via EPIA MS10000e lvds motherboard. [1406]
Build a wireless music player out of a Netgear router [1405]
The Camera Hacker web site [1404]
Slashdot book review of: Hacking Digital Cameras, by Chieh Cheng and Auri Rahimzadeh, ISBN 0764596519. [1403]
A re-implementation of the Amiga chip set in a single fpga chip. Wow! [1402]
Building a small file server into the case of an old UPS, another great way to use a Linksys NSLU2 [1401]
Printed circuit board etching, including using printer toner transfers as etching masks [1400]
An open source electric motor controller [1399]
Making a 5 foot parallel ATA (IDE) cable out of cat5e cable [1398]
Ocean State Electronics has a lot of items for the electronic hobbyist, including PCB boards and Snap Circuits. [1397]
Building an auxillary touch screen display from a PlayStation [1396]
iRobot has opened the specification of the Roomba Serial Control Interface [1395]
using a super capacitor to replace a 9V battery [1394]
free60.org, bringing Linux to the Xbox 360 game console [1393]
Total Christmas light control, use a parallel port to control 320 circuits. [1392]
Make a bluetooth audio bridge out of a broken pair of wireless headphones [1391]
Interfacing text-line type LCD displays [1390]
Building the classic crystal radio out of modern junk [1389]
Building your own MP3 player [1388]
PCI bus hacking [1387]
gumstix, makes small computer boards and interface hardware [1386]
Bass Burglar Alarms, also has a lot of home automation products [1385]
Spot welders, such as those from Hobby Spot Welders, are very useful for battery pack rebuilding, here's a low-cost alternative that one could make (discussed here) using a bank of capacitors to provide the welding current [1384]
Rebuilding laptop battery packs [1383]
Using a scanner to read audio from old LPs (a virtual gramophone) [1382]
Does your office elevator have an undocumented "express mode" [1381]
A multi-coloured, changing, glow light [1380]
Putting Linux on the Fry's wireless G Router (which is an Airlink AR315W device) [1379]
Using old Polaroid cameras as a source for parts for robotics projects, in particular reusing their ultrasonic ranging equipment. [1378]
Making a web cam see in the infra-red (which involves some disassembly), discussed here on Slashdot. [1377]
Build your own beer brewing station based on BSD, has some links to places to get temperature acquisition and relay control boards for PCs [1376]
Hacking the Linksys NSLU2, an inexpensive network attached storage drive controller, now this artical has 5 parts. The NSLU2-Linux home page. [1375]
You can use an optical mouse as a motion sensor [1374]
Turning a GameBoy into a controller for Lego Robotics, apparently a competition based on these will take place [1373]
Looks like a renaissance in hacking products and building your own from scratch is starting [1372]
Sharp is going to make an electronic dictionary with a full aphabetic keyboard and a colour LCD display, I wonder if someone will be able to hack this to run Linux... [1371]
More chances to extract hard drives from MP3 players, this time from the MuVo2 FM [1370]
Looks like RFID chips contain a user data area which may be hackable [1369]
If you can't afford your own numerically controlled fabrication lab, apparently there are labs that will do this for you. Look at eMachineShop and pad2pad for custom circuit boards. [1368]
Working with the ProLite PL_M2014R, a scrolling LED marquee type sign with a serial interface [1367]
Hacking the Canon Digital Rebel, a firmware change brings it features available in the 10D [1366]
Hacking the Linksys WRT54G, Cringely takes a look at it. More followup on this here. In late 2005 it looked like Linksys had discontinued this model, but according to this they have just changed the product name slightly [1365]
A Slashdot Review of the book Hardware Hacking, ISBN 1932266836 [1364]
Slashdot discusses how to make use of old LCD displays (from other devices that have died or are no longer needed) [1363]
The RabbitCore embedded controller modules (with ethernet) [1362]
MeHack.com is a site dedicated to product hacking [1361]
What to look for to see if the ATM you are about to use has been hacked to acquire your account information [1360]
A Slashdot artical on products that can be hacked [1359]
A Slashdot review of the book Hardware Hacking Projects for Geeks, ISBN: 0596003145 [1358]
Look what's in the mini-iPod, one interesting thing is this contains a 4GB microdrive and currently (Feb'04) it would be less expensive to buy an iPod and strip the drive out of it than to buy a drive alone. But don't do it because its even less expensive to buy a Nomad Muvo2 and gut it for the microdrive. Update, Jun 2004, looks like Creative have switched to building these with a version of the microdrive that is ATA interfaced so will not work in compactflash devices, they even have printed this on the packaging, see here [1357]
Cheap PC based oscilloscopes [1356]
Combining a Roomba with a tablet PC to make a robot [1355]
Linux-Hacker.net has this board for Internet Appliance Upgrades and Mods. [1354]
The MediaMVP is a PowerPC based Linux box with 64M of RAM and some flash RAM that has audio and video output, IR remote control and 100baseT networking for only US$99. It downloads the operating system from the host server PC when it powers up. Looks like www.shspvr.com has a board with information on this. [1353]
How to decode the bar codes on the various cards you carry. [1352]
Slashdot discusses Creating a Super Router based on the Linksys WRT54G router. This is covered on BroadBandReports.com here. These little router/firewall boxes are pretty powerful computers in the own right, I wonder what other types of uses they could be put to? The brains of a home control system perhaps? It even appears to be able to run the Asterix PBX system. Adding an SD flash card reader to the WRT54G. More news on this. More discussion of the OpenWRT embedded Linux distro for these routers here. [1351]
Slashdot discusses modifing the On Star console. [1350]
Hacking the Samsung 4510 for microC Linux, this is used in a lot of 22Mbps WLAN boxes, more discussion of this on Slashdot. [1349]
Hacking the Actiontec, a dial-on-demand router based on a uCLinux core [1348]
hacking the 3COM Audry computer, and more from Slashdot on the issue [1347]
Portelligent specializes in tearing appart hi tech toys (phones, digi cams...) and documenting them [1346]
Princess Auto in Calgary (with other locations across Canada) has lots of tools and mechanical parts and some surplus stuff [1345]
the RadioShack web site [1344]
The guts of the Compaq iPAQ [1343]
RobotStore for robot bits [1342]
Boogie Bass Hack [1341]

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