Among the many science toys that have fallen out of fashion since we started getting nervous around things like mercury, chlorinated hydrocarbons, and radiation is the spinthariscope, which let people watch the flashes of light on a phosphor screen as a radioactive material decayed behind it. In fact, they hardly expose their viewers to any […]
Today, if you can find a pneumatic tube system at all, it is likely at a bank drive-through. A conversation in the Hackaday bunker revealed something a bit surprising. Apparently, in some parts of the United States, these have totally disappeared. In other areas, they are not as prevalent as they once were, but are […]
[Usagi Electric] is known for minicomputers, but in a recent video, he shows off his TMS9900-based homebrew computer. The TMS9900 CPU was an early 16-bit CPU famously used in the old TI-99/4A computer, but as the video points out, it wasn’t put to particularly good use in the TI-99/4A because its RAM was hidden behind an […]
The infrared transceiver installed on the washing machine. (Credit: Severin) Since modern household appliances now have an MCU inside, they often have a diagnostic interface and — sometimes — more. Case in point: Miele washing machines, like the one that [Severin] recently fixed, leading to the firmware becoming unhappy and refusing to work. This fortunately […]
[Thinking Techie] takes us back to basics in a recent video explaining how magnets, coils, brushed DC motors, and brushless DC motors work. If this is on your “to learn” list, or you just want a refresher, you can watch the video below. It’ll be ten minutes well-spent. The video covers the whole technology stack […]
Though mobile devices and Apple Silicon have seen ARM-64 explode across the world, there’s still decent odds you’re reading this on a device with an x86 processor — the direct descendant of the world’s first civilian microprocessor, the Intel 4004. The 4004 wasn’t much good on its own, however, which is why [Klaus Scheffler] and […]
Just about every “getting started with microcontrollers” kit, Arduino or otherwise, includes an ultrasonic distance sensor module. Given the power of microcontrollers these days, it was only a matter of time before someone asked: “Could I do better without the module?” Well, [Martin Pittermann] asked, and his answer, at least with the Pi Pico, is […]