Posted Aug 28th 2008 10:15AM by Caleb Kraft
Filed under: misc hacks, peripherals hacks, daily
[Jon Bennett] sent us this link to his
Wifi Robot. After playing with a Linksys WRT54GL router, he was inspired to build something that would utilize this embedded Linux system. Using a thrift store R/C truck, he built a wireless robot rover. This thing can be controlled over the internet, or by laptop with a range of about 500 meters.
The router has been modified to have 2 Serial ports and a 1GB SD Card. It connects to a micro controller, which could be an Arduino or AVR Butterfly. He has supplied information for both. The truck has been mostly gutted, leaving only the chassis and electronics. He had to beef up some of the truck electronics when they fried under the load. The entire unit is powered by a pair of 7.2 Volt 3800 mAh battery packs. The most important thing on the list though, is the horn. You can honk the horn while you are driving this thing around.
The site supplies tons of information including pictures of his build, videos of it in action, speed tests, schematics, software downloads, and resource links. Great job [Jon].
Posted Aug 27th 2008 2:23PM by Caleb Kraft
Filed under: misc hacks, peripherals hacks, daily
[Kyle Stewart] sent us this
quick AVR project. He designed it to sit vertically on his breadboard to take up less space. It doesn't use any surface mount components, to make the assembly easier. You can download the schematic, parts list, and eagle files for the project on his blog.
Posted Aug 26th 2008 4:45PM by Eliot Phillips
Filed under: peripherals hacks, digital audio hacks
OpenStomp's Coyote-1 is now available for $349. The guitar effects pedal lets users design and upload their own effects to the device. It has two stomp switches with LEDs, an LCD display, and four user assignable knobs. The back has 1/4" in/out and one selectable 1/4". It also features NTSC composite out, a headphone jack, mini-USB for uploading, and an RJ11 I2C bus for expansion. The processor is a
Parallax Propeller Chip. While the OS on the pedal is open source, the hardware design and effect design software are not. You can check out the source and product manual
on their forum. If you're more interested in breadboarding hardware, you might like the
Beavis Board we covered earlier.
[via
Create Digital Music]
Posted Aug 26th 2008 8:00AM by Kimberly Lau
Filed under: downloads hacks, peripherals hacks
Less than a week after American Airlines introduced in-flight internet, hackers have already figured out
how to use the system to make
VoIP calls in a few easy steps with
Phweet, a Twitter application. While the network blocks most VoIP services, Phweet can connect two people using a Flash app.
Aircell, the company responsible for the system, is aware of the oversight, but it remains to be seen whether this little loophole will be fixed in a timely manner. Meanwhile, we encourage those of you who do fly on American Airlines to avoid making those phone calls; your neighbor would probably appreciate it.
[via
Digg]
Posted Aug 25th 2008 5:17PM by Caleb Kraft
Filed under: misc hacks, peripherals hacks
[Aaron Rasmussen] and his friend [Eli] slapped together this setup to see what it would be like to
run as much as their World of Warcraft characters. They used a couple old treadmills to spin some tires with makeshift mouse sensors on them. As their speed increased, so did their character. There was a decent amount of math done to figure the average speed of a World of Warcraft character, and ultimately they settled on 12 miles per hour. Not surprisingly, they found that too difficult due to the resistance in the rig as well as being out of shape. They ended up lowering the speed required to make their character go full sprint to 6 miles per hour.
Their final conclusion was that they could never run as much as their digital counterparts. Even if they were in really good shape. [Aaron] does say that it was fun enough to consider doing it regularly as a workout plan. He should wear the costume every time he uses it.
Posted Aug 25th 2008 12:15PM by Kimberly Lau
Filed under: misc hacks, peripherals hacks
Researchers at Georgia Tech are
working on a Tongue Drive System, which transforms the tongue into a tool that can manipulate computers and manage appliances and wheelchairs. This project has huge implications for the disabled, especially for those with few motor skills and limited movement. Many disabled Americans are paralyzed from the neck down, and this system could be a literal lifesaver, providing them with a method of communication and control over their own lives. Scientists have been attracted to the tongue's potential for a long time. It provides several advantages over using other organs or appendages. It's very sensitive, tactile, is not connected to the spinal cord, and does not usually end up being harmed in accidents. By placing a tiny magnet underneath the tongue, it's transformed into a virtual keyboard. Sensors placed in the cheek track the magnet's movement and processes the commands into directions for electronics, be it a wheelchair or a home appliance. We're excited to see where this will go.
Posted Aug 22nd 2008 2:49PM by Caleb Kraft
Filed under: peripherals hacks, daily, digital audio hacks
[D.St-Amand] is designing the
SyncMaster, a compact modular midi controller, from scratch. The design focuses on a modular build where you can swap out pieces like the one pictured above to achieve different layouts. Not only is it modular, but its very compact. Shown next to some common competitors, it looks very sleek.
Development seems to be moving forward, the pictures have been updated frequently. Lets hope to see a fully functional demo some time soon. Some more detailed information on the build might be nice as well. This may remind you of our story on
MachineCollective. While there are similarities in that they're modular, SyncMaster appears to be a much more polished and portable product. Keep us updated [D.St-Amand].
Posted Aug 21st 2008 3:15PM by Caleb Kraft
Filed under: peripherals hacks, robots hacks, daily
Hot on the heels of the
Wii missile launcher,
Das Uber Airsoft Gun Turret is here to put our past
airsoft turrets to shame. Made by [Miltron_B],
this autonomous beast not only has gorgeous LED indicators, it has lasers. Three of them. Three freaking lasers. Take a moment to wipe the drool from your chin.
We've seen plenty of turrets before, but this one really excels in design. It features two webcams for more precision detection and tracking and when set to manual mode, it can be controlled with an XBox 360 controller. He's posted great pictures of the process with a step by step break down. Tons of useful links are included to help you out.
Someone should construct a
Portal sentry gun case for this thing and add voice clips.
Posted Aug 18th 2008 2:30PM by Caleb Kraft
Filed under: misc hacks, peripherals hacks, daily
[toymotorhead] pieced together this
USB controlled power strip to help with his electrical bill. His goal was to be able to have devices turned off automatically when he shut down his computer as well as powered on when he turned his computer on. Another requirement was that the USB be isolated to protect the motherboard from spikes.
The cost of the parts in total were less than $30, and consisted of a solid state relay, some fuses, and some transient voltage surge suppressing diodes. The unit only switches power off or on depending on whether or not the computer is powered up, it doesn't control the outlets via software. He goes pretty in depth as to how everything works as well as showing nice diagrams and pictures. This should be a fairly quick and simple project, as long as you take the proper precautions for working with high voltage.
Posted Aug 13th 2008 1:15PM by Caleb Kraft
Filed under: peripherals hacks, news
[Curiouslee] put up some pictures of his
Siftables burn in. He got them in the mail with all their accessories and decided to make a special box to carry it all. He started with an ArtBin parts box and cut out dividers where necessary to make everything fit nice and tidy.
The
Siftables are quite interesting. They are an information interface that is supposed to be more physical and natural. The analogy they use is a container of nuts and bolts can be sifted through quite easily using your hands. They envision us being able to sift through data similarly. They also mention that it could be used as a gestural interface as well.
Continue reading Burning in the Siftables
Posted Aug 13th 2008 12:00PM by Caleb Kraft
Filed under: peripherals hacks, daily, digital audio hacks
[Julien Bayle] has posted this great breakdown of building an
RGB monome clone. He is a musical performer using
Ableton Live. He wanted to do away with the need for a computer screen and found that the
monome would have been perfect had it been RGB. So he decided to build his own.
The parts list for the entire project is as follows:
- 1x Arduino board
- 4x Sparkfun breakout PCB
- 4x Sparkfun buttons pads (like our door lock)
- 4x Sparkfun buttons bezel
- 64x RGB LEDs common cathode
- 64x Diodes Small Signal (1N4148)
- 1x MAX7221 (LED Driver)
- 1x 74HC164 (8-Bit Serial-In, Parallel-Out Shift Register)
- 1x 74HC165 (8-Bit Parallel-In, Serial-Out Shift Register)
He also has files for the schematics and source code as well as information on how to assemble and test it.
The RGB aspect is still under development. He is using the
LEDMatrix-Serial Interface-RGB from Sparkfun Electronics to run it. It is expensive, but is exactly what he was looking for.
There aren't very many pictures of the project, and none of the working RGB unit. He makes up for it in sheer information. Many parts have links to manufacturers or support forums. Hopefully he'll post some pictures and video of the final product soon.
Posted Aug 1st 2008 2:00PM by Caleb Kraft
Filed under: peripherals hacks, news
[Adrian Freed] posted this
interesting fabric gesture controller called Tablo. It uses a stretchy conductive fabric, laid over a framework to create a curve known as the
Witch of Agnesi. Holding the center of the fabric up is an inverted bowl covered with sections of conductive material. The whole thing is wired to a microcontroller that measures the resistance fluctuations when you press on the fabric. It is capable of measuring displacement and pressure as well as being multitouch.
They mention that the simple interface allows it to be used as a foot input as well as a hand input. We'd love to see a video of it in action.
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