This summer, we saw the WHY (What Hackers Yearn) event happen in Netherlands, of course, with a badge to match. Many badges these days embrace the QWERTY computer aesthetic, which I’m personally genuinely happy about. This one used 18650 batteries for power, in a dual parallel cell configuration… Oh snap, that’s my favourite LiIon cell […]
The clicking of a Geiger counter is well enough known as a signifier of radioactive materials, due to it providing the menacing sound effect any time a film or TV show deals with radiation. What we’re hearing is the electronic detection of an ionization event in a Geiger-Muller tube due to alpha or beta radiation, […]
Modern motherboards don’t come with ISA slots, and almost everybody is fine with that. If you really want one, though, there are ways to get one. [TheRasteri] explains how in a forum post on the topic. Believe it or not, some post-2010 PC hardware can still do ISA, it’s just that the slots aren’t broken […]
We all know what a typewriter looks like, and how this has been translated directly into the modern day computer keyboard, or at least many of us think we do. Many cultures do not use a writing system like the Roman or Cyrillic-style alphabets, with the Chinese writing system probably posing the biggest challenge. During […]
[Dhananjay Gadre] happened across a useful little trick the other day. Take any old 1N4148 or 1N914 glass-package signal diode and wire it up right, and you’ve got yourself a nifty little IR detector. It’s that simple. The trick is to treat the diode just like you would a proper IR photodiode. The part should […]
When it comes to soldering on a PCB it almost always helps to have some way to hold the board off your workbench, allowing leads to pass though with out making it unstable and keeping it level while working with tiny components. This project sent in by [Mel] was born out of necessity he was […]
There are many incredible open-source robotic arm projects out there, but there’s a dearth of affordable, stable, and mobile robotic platforms with arms. That’s where XLeRobot comes in. It builds on the fantastic LeRobot framework to make a unit that can be trained for autonomous tasks via machine learning, as well as operated remotely. XLeRobot, […]
VGA isn’t much used anymore, but it’s not hard to get a hold of monitors with that input. How about the older standards like EGA, CGA, or MDA? Well, it’s good luck on eBay or at the recycling yard to get a period-appropriate monitor, but the bulky, fragile CRTs seem to have been less likely […]
If you’re a musician and you want a reverb effect, there are lots of ways to go about it. You can use software plugins, all kinds of rack-mount effects, or pedals. Or, as [David] has done, you could go with a lamp. [David’s] build is straightforward enough in concept—he just chose a relatively unconventional item […]
The fake H313 TV box SBC in all its glory. (Credit: Oleksii’s Tech, YouTube) Marketplaces and e-waste recycling centers are practically overflowing with the things: ARM-based streaming TV boxes that run some — usually very outdated and compromised — version of Android. While you can use them for their promised streaming purposes, they’re invariably poorly […]