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- 2010-Oct-23: The Netduino Plus from netduino is a high powered Arduino system with on-board ethernet and a 48MHz ARM7 processor. [9417]
- 2010-Sep-26: From Tokyo Hacker Space, a video tour of Akihabara, neat stuff and a lot cheaper than a flight to Tokyo. [9397]
- 2010-Sep-26: 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. My first units arrived the other day, looks pretty nice TI. I could see these being quite useful in education circles. I'm thinking of making a camera time lapse shutter trigger for my old Minolta A2 and a fan controller for my RAID array. The official wiki is here. [9248]
- 2010-Aug-27: How Apple restricts the iPhone charging game. [9352]
- 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: 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:
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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