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https://hackaday.com/2023/07/17/adapter-board-expands-the-pi-zero/ | Adapter Board Expands The Pi Zero | Bryan Cockfield | [
"Raspberry Pi"
] | [
"adapter board",
"ethernet",
"pi 3b",
"pi zero",
"raspberry pi",
"USB ports"
] | The standard Raspberry Pi computers have been in short supply for a while now, so much so that people are going to great lengths to find replacements. Whether it’s migrating to alternative single-board computers or finding clones of the Pi that are “close enough”, there are solutions out there.
This method of building a full-size Raspberry Pi
with all of the bells and whistles using the much-less-in-demand Pi Zero also stands out as a clever solution.
[SpookyGhost] didn’t build this one himself, but he did stumble across it and write a pretty extensive how-to and performance evaluation for the board,
which can be found here
. The adapter connects to the Zero’s HDMI and USB ports, and provides all the connectors you’d expect from a larger Pi such as the 3B. It’s not a perfect drop-in replacement though — you don’t get the 3.5 mm audio jack, and the micro SD card location doesn’t match up with where it should be on a “real” Pi.
All things considered, this is one of those solutions that seems obvious in retrospect but we still appreciate its elegance. It might disappear as soon as chip shortages stop being an issue, but for now we’ll take any solutions we can. If you don’t already have a Pi Zero on hand, we’ve seen some other successes replacing them with
thin clients
or even
old smartphones
. | 23 | 13 | [
{
"comment_id": "6663778",
"author": "John P.",
"timestamp": "2023-07-17T15:54:52",
"content": "Oh that’s funny. I have two of these running. One just because it’s convenient to add an ethernet port to a Pi Zero (1) in a way that’s bolted down. And the other is a Pi Zero 2w that is in a HDD enclosur... | 1,760,372,232.697519 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/17/displayport-under-the-hood/ | DisplayPort: Under The Hood | Arya Voronova | [
"Engineering",
"Featured",
"Interest",
"News",
"Slider"
] | [
"display port",
"engineering"
] | Last time,
we looked at all the things that make DisplayPort unique for its users
. What about the things that make it unique for hackers? Let’s get into all the ways that DisplayPort can serve you on your modern tech wrangling adventures.
You Are Watching The AUX Channel
With DisplayPort, the I2C bus we’ve always seen come bundled with VGA, DVI and HDMI, is no more – it’s been replaced by the AUX bus. AUX is a 1 MHz bidirectional diffpair – just a bit too complex for a cheap logic analyzer, though, possibly, something you could wrangle with the RP2040’s PIOs. Hacking thoughts aside, it’s a transparent replacement for I2C, so that software doesn’t have to be rewritten – for instance, it usually does I2C device passthrough over AUX, so that EDID data can still be stored in a separate EEPROM chip on the monitor or eDP LCD panel.
AUX isn’t just a differential bus, it’s more pseudodifferential, like USB2 – for instance, AUX_P and AUX_N are used separately, with a combination of 1 MΩ and 100 kΩ pullups and pulldowns signaling different states of the physical connection – for instance, a pullup on AUX+ and a pulldown on AUX- means that an external device has been connected. If you’d like to learn which combination of resistors means what, you can find in the DisplayPort specification, which isn’t distributed openly but isn’t hard to come by, either.
Also, DisplayPort link training happens over AUX, and in order to facilitate that, a piece of DisplayPort controller’s external memory is usually exposed over the AUX channel, through a mechanism that’s called DPCD. If you dig a bit, using “DPCD” as the keyword, you can easily reach into the lower-level details of your DisplayPort connection. Some of the DPCD memory map is static, and some parts are FIFOs you can funnel data into, or out of. You can find a wide variety of documents online which describe the DPCD structure – for now, here’s a piece of Bash that works on Linux graphics drivers for AMD and Intel, and will show you you the first 16 bytes of DPCD:
# sudo dd if=/dev/drm_dp_aux0 bs=1 skip=256 count=16 |xxd
00000000: 0084 0000 0000 0000 0108 0000 0000 0000 ................
[...]
In particular, the 4th nibble (digit) here describes the amount of lanes for the DisplayPort link established – as you can see, my laptop uses a four-lane link. Also, the
/dev/drm_dp_aux0
path might need to be adjusted for your device. In case you ever want to debug your DP link, having direct access to the DPCD memory space like this might help you quite a bit! For now, let’s move onto other practical aspects.
Got eDP, Now What?
What if you have an eDP display handy and you’d like to reuse it in a project? First, you’ll want to know the pinout. For laptop displays, the eDP panel pinouts are reasonably standardized – there are three pinouts, one of them 30-pin 2-lane, one 40-pin 2-lane with extra USB and I2C pins for wiring up a touchscreen, and one 40-pin connector with 4 lanes and no touchscreen support; you can see
more details on these pinouts here.
Other pinouts exist, but they’re rare – my friend has so far found one display within a Wacom tablet, which uses the 30-pin pinout but flips the pins, so that pin 1 is mapped to pin 30 of the connector and so on; this has, sadly, resulted in magic smoke. That said, this is rare, and a quick board trace observation or even a multimeter check will spare you such trouble if you’re unsure. Also, the panel datasheet will answer all of your questions, if not all.
If your pinout is the 30-pin one, you’re in luck – there’s a wide variety of driver boards with same hardware and panel-tailored firmware; there are
also generic boards
that tend to work well with 1920 x 1080 panels, the most popular resolution for laptop screens within the past five years. It does seem like those boards might make certain kinds of shortcuts when it comes to DisplayPort link management, however – whether they assume link training parameters of the panel they’re programmed for, or perhaps it’s the pixel format, but my experience has shown – if you can grab a board that’s labelled to be programmed for your specific panel, consider doing just that; otherwise, it might not start, or, you might get visual interfaces or weird flickering. On the other hand, as I’ve been getting into laptop display reuse, I’ve found a few boards where the DP panel resolution can be set with jumpers, and those have proven themselves to be more than universal enough, so if you can grab one alongside your pre-programmed board order, you might be rewarded with greater compatibility than you’d expect for any further eDP tinkering adventures of yours.
When it comes to tablet eDP displays, it’s way less standardized, but you can absolutely get by with the panel’s datasheets or even schematics. Sometimes, there’s even ready-to-go DisplayPort breakouts for a certain kind of display, but it’s rare, and you might want to bodge your own. Of course, bodging a 2.7 Gbps link with jumper wires isn’t as viable, this is not PCIe, which is to say, you’re getting into the territory of drawing your own DisplayPort-carrying PCB. Let’s equip you accordingly.
Taming The Diffpairs
Of course, like any self-respecting high-bandwidth interface of modern day, DisplayPort uses differential pairs. Now, this wouldn’t be the first interface that we need to draw controlled impedance pairs for – you can revisit the
PCIe diffpair routing article
for the basics. There are differences between PCIe and DisplayPort routing, of course – for a start, DisplayPort needs 100 ohm impedance, as opposed to PCIe’s 85 ohms; not much of a problem and the pairs parameters won’t even be all that different. However, there are also further restrictions – as a result of those, DisplayPort no longer has the “wet string” factor.
Remember how I mentioned that, for PCIe, you don’t need to bring all the pairs to the same length. Well, that’s the problem now, you do have bring all the differential pairs to the same length for DisplayPort, in addition to the intra-pair skew compensation that you still have to do. In KiCad, the tool for that is mapped to the key 8, and it lets you lengthen individual pairs by adding wiggles, of the kind that you most likely have already seen on PCBs out there.
Now, according to the specification, the between-pair difference can be from 5 cm to 1 cm total, depending on the DisplayPort link speed. You might think that you have some leeway here, but it’s better if you limit your differences into the 1 mm – 2 mm millimeter range – some of your leeway might be already “spent” by your GPU, your cabling, or your monitor, in short, whatever parts of the DP link that you don’t control.
In addition to the inter-pair length matching, DisplayPort link training isn’t as accommodating. You can no longer flip pairs whenever you need to do that to make your routing prettier, as much as that might be tempting – the DisplayPort link do not treat that with kindness. On the bright side, this more or less marks the end of what you need to know to route the main link differential pairs.
This is enough for you to dive into the DisplayPort pool – but first, let me let you in on one last thing you should know. You’ve learned about the main link pairs, you’ve learned about the AUX bus – I’d like to bring the HPD signal to your attention. Despite the existence of the AUX bus, HPD is a required signal for a DisplayPort link, since, in a way, AUX is just like USB 2.0 – a display (device, sink) can’t speak until it’s spoken to; HPD is its way of bringing attention to itself, avoiding polling that USB has to use. It’s also a signal used for display hotplug, apparently, necessarily complementary to the method used on the AUX pairs to detect when a display has been connected. In short, make sure you don’t omit HPD.
DisplayPort Conquered, Altmode Is Next
Today, hopefully, I’ve provided enough information for you to be comfortable handling a DisplayPort link, whenever you might decide to take upon such a responsibility! We would be remiss to not talk about the DisplayPort altmode in more depth – the intersection of two widely adopted modern-day technologies, DisplayPort and USB-C. Next time, we’ll see towards making you comfortable handling that, too, with the amount of depth that I hope you will appreciate. Until then – here’s to making you more comfortable in modern-day display technology fields! | 14 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6663763",
"author": "madmod",
"timestamp": "2023-07-17T14:48:49",
"content": "I really love the in depth protocol explanations!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6663764",
"author": "ihsr",
"timestamp": "2023-07-17T14:57:4... | 1,760,372,232.49999 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/17/finding-undocumented-8086-instructions-via-microcode/ | Finding Undocumented 8086 Instructions Via Microcode | Al Williams | [
"Retrocomputing"
] | [
"8086",
"ken shirriff",
"undocumented instructions"
] | Video gamers know about cheat codes, but assembly language programmers are often in search of undocumented instructions. One way to find them is to map out all of a CPU’s opcodes and where there are holes, try those values, and see what happens. Not good enough for [Ken Shirriff]. He prefers examining the CPU’s microcode and
deducing what each part of it does
.
Microcode is a feature of many modern CPUs. The CPU runs several “microcode” instructions to process a single opcode. For the Intel 8086, there are 512 micro instructions, each with 21 bits. Each instruction has two parts: a part that moves a source to a destination and another that performs some other operation, such as an ALU operation. [Ken] explains it all in the post, including several hidden registers you can’t see, but the microcode can.
Searching for holes in the opcode table.
Some of the undocumented instructions are probably not useful. They are either impractical or duplicate a function you can already do another way. Not all of the instructions are there for technical reasons. For example, opcode D6, commonly known as SALC for “Set AL to Carry”, seems to exist only as a trap for anyone making a carbon copy of Intel’s microcode. When other companies like NEC made 8086 clones, having an undocumented instruction would strongly suggest they just copied Intel’s intellectual property (in NECs case, they didn’t).
Other cases happen where an instruction just doesn’t make sense. For example, you can pop all segment registers, and though it is not documented, you can deduce that POP CS should be opcode 0F. The problem is there is no sane reason to pop CS off the stack. The instruction works; it just isn’t useful. The opcodes from 60-6F are conditional jumps that are no different from the instructions at 70-7F because of decoding. There is no reason to document both identical instruction ranges.
The plot thickens when you go to two-byte instructions. You’ll find plenty of instructions of dubious value. You don’t hear much about undocumented instructions anymore. Why? Because modern CPUs have enough circuitry to dedicate some to detecting illegal instructions and halting the CPU. But the 8086 was squeezed too tight to allow for such a luxury. Good thing for people like us who enjoy solving puzzles.
You can still get a modern CPU to tell you
more about instructions even if it won’t run them
. Even the 80286 had some
secret opcodes
. | 23 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6663721",
"author": "BT",
"timestamp": "2023-07-17T12:23:32",
"content": "Very interesting, I love [Ken Shirriff]’s articles. I notice now that c9h is a return instruction on the 8086 as well as the z80!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comm... | 1,760,372,232.394148 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/17/diy-laser-for-ablating-metal/ | DIY Laser For Ablating Metal | Bryan Cockfield | [
"Laser Hacks"
] | [
"ablation",
"blue laser",
"circuit board",
"cnc",
"copper",
"grbl",
"laser",
"pcb",
"Printed Circuit Board"
] | For those who wish to go beyond through-hole construction on perfboard for their circuit boards, a printed circuit board is usually the next step up. Allowing for things like surface-mount components, multi-layer boards, and a wider array of parts, they are much more versatile but do have a slight downside in that they are a little bit harder to make. There are lots of methods for producing them at home or makerspace, though, and although we’ve seen plenty of methods for their production like toner transfer, photoresist, and CNC milling, it’s also possible to make them using laser ablation,
although you do need a special laser to get this job done
.
The problem with cutting copper is that it reflects infra-red, so a higher-wavelength
blue
green laser is used instead. And because you want to ablate the copper, but not melt the surrounding areas or cut straight through the board, extremely short, high-power pulses are the way to go. Here, the [Munich Fab Lab] is using 9 kW pulses of around 30 microseconds each. With these specifications the copper is ablated from the surface of the board allowing for fine details in the range of about 20 µm, which is fine enough for just about any circuit board. The
design of the laser head itself
is worth a look.
Aside from the laser, the rest is standard CNC machine fodder, but with an emphasis on safety that’s appropriate for a tool in a shared workspace, and the whole project is published under an open license and offers an affordable solution for larger-scale PCB production with extremely fine resolution and without the need for any amounts of chemicals for the more common PCB production methods. There is a lot more information available
on the project’s webpage
and
its GitHub page
as well.
Of course, there are
other methods of producing PCBs by laser
if you happen to have a 20 W fiber laser just kicking around. | 51 | 13 | [
{
"comment_id": "6663693",
"author": "Henrik",
"timestamp": "2023-07-17T09:26:43",
"content": "Who doesn’t have a 9KW laser laying around the lair?Oh wait, they are mounted on my pet sharks",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6663743",
"au... | 1,760,372,232.588117 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/16/illumos-gets-a-new-c-compiler/ | Illumos Gets A New C Compiler | Al Williams | [
"Software Development",
"Software Hacks"
] | [
"illuminos",
"pcc",
"solaris",
"unix"
] | Illumos is an OpenSolaris-derived Unix system, and no Unix is complete without a C compiler or two. And with a name like Portable C Compiler (PCC), you would think that would be a great bet to get up and running on Illumos. That’s probably what [Brian Callahan] thought, too, but
found out otherwise
.
PCC already generates x86 code, so that wasn’t the problem. It was a matter of reconfiguring the compiler for the environment, ironic since PCC probably started on true Unix but now won’t work with 64-bit Solaris-like operating system. According to the post:
It looks like some time ago someone added configuration for 32-bit x86 and SPARC64 support for the Solaris family. But no one ever tried to support 64-bit x86. So first we had to teach the configure script for both pcc and pcc-libs that 64-bit x86 Solaris
While there were some code changes, much of the problem centered around differences in tools available under Linux vs Illuminos. It is an interesting look at moving a tool over and gives you a taste of what life under Illumos might be like.
We always think we want to try one of the Illumos distributions or even
Solaris
proper. Reports of
its death
were apparently premature. | 15 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6663676",
"author": "M",
"timestamp": "2023-07-17T06:00:07",
"content": "This is actually probably pertinent to the people over at Oxide. The rack they just started shipping runs on an illumos kernel.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment... | 1,760,372,232.639996 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/16/improving-ocean-power-with-static-electricity/ | Improving Ocean Power With Static Electricity | Al Williams | [
"News",
"Science"
] | [
"triboelectric"
] | Water is heavy, so if you think about it, a moving ocean wave has quite a bit of energy. Scientists have a new way to use triboelectric generators to
harvest that power for oceangoing systems
. (PDF) Triboelectric nanogenerators (TENGs) are nothing new, but this new approach allows for operation where the waves have lower amplitude and frequency, making traditional systems useless.
The new approach uses a rotor and a stator, along with some aluminum, magnets, and — no kidding — rabbit fur. The stator is 3D printed in resin. The idea is to mechanically accumulate and amplify small low-frequency waves into high-frequency motion suitable for triboelectric generation.
The paper has a lot of information about modeling both waves and how triboelectric generators work. Part of the construction will be familiar to people working with resin 3D printers: FEP film, which serves as the insulating part of the generator.
The paper discusses a demonstration of using the generator to power an acoustic transmitter. The generator charges a capacitor, and when there is sufficient charging, the system uses it to send data acoustically.
If you think using FEP film in a triboelectric generator is odd, try
Scotch tape
. In fact, we’ve
seen it done more than once
. | 19 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6663653",
"author": "M",
"timestamp": "2023-07-17T02:20:21",
"content": "There have been LOTS of attempts to harness ocean movement for electricity generation. It’s not an efficiency problem.All the tidal energy capture systems ever built have been smashed apart by storms.https://ww... | 1,760,372,232.323906 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/16/hackaday-links-july-16-2023/ | Hackaday Links: July 16, 2023 | Dan Maloney | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Hackaday links",
"Slider"
] | [
"bearings",
"Endeavor",
"engine failure",
"flying car",
"ford",
"full stack",
"hackaday links",
"Kia",
"knock sensor",
"loom",
"mars",
"museum",
"Perseverance",
"recall",
"retrocomputer",
"sample return",
"Space Shuttle",
"textile"
] | Last week
, we noted an attempt to fix a hardware problem with software, which backfired pretty dramatically for Ford when they tried to counter the tendency for driveshafts to fall out of certain of their cars by automatically applying the electric parking brake.
This week, the story is a little different, but still illustrates how software and hardware can interact unpredictably, especially in the automotive space.
The story
centers on a 2015 Optima recall for a software update for the knock sensor detection system. We can’t find the specifics, but if
this recall on a similar Kia model in the same model year range
and
a class-action lawsuit
are any indication, the update looks like it would have made the KSDS more sensitive to worn connecting rod damage, and forced the car into “limp home mode” to limit damage to the engine if knocking is detected.
A clever solution to a mechanical problem? Perhaps, but because the Kia owner in the story claims not to have received the snail-mail recall notice, she got no warning when her bearings started wearing out. Result: a $6,000 bill for a new engine, which she was forced to cover out of pocket. Granted, this software fix isn’t quite as egregious as Ford’s workaround for weak driveshaft mounting bolts, and there may very well have been a lack of maintenance by the car’s owner. But if you’re a Kia mechanical engineer, wouldn’t your first instinct have been to fix the problem causing the rod bearings to wear out, rather than papering over the problem with software?
Some people loved it, and a lot of space nerds really hated it. Either way, it’s hard to argue with the fact that NASA’s Space Shuttle program resulted in some pretty amazing engineering, and that artifacts from the program are highly sought-after as museum pieces. And perhaps no artifact is more highly prized than the three remaining orbiters, one of which will soon be at the center of
a unique and awe-inspiring display
.
Endeavour
(OV-105), which was moved to the California Science Center in Los Angeles in 2012 to
much well-deserved fanfare
, is going to be displayed in a full-stack, upright configuration. The orbiter will be reunited with external tank ET-94 and a pair of solid rocket boosters for the first time since she last flew in 2011. The 20-story stack will be erected over the next six months or so, after which a new wing of the museum will be built around it. It’ll be the first time a Space Shuttle full-stack assembly will be attempted outside of a NASA facility. We’re keen to see how this whole thing goes together — it’ll make for some interesting crane work.
Also in space news, we just learned that
a US Senate subcommittee slashed the budget for the Mars Sample Return mission
. And dramatically so; NASA wanted $949 million to fund fiscal year 2024 work on the mission, but senators offered just a third of that. NASA has already spent $1.74 billion on the Sample Return mission, which was supposed to fly in 2028 but looks like it’ll slip, drawing enough of the lawmakers’ ire for them to threaten to reallocate the $300 million to Artemis if NASA can’t prove the whole Sample Return mission won’t cost more than $5.3 billion. We’ve covered some of
the ideas NASA is batting around
for collecting and returning
the sample tubes
Perseverance
is leaving on the surface of Mars; looks like they might have to scale things back a bit.
Is this it? Are we finally in the flying car future? Judging by the buzz recently, we’d be inclined to say yes, that is if we didn’t live in a reality-based world with multiple decades of observing just how poorly humans handle maneuvering a vehicle in only two dimensions. But still, we’re seeing a lot of stories about
the FAA’s approval of the Alef Aeronautics Model A flying car
. It’s important to note that this certification is for testing only, so it’s not like these things will be
rolling
flying off the assembly line anytime soon. Also in the zeitgeist is the in-no-way-sketchy ASKA A5 flying car, about which we can add little by way of comment to what you’ll see in the video below.
And finally, from the “If it ain’t broke, for the love of God, don’t touch it!” department, we were tipped off to
a factory in Japan that’s relying on a 40-year-old computer to design their textiles
. We couldn’t find any technical details, and the machine doesn’t seem to be any of the usual suspects from that era, although the keyboard layout and cassette drive bear a passing resemblance to a Commodore PET. The machine is shown only briefly and seems to run custom software for designing fabric patterns, which are stored on cassette tape and transferred to punch tape sheets for a Jacquard loom.
The rest of the video is a fascinating look inside an industry that is usually so optimized and scaled to ludicrous levels that watching the machines work is unsatisfying. Here you can actually see what’s going on with the looms that make the fabric for
hanten
, which are traditional winter coats. The handwork needed to manufacture these garments, which look remarkably cozy, is also a treat, especially the part where the padding is inserted. Enjoy the show. | 26 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6663625",
"author": "Eric",
"timestamp": "2023-07-16T23:47:33",
"content": "I don’t think that computer is a PET. It used Sharp monitor and PET all used built in monitor with no logo on the CRT bezel",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment... | 1,760,372,232.227435 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/16/halbach-array-makes-magents-strong-weak/ | Halbach Array Makes Magnets Strong, Weak | Al Williams | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"halbach array",
"magnet"
] | If you want a strong magnet, the obvious answer is to buy one. However, for a variety of reasons, you might want to combine several smaller magnets. There are a few ways to do this, but the
Halbach array
, as [wannabemadsci] explains, allows you to make an array of magnets where one side is very strong, and the other side is very weak.
The example uses a 3D-printed housing and five cube magnets. To form a Halbach array, the poles of the magnets are in a specific orientation that effectively rotates ninety degrees for each — in this case — cube.
The fields add and cancel each other so that you get the most magnetic lines of force on one side and very few on the other side. This might seem like a curiosity, but there are a range of practical applications. Maglev trains are one example. Brushless motors and free electron lasers can take advantage of the effect, too.
You can also have a halbach cylinder with all the magnetic flux inside the ring and practically none outside. You can read more
about the math and applications
on Wikipedia. If you think cylinders sound familiar, maybe you are thinking about
core memory
. Don’t understand magnets? We aren’t sure anyone understands them completely,
but we try
. | 15 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6663576",
"author": "now just Bob",
"timestamp": "2023-07-16T20:05:08",
"content": ">Magents ? Typo???",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6663577",
"author": "Al Williams",
"timestamp": "2023-07-16T20:06:38",
... | 1,760,372,232.15887 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/16/sleuth-untrusted-usb-communication-with-usbvalve/ | Sleuth Untrusted USB Communication With USBValve | Abe Connelly | [
"Peripherals Hacks",
"Security Hacks"
] | [
"I2C oled",
"malware",
"PenetrationTesting",
"Raspberry Pi Pico",
"tinyusb"
] | USB devices are now ubiquitous and, from an information security standpoint, this is a terrifying prospect as malicious software can potentially be injected into a system by plugging in a compromised USB stick. To help get some piece of mind, [Cesare Pizzi] created
USBValve
to help expose suspicious USB activity on the fly.
The idea behind USBValve is to have the onboard microcontroller advertise itself as a storage device, pretending to have a filesystem with some common files available. When an unknown USB device is first inserted into the USB port on the USBValve tool, USBValve displays usage information, via the attached OLED screen, on whether the USB device is accessing files it shouldn’t be or immediately trying to write to the filesystem, which is a clear sign of malicious behavior.
The USBValve hardware is a straight forward composition of a Raspberry Pi Pico, an tiny I2C OLED screen and an optional PCB carrier board with a 3D printed spacer. The software uses Adafruit’s
Tiny USB
library along with the
SSD1306AsciiWire
library to drive the OLED display. And it’s all open source, including the code and PCB design files.
There’s a lot of security fun to be had with USB, from
DIY dirt cheap
Rubber Duckies to
open source hardware
Rubber Duckies, to discussions on the
BadUSB
exploits. The simplicity of the USBValve project allows it to be low cost, easy to use and can provide concise, critical information for a variety of real world threats.
After the break, be sure to check out [Cesare Pizzi]’s talk about USBValve at the SCC Insomnihack conference which has a wealth of information on how it fares against some known malware attacks, discussions on some of its shortcomings and potential avenues for improvement.
Thanks to [watchdog] for the tip! | 11 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6663566",
"author": "",
"timestamp": "2023-07-16T19:29:51",
"content": "Would be nice to have one of these that restricts a device to a single type (e.g: A USB Drive cannot become a mouse later on). Then you could log both malicious hosts and badusbs. Could also make a tester that ... | 1,760,372,232.441143 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/16/a-current-sensing-coil-thats-open-ended/ | A Current Sensing Coil That’s Open Ended | Jenny List | [
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"current sense",
"rogowski coil",
"sense coil"
] | One of the joys of writing for Hackaday comes in learning new things which even after a long engineering background haven’t yet come your way. So it is with the Rogowski coil, an AC current sensing coil which is unlike conventional current transformers in that it’s open ended — in other words not needing to be closed around the conductor it’s measuring. [Weston Braun] has an interesting introduction to the subject, as part of his
open source Rogowski coil based current probe
.
The project itself is an amplifier and integrator that provides a voltage output proportional to the current sensed by the coil, but the real meat is in discovering the coils themselves. They’re a many-turn coil wound on a flexible former, forming in effect a toroidal inductor with a gap in it when bent into a circle. They’re for high frequencies only though, with the one in this project having a bandwidth from 888 Hz to 25 MHz. We don’t have any immediate need to non-intrusively measure current at those frequencies, but it’s something to know that we could.
This isn’t the first time a Rogowski coil has turned up on Hackaday though,
back in 2011 we saw one used to measure a steep current impulse
. | 9 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6663471",
"author": "Rex",
"timestamp": "2023-07-16T14:09:28",
"content": "Is this one of those devices that I see on TV that is used to detect if a ghost has been in a room? If so then I want one.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id... | 1,760,372,232.26894 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/16/brute-forcing-a-mobiles-pin-over-usb-with-a-3-board/ | Brute Forcing A Mobile’s PIN Over USB With A $3 Board | Donald Papp | [
"Security Hacks"
] | [
"brute force",
"keystroke injection",
"otg",
"pin",
"usb"
] | Mobile PINs are a lot like passwords in that there are a number of very common ones, and [Mobile Hacker] has a clever proof of concept that uses a tiny microcontroller development board to emulate a keyboard to
test the 20 most common unlock PINs on an Android device
.
Trying the twenty most common PINs doesn’t take long.
The project is based on
research analyzing the security of 4- and 6-digit smartphone PINs
which found some striking similarities between user-chosen unlock codes. While the research is a few years old, user behavior in terms of PIN choice has probably not changed much.
The hardware is not much more than a Digispark board, a small ATtiny85-based board with built-in USB connector, and an adapter. In fact, it has a lot in common with the
DIY Rubber Ducky
except for being focused on doing a single job.
Once connected to a mobile device, it performs a form of keystroke injection attack, automatically sending keyboard events to input the most common PINs with a delay between each attempt. Assuming the device accepts, trying all twenty codes takes about six minutes.
Disabling OTG connections for a device is one way to prevent this kind of attack, and not configuring a common PIN like ‘1111’ or ‘1234’ is even better. You can see the brute forcing in action in the video, embedded below.
Bruteforcing PIN protection of popular app using $3 ATTINY85
#Arduino
Testing all possible PIN combinations (10,000) would take less than 1,5 hours without getting account locked. It is possible coz, PIN is limited only to 4 digits, without biometrics authentication
#rubberducky
pic.twitter.com/rbu9Tk3S9d
— Mobile Hacker (@androidmalware2)
July 12, 2023 | 52 | 22 | [
{
"comment_id": "6663433",
"author": "hsrjs",
"timestamp": "2023-07-16T12:03:01",
"content": "What if my PIN is 2137? It’s a holy (papal) numer but not very common unless youre Polish.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6663498",
"author"... | 1,760,372,233.001233 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/16/hackaday-prize-2023-pi-pico-measures-volts-amps-and-watts/ | Hackaday Prize 2023: Pi Pico Measures Volts, Amps And Watts | Robin Kearey | [
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"INA219",
"power meter",
"rp2040",
"wattmeter"
] | Measuring a voltage is pretty easy: just place your multimeter’s probes across the relevant pins and read the value. Probing currents is a bit trickier, since you need to open up the circuit and place your probes in series. Checking a circuit’s power consumption is the hardest, since you need to measure both voltage and current as well as multiply them at each moment in time. Fed up with having to hook up two multimeters and running a bunch of synchronized measurements, [Per-Simon Saal] built himself
an automatic digital power meter
.
The heart of this instrument is an INA219 chip, which can measure and digitize voltage and current simultaneously. It outputs the results through an I2C bus, which [Per-Simon] hooked up to a miniaturized version of the Raspberry Pi Pico called an RP2040-Zero. A screw terminal block is provided to connect the system to the device under test, while a 0.96″ OLED display shows the measured voltage, current and power.
The maximum voltage that can be measured is 26 V, while the current range is determined by the shunt resistor mounted on the board. The default shunt is 0.1 Ω, resulting in a 3.2 A maximum current range, but you can get pretty much any range you want by simply mounting a different resistor and changing the software configuration. In addition to displaying the instantaneous values, the power meter can also keep a log of its measurements – very useful for debugging circuits that use more energy than expected or for measuring things like the capacity of a battery.
There are lots of ways to measure electric power, but they all boil down to multiplying current and voltage in some way. The
multiplication was done magnetically
in the old days, but modern meters like [Per-Simon]’s of course use digital systems. Some can even
plug directly into a USB port
. If you want to measure mains power, transformers are
an essential component for safety reasons
.
The
Hackaday
Prize 2023
is Sponsored by: | 6 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6663415",
"author": "solipso",
"timestamp": "2023-07-16T10:29:20",
"content": "Wow! So much innovative. And it only runs on a dual core 100MHz+ computer with pebble 256kB RAM! I am petrified.Anyway, it is nice and working and all, but why such mundane project gets chosen for HaD art... | 1,760,372,233.148377 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/15/reverse-engineering-a-classic-thinkpad-battery/ | Reverse Engineering A Classic ThinkPad Battery | Bryan Cockfield | [
"laptops hacks"
] | [
"3d printed",
"701",
"701c",
"attiny",
"battery",
"cloning",
"nickel metal hydride",
"nimh",
"pcb",
"reverse engineering",
"thinkpad"
] | The ThinkPad 701 is an iconic laptop series from the mid-90s and is still highly sought after today because of its famous butterfly keybaord. The laptop itself is tiny even by the standards of the time, so in order to fit a full-size keyboard IBM devised a mechanism where the keyboard splits and slides over itself to hide away as the screen is closed. But, like most 30-year-old laptops, the original batteries for these computers are well past their prime. [polymatt] takes us through all of the steps needed in order to
recreate a battery from this era down to the last detail
.
He starts by disassembling an old battery with extensive damage from the old, leaky batteries. The first part of the recreation is to measure the battery casing so a new one can be modeled and printed. The control boards for the batteries of these computers were not too sophisticated, so [polymatt] is able to use a logic analyzer with a working unit to duplicate its behavior on an ATtiny microcontroller. With that out of the way, a new PCB is created to host the cloned chip and a new battery pack, made out of 9 NiMH cells is put together.
[polymatt] wanted this build to be as authentic as possible, so he even goes as far as replicating the label on the underside of the battery. With everything put together he has a faithful recreation of this decades-old battery for a famous retro laptop. ThinkPads are popular laptops in general, too, due to their fairly high build quality (at least for their enterprise lineups) and comprehensive driver support especially for Linux and other open-source software projects like
coreboot
and
libreboot
.
Thanks to [Roman UA] for the tip! | 14 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6663367",
"author": "Mhajicek",
"timestamp": "2023-07-16T07:42:36",
"content": "How does the processing power of the new battery controller compare to that of the laptop?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6663372",
"auth... | 1,760,372,233.19696 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/15/gravity-wave-detector-is-galactic-sized/ | Gravity Wave Detector Is Galactic Sized | Al Williams | [
"News",
"Science",
"Space"
] | [
"gravity waves",
"pulsars"
] | Detecting gravity waves isn’t easy. But what if you had a really big detector for a long time? That’s what researchers did when they crunched
15 years’ worth of data from the NANOGrav data se
t. The data was collected from over 170 radio astronomers measuring millisecond pulsars as a way to potentially detect low-frequency gravity waves.
Millisecond pulsars spin fast and make them ideal for the detection of low-frequency gravity waves, which are difficult to detect. The bulk of the paper is about the high-powered data analysis for a very large data set.
The NANOGrav data set 75 covers 68 pulsars collected from 2004 to 2020. Instruments included the Arecibo Observatory (Arecibo), the Green Bank Telescope (GBT), and the Very Large Array (VLA). There was also additional data taken from existing sources.
Other than being an interesting piece of science, there probably isn’t much hacking going on in the area of sub-Hertz gravity wave detection. But we think if you can follow the hairy math in this paper, it might give you some tricks for fitting observed data to models. We think.
The trick here isn’t detecting just
any old gravity waves
, but the low-frequency kind. Even the ordinary dections take some
advanced engineering
. | 13 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6663247",
"author": "Pat",
"timestamp": "2023-07-16T03:38:38",
"content": "Gravitational waves. Gravity waves was taken: they’re actually the waves you probably think about the most common, as in, a wave with gravity as the restoring force, like waves on an ocean.",
"parent_id":... | 1,760,372,233.049127 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/15/pi-zero-runs-doom-via-wireless-power/ | Pi Zero RunsDOOMVia Wireless Power | Donald Papp | [
"Raspberry Pi"
] | [
"doom",
"Raspberry Pi W",
"tft",
"touchscreen",
"wireless charging",
"Wireless power"
] | What’s better than a Raspberry Pi Zero running
DOOM
on a 3.5″ touchscreen?
Running it over wireless power
, of course!
[atomic14] has been interested in wireless power for a while, and while most of the hardware he’s tested over the years has been less than impressive, he demonstrates one that’s able to reliably deliver 5 V at about 1 A which is more than enough to boot a Raspberry Pi W2 into X and launch
DOOM
. But while that’s neat, he explains that wireless power isn’t quite yet an effortless solution.
The hardware can deliver 5 V at about 1 A wirelessly, which is plenty, but coil alignment is critical to efficiency.
For one thing, the hardware he’s using — similar to those used for mobile phone charging — need the receiver to be very close to the transmitter. In addition, they need to be aligned well or efficiency drops off sharply. For mobile phones this isn’t much of a problem, but it’s difficult to position a Raspberry Pi and display
just so
when one can’t see the coils. Misalignment means brownouts and other unreliable operation.
So while the wireless power is capable of running the Pi directly, [atomic14] attempts to put a small battery and charger circuit into the mix in order to make the whole thing both portable and more reliable. But because nothing is easy, he discovers that his charging board — which should be able to output as low as 4.5 V — isn’t able to be adjusted down any lower than 5.66 V. It turns out that a resistor marked 104 (which should be 100 kΩ) is
actually
measuring 57 kΩ, and the trim pot doesn’t go lower than 10 kΩ. The solution is a bit of component swapping, but we suppose it’s a reminder that sometimes with cheap parts, one pays in other ways.
You can see [atomic14]’s wireless power Raspberry Pi running the classic shooter in the video below. Wireless power may have its issues, but it’s certainly a lot less messy than
running
DOOM
with a gigantic potato battery
.
Thanks to [Chris] for the tip! | 8 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6663205",
"author": "IsRadioKill",
"timestamp": "2023-07-16T02:19:46",
"content": "I bet some supercaps and the required balancing hardware would give you just enough power to re-align the device.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id"... | 1,760,372,233.099492 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/15/hackaday-prize-2023-omote-universal-remote/ | Hackaday Prize 2023: OMOTE Universal Remote | Tom Nardi | [
"home entertainment hacks",
"The Hackaday Prize"
] | [
"2023 Hackaday Prize",
"remote control",
"TV remote"
] | A good universal remote can help tame today’s complex home entertainment systems, combining both classic IR and more modern WiFi and Bluetooth connectivity with programmable functions that allow the user to execute multi-step operations with a single button. Unfortunately, programming them often involves the use of clunky proprietary software.
Which is why
[Maximilian Kern] has developed the OMOTE
. This open source universal remote is powered by the ESP32, and features the usual collection of physical buttons in addition to a 2.8” 320 x 240 touchscreen with a responsive graphical interface that can display more advanced user interfaces. Everything is packed into an ergonomic 3D printed case that gives it an exceptionally professional look.
The remote’s USB-C port can be used to recharge the internal 2,000 mAhA battery, as well as reprogram the ESP32’s firmware via a CH340C serial chip. The battery life is estimated to be about six months given the considerable low-power capabilities of the ESP32, which includes the use of a LIS3DH 3-axis accelerometer to keep the hardware in sleep mode until it’s picked up.
The software side is still in development, so the IR codes for the remote are currently hardcoded and its WiFi capabilities are limited to MQTT. But in the future, [Maximilian] imagines a web-based configuration interface that runs on the ESP32 and lets you add codes and setup the remote via your phone or desktop.
It looks like the hardware is more or less complete, so presumably the focus from here on out will be bringing the software across the finish line. Don’t worry, there’s still plenty of time — since it’s an entry into the
Gearing Up
challenge of the 2023 Hackaday Prize
, the judges won’t pick the finalists until August 8th.
The
Hackaday
Prize 2023
is Sponsored by: | 39 | 14 | [
{
"comment_id": "6663091",
"author": "Andy",
"timestamp": "2023-07-15T20:27:42",
"content": "Very nice. Have you tested it for reilience to canine interest? 😀",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6663179",
"author": "The Commenter Formerly... | 1,760,372,233.464191 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/15/ssh-can-handle-spaces-in-command-line-arguments-strangely/ | SSH Can Handle Spaces In Command-line Arguments Strangely | Donald Papp | [
"Linux Hacks"
] | [
"bug",
"linux",
"openssh",
"parsing",
"ssh"
] | One of the things
ssh
can do is execute a command on a remote server. Most of us expect it to work transparently when doing so, simply passing the command and its arguments on without any surprises in the process. But after 23 years of using OpenSSH on a nearly daily basis, [Martin Kjellstrand] got surprised.
It turns out that the usual rules around how things are parsed can have
some troublesome edge cases when spaces are involved
. [Martin] kicks off an example in the following way:
One would reasonably expect the commands
figlet foobar bar\ baz
and
ssh localhost figlet foobar bar\ baz
to be functionally equivalent, right? The former ultimately runs the command “figlet” with arguments “foobar” and “bar baz” on the local machine. The second does the same, except with
ssh
being involved in the middle. As mentioned, one would expect both commands to be functionally identical, but that’s not what happens. What happens is that
ssh
turns
bar\ baz
into
two distinctly separate
command-line arguments in the process of sending it for remote execution: “bar” and “baz”. The result is mystification as the command fails to run the way the user expects, if it runs at all.
What exactly is going on, here? [Martin] goes into considerable detail tracking down this odd behavior and how it happens, but he’s unable to ultimately explain why
ssh
does things this way. He suspects that it is the result of some design decision taken long ago. Or perhaps a bug that has, over time, been promoted to entrenched quirk.
Do you have any insights or knowledge about this behavior? If so, [Martin] wants to hear about it and so do we, so don’t keep it to yourself! Let us know in the comments, below. | 48 | 17 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662982",
"author": "Myself",
"timestamp": "2023-07-15T17:09:14",
"content": "My least favorite SSH quirk is when ssh’ing into a headless Raspberry Pi, I could never get my locale set up, no matter how much I worked with raspi_config and localegen and every search result on the whol... | 1,760,372,233.375023 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/15/sweet-hacks/ | Sweet Hacks | Elliot Williams | [
"3d Printer hacks",
"Hackaday Columns",
"Rants",
"Slider"
] | [
"newsletter"
] | While talking about a
solar powered portable Bluetooth speaker project
on the podcast, I realized that I have a new category of favorite hacks: daily-use hacks.
If you read Hackaday long enough, you’ll start to categorize everything. There are the purely technical hacks, beautiful hacks, minimalist hacks, maximalist hacks, and then the straight-up oddball hacks. Sometimes what strikes us is the beauty of the execution. Sometimes it’s clever choice of parts that were designed to do exactly the right thing, and simply watching them do their job well is satisfying, and other times we like to see parts fooled into doing something they have no right to.
While I really like the above speaker build because it’s beautiful, and because it uses a clever choice of audio amplifier to work with the supercapacitors’ wild voltage swings, what really struck me about the project is that [Jamie Matthews] has been using it every day for the last nine months. It’s on his desk and he uses it to listen to music.
That’s a simple feat in a way, but it’s a powerful one. Some of my absolutely favorite projects of my own are similar – they are ones that I use all the time. Not the cliche “life hack”, which are usually like a clever way to peel a grapefruit, but rather hacks that become part of daily life. So look around you, and if you’re anything like me, you’ll find a number of these “daily driver” hacks. And if you do, celebrate them.
(And maybe even
send ’em in to the tips line
to share!)
This article is part of the Hackaday.com newsletter, delivered every seven days for each of the last 200+ weeks. It also includes our favorite articles from the last seven days that you can see on
the web version of the newsletter
.
Want this type of article to hit your inbox every Friday morning?
You should sign up
! | 6 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662946",
"author": "Danjovic",
"timestamp": "2023-07-15T15:20:26",
"content": "That’s a good subject for a contest, don’t you think?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6663474",
"author": "Elliot Williams",
"time... | 1,760,372,233.247222 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/15/these-fake-nixie-tubes-have-a-bootup-screen/ | These Fake Nixie Tubes Have A Bootup Screen | Donald Papp | [
"clock hacks",
"Parts"
] | [
"bootup",
"clock",
"fake nixie",
"nixie",
"oled"
] | [IMSAI Guy] bought a fake Nixie clock, and luckily for all of us has filmed
a very close look and demonstration
. Using OLED displays as the fake Nixie elements might seem like cheating to some, the effect is really very well done.
Clock digits with bootup screens is something we didn’t know we liked until we saw it.
When it comes to Nixie elements, it’s hard to say which gets more attention and project time from hardware folks: original Nixie tube technology, or fake Nixie elements. Either way, their appeal is certainly undeniable.
Original Nixie tubes have shown up in
modern remakes of alarm clocks
, and modern semiconductors make satisfying a Nixie tube’s power requirements much easier with
clever and compact Nixie drivers costing under $3 USD
. This is also a good time to remind people that Nixie tubes don’t have to be digits.
This audio spectrum visualizer
, for example, uses IN-13 tubes which serve as elements of a bar graph.
Authentic Nixie elements require high voltages and
are labor-intensive to manufacture
to say the least, and as far as fake Nixie elements go, this one looks pretty good once it lights up. You can see it in action in the video, embedded below. | 35 | 13 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662895",
"author": "dos",
"timestamp": "2023-07-15T11:20:58",
"content": "When I was a kid, I used to add fake splash screens to my applications and trigger random HDD usage just to make it seem that a Big Serious App™ is being loaded.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"... | 1,760,372,233.541116 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/15/planar-speaker-build-uses-hard-drive-magnets/ | Planar Speaker Build Uses Hard Drive Magnets | Al Williams | [
"digital audio hacks"
] | [
"foil",
"planar speakers",
"speakers"
] | We like to see people building things that are a little unusual, and we
really
like it when said unusual thing uses salvaged parts. This project from [JGJMatt] ticks all our boxes — the build creates
a planar speaker that uses salvaged magnets
from a hard drive.
A planar speaker, according to the post, uses wires and magnets to manipulate a flat film that acts as the transducer. The speaker housing is 3D printed and looks great but is otherwise unremarkable. The fun starts when a Dremel with a diamond disk cuts the magnets in half. Cutting neodymium poses several challenges. For example, if you heat the material up too much while cutting, it can lose its magnetism.
With the proper magnets, you can move to the tedious method of creating the coils. The post shows three different methods. But the part we really liked was using a resin 3D printer as a UV source to expose a resist mask which transfers to a copper or aluminum foil that will be the sound-generating film. [JGJMatt] used a similar technique to put resist on PC board blanks, too. Unfortunately, there were some issues so the finished speakers didn’t use the foil prepared using this method. Instead, a quick modification to the resin printer allowed a thin film of resin to rest on the foil, which was then exposed.
Once you have the pieces, there isn’t much left to do but put them together. Honestly, this is one of those things you probably won’t do yourself unless you are obsessed with speakers. But there were a lot of interesting techniques here that might come in handy, even if you don’t care about audio reproduction.
[JGJMatt] showed us
a ribbon speaker before
. We have seen some
speakers that are practically all 3D printed
. | 3 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662967",
"author": "echodelta",
"timestamp": "2023-07-15T16:04:42",
"content": "Sound from both sides mixes and partially cancels out giving a washed out sound. There is a reason why any speaker diaphragm needs to be in a baffle. Even worse is the sound when the diaphragm is parall... | 1,760,372,233.284233 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/14/trebuchet-sends-eggs-flying/ | Trebuchet Sends Eggs Flying | Bryan Cockfield | [
"Weapons Hacks"
] | [
"catapult",
"competition",
"contest",
"design",
"distance",
"egg",
"trebuchet",
"weight"
] | Without any sort of restrictions on designs for trebuchets, these medieval siege weapons are known to send 90 kilogram projectiles over 300 meters. The egg-launching trebuchet contest that [AndysMachines] is entering, on the other hand, has a few limitations that dramatically decreased the size of the machines involved. The weight of the entire device is limited to no more than 3 kg, with any physical dimension no more than 300 mm, but that’s more than enough to
send an egg flying across a yard with the proper design and tuning for maximum distance
.
Trebuchets distinguish themselves amongst other siege weapons by using a falling weight to launch the projectile. The rules of this contest allow for the use of springs, so [AndysMachines] is adding a spring in between the trebuchet arm and the weight in order to more efficiently deliver the energy from the falling weight. More fine tuning of the trebuchet was needed before the competition, though, specifically regarding the stall point for the trebuchet. This is the point where the forces acting on the arm from the projectile and the weight are balanced, and moving this point to allow the projectile to release at a 45-degree angle was needed for maximum distance.
The video goes into a lot of detail about other fine-tuning of a trebuchet like this, aided by some slow-motion video analysis. In the end, [AndysMachines] was able to launch the egg over ten meters with this design. Of course, if you want to throw out the rule book and replace the eggs with ball bearings and the aluminum and steel with titanium, it’s possible
to build a trebuchet that breaks the sound barrier
. | 7 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662853",
"author": "Ryan",
"timestamp": "2023-07-15T06:23:23",
"content": "Trebuchegg?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6662855",
"author": "Fred",
"timestamp": "2023-07-15T06:26:32",
"content": "Trebuchets are reall... | 1,760,372,233.586286 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/14/bringing-a-baofeng-into-the-cyberpunk-2077-universe/ | Bringing A Baofeng Into TheCyberpunk 2077Universe | Dan Maloney | [
"Cyberdecks",
"Radio Hacks"
] | [
"amateur",
"arduino",
"baofeng",
"cyberdeck",
"Cyberpunk 2077",
"ham",
"handy talkie",
"radio",
"UV-5R"
] | You’ve got to love the aesthetics of dystopian cyberpunk video games, where all the technology looks like it’s cobbled together from cast-off bits of the old world’s remains. Kudos go to those who attempt to recreate these virtual props and bring them into the real world, but our highest praise goes to those who not only make a game-realistic version of a prop, but make it actually work.
Take the Nokota Manufacturing radio from
Cyberpunk 2077
, for instance. [Taylor] took one look at that and knew it would be
the perfect vessel for a Baofeng UV-5R
, the dual-band transceiver that amateur radio operators love to hate. The idea is to strip the PCB out of a Baofeng — no worries,
the things cost like $25
— and install it in a game-accurate 3D printed case. But this is far from just a case mod, since [Taylor]’s goal is to replace the radio’s original controls with something closer to what’s in the game.
To that end, [Taylor] is spinning up an interface to the stock radio’s keypad using some 7400-series bilateral analog switches. Hooked to the keypad contacts and controlled by a Mini MEGA 2560 microcontroller, the interface is able to send macros that imitate the keypresses necessary to change frequencies and control the radio’s settings, plus display the results on the yellow OLED screen that seems a dead-ringer for the in-game display. The video below shows some early testing of the interface.
While very much still a work in progress, we’ve been following [Taylor]’s project for a week or so and he’s really gaining some ground. We’ve encouraged him to enter this one in
the Cyberdeck Challenge
we’ve got going on now; it might not have much “deck” going for it, but it sure does have a lot of “cyber.” | 10 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662825",
"author": "The Commenter Formerly Known As Ren",
"timestamp": "2023-07-15T03:12:53",
"content": "I’d rather have a Pip-Boy!B^)",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6662852",
"author": "reyh45yh45",
"timestamp": "202... | 1,760,372,233.804417 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/14/the-another-world-chip/ | The Another World Chip | Jenny List | [
"FPGA"
] | [
"another world",
"fpga",
"fpga game"
] | We cover many recreations of classic computer games on these pages, sometimes on original hardware, other times through ports to newer hardware, or even on emulators. But [Sylefeb]’s version of the Amiga classic
Another World
is in a class of its own. It doesn’t recreate an Amiga or run an emulator,
instead it implements the game itself on a relatively modest Lattice UP5K FPGA
.
This feat is possible because of the game’s architecture, it runs on a quite minimalist virtual machine that only needs blitter and rasterising hardware. This makes it a good candidate for the FPGA treatment. [Sylefeb] goes into a deep discussion of the hardware implemented in the FPGA, which makes a solid primer for how some of the 16-bit era games worked. In particular, we needed to read over the section about the rasterisation of polygons more than once. But it’s worth it.
The game can be run on a few dev boards featuring this FPGA, among which we’re particularly pleased to see
the MCH 2023 conference badge
. It requires a copy of the original to be owned for the game files, but we suspect if you’re this deep in you’d probably see that as a small price to pay. | 6 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662800",
"author": "TSW",
"timestamp": "2023-07-15T00:37:50",
"content": "My dad bought Another World from Egghead Software for his Apple ][gs when I was young. I remember the game required excellent timing for jumps, and the animation was very smooth.That’s my story.",
"parent... | 1,760,372,233.846785 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/14/open-source-lamp-instrument-aimed-at-clinicians-and-biohackers-alike/ | Open-Source LAMP Instrument Aimed At Clinicians And Biohackers Alike | Dan Maloney | [
"Medical Hacks"
] | [
"COVID",
"diagnosis",
"dna",
"fluoresecense",
"lamp",
"nucleic acid",
"rna",
"RT-LAMP",
"SARS-CoV-2"
] | Over the last few years, we’ve all been given a valuable lesson in both the promise and limitations of advanced molecular biology methods for clinical diagnostics. Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) was held up as the “gold standard” of COVID-19 testing, but the cost, complexity, and need for advanced instrumentation and operators with specialized training made PCR difficult to scale to the levels demanded by a pandemic.
There are other diagnostic methods, of course, some of which don’t have all the baggage of PCR. RT-LAMP, or reverse transcriptase loop-mediated amplification, is one method with a lot of promise, especially when it can be done on
a cheap open-source instrument like qLAMP
. For about 50€, qLAMP makes amplification and detection of nucleic acids, like the RNA genome of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, a benchtop operation that can be performed by anyone. LAMP is an isothermal process; it can be done at one single temperature, meaning that no bulky thermal cycler is required. Detection is via the fluorescent dye SYTO 9, which layers into the base pairs inside the amplified DNA strands, using a 470-nm LED for excitation and a photodiode with a filter to detect the emission. Heating is provided by a PCB heater and a 3D-printed aluminum block that holds tubes for eight separate reactions. Everything lives in a 3D-printed case, including the ESP32 which takes care of all the housekeeping and data analysis duties.
With the proper test kits, which cost just a couple of bucks each, qLAMP would be useful for diagnosing a wide range of diseases, and under less-than-ideal conditions. It could also be a boon to biohackers, who could use it for their own citizen science efforts. We saw
a LAMP setup
at the height of the pandemic that used the Mark 1 eyeball as a detector; this one is far more quantitative. | 28 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662739",
"author": "hartl",
"timestamp": "2023-07-14T21:11:14",
"content": "Yeah, the side effects of stupidity did so much harm to our society that it will take decades for it to heal, if ever.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id":... | 1,760,372,234.035023 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/14/listening-to-bats-as-they-search-for-food/ | Listening To Bats As They Search For Food | Bryan Cockfield | [
"Raspberry Pi"
] | [
"bat",
"bat detector",
"heterodyne",
"op-amp",
"pico",
"raspberry pi",
"sound",
"time expansion",
"ultrasonic"
] | The range of human hearing goes up to about 20 kilohertz, which is fine for our purposes, but is pretty poor compared to plenty of other animal species. Dogs famously can hear up to about 60 kHz, and dolphins are known to distinguish sounds up to 100 kHz. But for extremely high frequencies we’ll want to take a step into the world of bats. Some use echolocation to locate each other and their food sources, and bats like the pipistrelle can listen in to sounds up to 350 kHz. To listen to them you’ll need
a device like the π*pistrelle
.
The original implementation of the bat detector was based on a Raspberry Pi Pico, from which it gets its name. But there have been several improvements on it in the years since it was first developed. The latest can detect bats when it hears their 350 kHz sonar calls thanks to an ultrasonic microphone and op amp. The device then records the bat sounds and then either heterodynes the sound down or time-expands it to human-audible range so the calls can actually be heard. There’s an LED display on the board as well as three input buttons, but an iOS companion app is available to interact with the device as well.
If you want to know for sure which species is flying around at night,
you can use machine learning to help figure that out
. | 14 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662723",
"author": "Greg Garriss",
"timestamp": "2023-07-14T20:14:49",
"content": "Nice.. I built an analog heterodyne module for listneing to bats a few decades ago . This could be a fun update.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": ... | 1,760,372,233.757329 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/14/ask-hackaday-learn-assembly-first-last-or-never/ | Ask Hackaday: Learn Assembly First, Last, Or Never? | Al Williams | [
"Ask Hackaday",
"Rants",
"Slider",
"Software Development"
] | [
"assembly language"
] | A few days ago, I ran into an online post where someone pointed out the book “
Learn to Program with Assembly
” and asked if anyone had ever learned assembly language as a first programming language. I had to smile because, if you are a certain age, your first language may well have been assembly, even if it was assembly for
machines that never existed
.
Of course, that was a long time ago. It is more likely, these days, if you are over 40, you might have learned BASIC first. Go younger, and you start skewing towards Java, Javascript, or even C. It got me thinking, though: should people learn assembly, and if so, when?
Assembly language is a text representation of the machine code your CPU executes
I’m no stranger to assembly languages, but I’m not sure I know a modern and defensible answer to this question. You can find plenty of
tutorials
, of course (including
some from me
). There are plenty of cases where a few lines of embedded assembly can make a big difference in a program. Debugging a bad compiler can also require assembly chops. So it seems that at least some people still need to learn assembly. That leaves the question of when to learn it and, as a corollary, who needs to learn it.
My traditional answer would be that everyone should learn it as soon as possible. But that could be because that’s how I did it years ago. I’m not convinced that’s the right answer for everyone today. However, I’ll make my case.
The Case for Early
If you are satisfied writing code to validate zipcodes in Javascript, you probably don’t need to learn assembly. But if you want to really be a top programmer, you are going to have to confront it sooner or later. Learning it early has some benefits. If you understand what’s really going on at the CPU level, a pointer in C doesn’t seem like a tough concept. Being able to look at the output from a compiler and understand what it means is often illuminating when you are trying to learn something new.
However…
The only problem is that modern assembly language is difficult. CPU instruction sets are strange, and there are issues with CPUs that do out-of-order execution. Then there is relocatable code and other details that are easy to trip on and not very useful to know much about.
Even if you can’t afford an Altair, you can get a replica. Or just stick with software emulation
So there are two ways to go. First, pick an older CPU. Something like the Z80, the 1802, or the 6502 isn’t that hard to learn, and there are a ton of resources available. Don’t have any hardware like that? Who cares? Use an emulator. You can probably even find some that
run in the browser
and have excellent debugging capabilities not available in the real hardware. I’ve programmed on dozens of CPUs, and they are all pretty similar. Given the oddness of the 1802, I might not recommend it even though I love it myself. It is, on the other hand, very simple to learn. The PDP-8 or
PDP-11
are other good candidates, although some of how minicomputers do things are rarely seen today.
Or, pick a machine that doesn’t exist. Most of these were made for learning, so that’s a plus, and many of them also have modern emulators. If you were to pick one, I’d suggest
Mix
. The books from Knuth are classic and use Mix. They influenced everyone, so you’ll see echoes of Knuth’s ideas in every computer system you ever touch. (That isn’t a quantum computer, at least.)
Just don’t go too far back. Programming the EDSAC, TUTAC, or the 4004 is probably not representative of modern computing at all. Honestly, none of these CPUs are. But they can help set the stage for tackling more advanced processors if needed. Like the old adage: You have to crawl before you walk, and walk before you run.
The Case for Late
You could easily argue the other side, too. Maybe assembly language makes more sense once you understand why you need pointers to make linked lists and why conditional jumping is a thing. If you’ve been programming for a while, some ideas like hex numbers and addresses might already be familiar.
Probably the wrong time to learn it, though, is when you have an intractable bug, and you suspect the compiler is optimizing your code incorrectly. Or at the midnight hour before a deadline when you need to shave that extra little bit from your code.
What Do You Think?
This is, after all, “Ask Hackaday,” so tell us what you think in the comments. Make your case for why no one needs to learn assembly. Or tell us your opinion about the best processor to learn. Learn in the
browser
? We don’t suggest WebAssembly, but maybe you disagree. What are the best online resources and books? What’s your favorite story about that time that knowing assembly saved the day?
(Digital rain effect from
[Rezmason]’s generator
.) | 154 | 50 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662644",
"author": "A3DP",
"timestamp": "2023-07-14T17:04:59",
"content": "Yes definitely learn a little bit of assembly the efficiency of coding is amazingly fast. I remember fondly the ZX81",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6... | 1,760,372,234.196384 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/14/hackaday-podcast-227-open-source-software-decoupling-caps-diy-vr/ | Hackaday Podcast 227: Open Source Software, Decoupling Caps, DIY VR | Tom Nardi | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"News",
"Slider"
] | [
"Hackaday Podcast"
] | Elliot Williams and Tom Nardi start this week’s episode by addressing the ongoing Red Hat drama and the trend towards “renting” software. The discussion then shifts to homebrew VR gear, a particularly impressive solar-powered speaker, and some promising developments in the world of low-cost thermal cameras. Stay tuned to hear about color-changing breadboards, an unofficial logo for repairable hardware, and five lines of Bash that aim to unseat the entrenched power of Slack. Finally, we’ll take the first steps in an epic deep-dive into the world of DisplayPort, and take a journey of the imagination aboard an experimental nuclear ocean liner.
Check out the complete show notes below, and as always, let us know what you think in the comments.
Or
download the episode directly in glorious DRM-free MP3
.
Where to Follow Hackaday Podcast
Places to follow Hackaday podcasts:
iTunes
Spotify
Stitcher
RSS
YouTube
Check
out our Libsyn landing page
Episode 227 Show Notes:
News:
SuSE Take On Red Hat, Forking RHEL
Et Tu, Red Hat?
What’s that Sound?
Think you know that sound?
Fill out the form
for a chance to win a Hackaday Podcast t-shirt!
Interesting Hacks of the Week:
Proper Decoupling Capacitors
The Other Way To Fight Software Rental
Behold A DIY VR Headset Its Creator Will “Never” Build Again
Enhance VR Immersion By Shoehorning An Ambilight Into A Headset
Phone Thermal Cameras Get Open Source Desktop Tools
Hackaday Prize 2023: Supercapacitors Let Solar Speaker Work In Darkness
Using An Old Satellite To See The Earth In A New Light
Quick Hacks:
Elliot’s Picks:
Clock Escapement Uses Rolling Balls
The Demoscene, Now An Irreplaceable Piece Of Cultural Heritage
Thermochromic Treatment Keeps Solderless Breadboards Smokeless
Tom’s Picks:
Show ‘Em What You’re Made Of With This Repair Logo
CP/M Porting In A Few Hours
Suc Aims To Replace Slack In Five Lines Of Bash
Can’t-Miss Articles:
DisplayPort: A Better Video Interface
Retrotechtacular: The Nuclear Cruise Ship Of The Future Earns Glowing Reviews | 1 | 1 | [
{
"comment_id": "6663148",
"author": "Samantha",
"timestamp": "2023-07-15T22:46:03",
"content": "Was it an Otomatone?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
}
] | 1,760,372,233.895875 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/14/students-3d-print-low-cost-braille-keypad/ | Students 3D Print Low Cost Braille Keypad | Lewin Day | [
"Peripherals Hacks"
] | [
"keypad",
"numberpad",
"numpad"
] | Numerical keypads are common entry devices for everything from home security systems to phones and more. Unfortunately, a great deal of them are difficult to use if you’re visually impaired.
This high-contrast Braille keypad aims to solve those issues with simple design choices.
The keypad was developed as a school project by students [Nicholas Nguyen] and [Daniel Wang]. It uses a regular layout, with 1 at the top left and 9 at the bottom right. The keypad itself is 3D printed with large buttons for easier use. Each button has its numeral inlaid on the face which allows it to be easily filled in with paint for high-contrast readability.
The real neat feature, though, is that each individual button features its relevant number in Braille. The pips are directly 3D printed into the shape of each button. For those that familiar with the tactile writing system, this makes the keypad much easier to use. It obviates the need to guess at the keypad’s orientation, and we’re honestly surprised we don’t see this on more devices out in the wild.
We’ve featured a variety of neat Braille hacks over the years,
including this neat tactile display. | 7 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662631",
"author": "Urgon",
"timestamp": "2023-07-14T16:09:49",
"content": "Am I blind, or there is no “0” key?Also there are high-contrast and Braille stickers for standard PC keyboards. In my school we used black on yellow, but personally I would prefer yellow on black…",
"pa... | 1,760,372,234.324221 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/14/this-week-in-security-apples-0-day-microsofts-mess-and-more/ | This Week In Security: Apple’s 0-day, Microsoft’s Mess, And More | Jonathan Bennett | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Security Hacks",
"Slider"
] | [
"apple",
"ghostscript",
"microsoft",
"This Week in Security"
] | First up,
Apple issued an emergency patch
, then yanked, and
re-issued it.
The problem was a Remote Code Execution (RCE) vulnerability in WebKit — the basis of Apple’s cross-platform web browser. The downside of a shared code base,is that bugs too are write-once, exploit-anywhere. And with Apple’s walled garden insisting that every browser on iOS actually run WebKit under the hood, there’s not much relief without a patch like this one.
The vulnerability in question, CVE-2023-37450, is a bit light on further details except to say that it’s known to be exploited in the wild. The first fix also bumped the browser’s user-agent string, adding an
(a)
to denote the minor update. This was apparently enough to break some brittle user-agent detection code on popular websites, resulting in an unhelpful “This web browser is no longer supported” message. The second patch gets rid of the notification.
Microsoft Loses It
Microsoft
has announced that on May 15th
, an attack from Storm-0558 managed to breach the email accounts of roughly 25 customers. This was pulled off via “an acquired Microsoft account (MSA) consumer signing key.” The big outstanding question is how Microsoft lost control of that particular key. According to an anonymous source
speaking to The Washington Post
, some of the targeted accounts were government employees, including a member of cabinet. Apparently the FBI is asking Microsoft this very same question.
Speaking of Microsoft, there’s also
CVE-2023-36884
, a vulnerability in Microsoft Office. This one appears to be related to the handling of HTML content embedded in Office documents, and results in code execution upon opening the document. This along with another vulnerability (
CVE-2023-36874
) was being used by storm- another unknown threat actor, Storm-0978
in an ongoing attack
.
There’s an interesting note that this vulnerability can be mitigated by an Attack Surface Reduction (ASR) rule, that
blocks Office from launching child processes
. This might be a worthwhile mitigation step for this and future vulnerabilities in office.
Ghost in the Script
To complete the trifecta, we have
a bug in the Open Source Ghostscript
, that might just have the longest tail of the three. The problem here is pipes. Ghostscript first runs a path simplification routine, and
that routine wasn’t properly handling paths with embedded pipes
. And of course, once such a location string is actually accessed, it can commit arbitrary command execution.
The bug is fixed, but GhostScript is used in many other projects, and in some cases embedded as a static library. There’s sure to be a bunch of follow-on problems, where applications, web sites, and appliances get bit by this particular bug. Researchers at Kroll were able to reverse-engineer a Proof-of-Concept from the patches. That PoC doesn’t appear to be public yet, but it’s likely just a matter of time before this issue is used in attacks.
More File-sharing Vulnerabilities
While the industry is still recovering from
the Moveit attacks
, it looks like another solution just might have a similar problem.
This time it’s Citrix Sharefile
.
Up first is a path traversal bug, where part of the filename is sanitized, and then concatenated with another user-provided value that isn’t sanitized. Whoops. Then a decryption routine blocks unauthenticated uploads. Except, it doesn’t actually check the decrypted data before allowing the file upload, so all it takes is a value that has properly formatted padding. That combined with the path traversal means unauthenticated arbitrary file upload — an easy webshell.
Citrix has published an update
, so go grab it!
Bits and Bytes
Sonicwall’s Global Management System (GMS) and Analytics products
have a pair of 9.8 vulnerabilities
, in addition to a pair of 9.4 and lower severity vulnerabilities. The combination of authentication bypasses, arbitrary file uploads, and information leaks is probably enough to string together a nasty attack chain.
Solarview is an Industrial Control System (ICS),
apparently under attack by the Mirai botnet
. The vulnerability in question, CVE-2022-29303, is a pre-auth command injection bug, leading to full compromise. The wrinkle here is that the CVE was marked as fixed in release 6.20, but it looks like the
conf_mail.php
endpoint wasn’t properly secured until release 8.00. “Less than one third of the internet-facing SolerView series systems are patched against CVE-2022029303.” Eek!
What do you do when you get your hands on a retired Google Search appliance box? Obviously,
you break into it, and convince it to spill its secrets
. That took some doing, as the machine’s BIOS was locked down, and the drives used self-encryption to prevent read access. No problem, just find a vulnerability in the machine’s admin console, and use a Line Feed (LF) injection to pop a shell. There’s more fun to be had in the full write-up, enjoy! | 4 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662640",
"author": "Dan",
"timestamp": "2023-07-14T16:31:36",
"content": "Probably too late for this week: WP “All in one security” was leaking passwords plaintext…WP is more secure without most of these “security” plugins.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
... | 1,760,372,234.280553 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/14/how-does-your-mcdonalds-burger-get-to-you/ | How Does Your McDonald’s Burger Get To You? | Jenny List | [
"Reverse Engineering"
] | [
"beacon",
"bluetooth",
"McDonald's"
] | Table service and McDonalds sound as though they should be mutually exclusive as a fundamental of the giant chain’s fast food business model, but in many restaurants there’s the option of keying in the number from a plastic beacon when you order, placing the beacon on the table, and waiting for a staff member to bring your food. How does the system work?
[Whiterose Infosec] scored one of the beacons, and subjected it to a teardown and some probing.
The beacon in question has the look of being an older model judging by the 2009 date codes on its radio module and the evident corrosion on its battery terminals. Its Bluetooth 4 SoC is end-of-life, so it’s possible that this represents a previous version of the system. It has a few other hardware features, including a magnet and a sensor designed to power the board down when it is stacked upon another beacon.
Probing its various interfaces revealed nothing, as did connecting to the device via Bluetooth. However some further research as well as asking some McD’s employees revealed some of its secret. It does little more than advertise its MAC address, and an array of Bluetooth base stations in the restaurant use that to triangulate its approximate position.
If you’ve ever pondered how these beacons work while munching on your McFood, you might also like to read
about McVulnerabilities elsewhere in the system
. | 32 | 14 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662552",
"author": "Eric Mockler",
"timestamp": "2023-07-14T11:18:22",
"content": "I installed these in 1 restaurant, never again. Thank god none of the tables were installed yet, so I didn’t have to calibrate the whole mess. The Neglectricians electrified the ceiling grid, guess h... | 1,760,372,234.389702 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/14/sloth-door-greeter-uses-neat-fold-up-electronics-enclosures/ | Sloth Door Greeter Uses Neat Fold-Up Electronics Enclosures | Lewin Day | [
"3d Printer hacks"
] | [
"3d printer",
"housing",
"sloth"
] | [Alan Reiner] is building a sloth-like door greeter for his house. Sloxel, as he is affectionately known, can move around and even talk,
with [Alan] using some nifty tricks in the design process
Sloxel’s job is to vet visitors to [Alan’s] house, before inviting them to knock on the door or to leave their details and go away. There’s still plenty of work to do on that functionality, which [Alan] plans to implement using ChatGPT. In the meantime, though, he’s been working hard on the hardware platform that will power Sloxel. A Raspberry Pi 3B+ is charged with running the show, including talking to the ChatGPT API and handling Sloxel’s motion along a linear rail with a number of stepper motors.
What we really love about this build, though, is the enclosure. [Alan] designed a housing for everything that can be 3D printed as a single part with print-in-place hinges. The four sides of the enclosure can then be folded up and into place with a minimum of fuss. Plus, the enclosure has plenty of nifty features that makes it easy to mount all the required hardware. It’s a neat design that we’d love to repurpose for some of our own projects.
We’ve seen other neat ideas in this area before,
like using PCBs themselves as an enclosure.
Video after the break. | 3 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662533",
"author": "Elliot Williams",
"timestamp": "2023-07-14T09:38:39",
"content": "All those zip-tie mounting points! Very nice.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6662555",
"author": "Ian",
"timestamp": "2023-07-14T11... | 1,760,372,234.238574 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/13/at-last-a-beagle-v-in-the-wild/ | At Last, A Beagle V In The Wild | Jenny List | [
"computer hacks"
] | [
"beaglebone",
"BeagleV-ahead",
"RISC-V"
] | The RISC-V ISA specification contains the recipe for everything from the humblest of microcontrollers to the most accomplished of high-end application processors, but it’s fair to say that at our end of the market it’s mostly been something for the lower end. There are plenty of inexpensive small RISC-V microcontrollers, but so far not much powerful enough for example to run a Linux-based operating system.
It’s a situation that’s slowly changing though, and it looks as though things may have taken a turn for the better as
a new BeagleBoard has appeared using a RISC-V chip
. The BeagleV-Ahead has a BeagleBone form factor and packs an Alibaba T-Head TH1520 SoC, a 2GHz quad-core part with a GPU and DSP components on-board. They link to a selection of distributors, from which one can seemingly be bought for about $170.
It’s a departure from the ARM chips that have until now powered the BeagleBoard line, but its appearance shouldn’t come as a surprise to seasoned Beagle watchers
as they announced their RISC-V developments back in 2021
. We’re guessing they too had to contend with the chip shortage which hit other players such as Raspberry Pi, so we’re pleased to see a product on the market. In particular though we’re pleased to see one on a BeagleBoard. because unlike a random no-name single board computer they’re a manufacturer who supports their products.
There’s
a page with a good choice of operating systems for the board
, and we hope that this means they provide kernel support for this SoC. This is the real benefit of buying a BeagleBoard or a Raspberry Pi, because cheap competitors will typically support only one kernel version compared with their years of support. So while this board is by no means cheap, we’re hoping it heralds a new wave of powerful RISC-V computers. Something to look forward to indeed. | 41 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662481",
"author": "Truth",
"timestamp": "2023-07-14T05:17:05",
"content": "Why did they choose a TH1520, it contains four Xuantie C910 RISC-V cores. And they all implement the pre-ratification RISC-V Vector Extension 0.7.1 which is incompatible at a binary and assembly language le... | 1,760,372,234.469416 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/13/orca-slicer-is-the-new-game-in-town/ | Orca Slicer Is The New Game In Town | Lewin Day | [
"3d Printer hacks"
] | [
"3d printing",
"orca slicer",
"slicer"
] | Slicers are the neat little tools that take your 3D models and turn them into G-code that your 3D printer can actually understand. They control the printing process down to the finest detail, and determine whether your prints are winners or binners. Orca Slicer is the new tool on the block,
and [The Edge of Tech] took a look at what it can do.
The video explores the use of Orca Slicer with the Bambu Lab P1P and X1 Carbon. [The Edge of Tech] jumps into the feature set, noting the
rich calibration tools
that are built right into the software. They work with any printer, and they’re intended to help users get perfect prints time and time again, with less messy defects and print failures. It’s also set up out of the box for network printing and live updates, which is super useful for those with multiple printers and busy workflows. You can even watch camera feeds live in the app from duly equipped printers. It’s even got nifty features for calculating your filament cost per print.
If you’re not happy
with your current slicer
, give Orca Slicer a go. Let us know what you think in the comments. Video after the break. | 13 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662485",
"author": "Drone",
"timestamp": "2023-07-14T05:31:13",
"content": "CAREFUL – I went to “The Edge of Tech” main YouTube site to look around and a pop-up appeard auto-subscribing me to the channel BY DEFAULT! Fortunately there’s a button to opt-out that appears, and I never ... | 1,760,372,234.523977 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/13/taking-mechanical-keyboard-sounds-to-the-next-level/ | Taking Mechanical Keyboard Sounds To The Next Level | Bryan Cockfield | [
"Peripherals Hacks"
] | [
"audio",
"bell",
"keyboard",
"mechanical keyboard",
"noise",
"solenoid",
"sound",
"Teensy",
"typewriter",
"usb"
] | When it comes to mechanical keyboards, there’s no end to the amount of customization that can be done. The size and layout of the keyboard is the first thing to figure out, and then switches, keycaps, and then a bunch of other customizations inside the keyboard like the mounting plate and whether or not to add foam strips and other sound- and vibration-deadening features. Of course some prefer to go the other direction with it as well, omitting the foam and installing keys with a more noticeable click, and still others go even further than that by
building a separate machine to make their keyboard activity as disruptive as it could possibly be
.
This started as a joke among [ac2ev] and some coworkers, who were already teasing about the distinct sound of the mechanical keyboard. This machine, based on a Teensy microcontroller, sits between any USB keyboard and its host computer, intercepting keystrokes and using a small solenoid to tap on a block of wood every time a keystroke is detected. There’s also a bell inside that rings when the enter key is pressed, similar to the return carriage notification for typewriters, and as an additional touch an audio amplifier with attached speaker plays the Mario power-up sound whenever the caps lock key is pressed.
[ac2ev] notes that this could be pushed to the extreme by running a much larger solenoid powered by mains electricity, but since this was more of a proof-of-concept demonstration for some coworkers the smaller solenoid was used instead. The source code for the build can be found on the
project’s GitHub page
and there’s also
a video of this machine in action here
as well. Be careful with noisy mechanical keyboards, though, as the
sounds the keys produce can sometimes be decoded
to determine what the user is typing. | 10 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662435",
"author": "DeveloperLen",
"timestamp": "2023-07-14T00:35:36",
"content": "Anyone old enough to remember the sound of an IBM 029 keypunch would remember how satisfying it is in small doses. …And deafening when all 30 of them are going at once approaching CS project due date... | 1,760,372,234.573238 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/13/awning-motorized-and-automated-to-avoid-wind-damage/ | Awning Motorized And Automated To Avoid Wind Damage | Lewin Day | [
"home hacks"
] | [
"awning",
"awnings",
"blinds",
"ESP32"
] | Awnings can be architecturally beautiful, and they provide lovely shelter from the sun and even a bit of rain. They don’t always like taking a pounding from high winds though. [Steve Carey] installed some nice awnings, but wanted to avoid any potential issues,
so he built an automated system to extend and retract them for him.
An ESP32 serves as the brains of the operation. It’s set up to open and close the blinds using a high-torque brushed motor run by a BTS7960 motor driver. The motor turns the awning’s rod via a hook, so it can be readily removed in the event [Steve] moves house. Reed switches are used as end stops to ensure the motor stops when the awning is fully open or closed. The ESP32 is hooked up to an accelerometer mounted on the awning. It’s set up to sum the accelerations detected in all three axes, and close the awning in the event conditions get too windy.
There’s a certain peace of mind that comes with having your awning hooked up with a preventative safety system. We don’t have a lot of awning posts on Hackaday,
but we have seen a good number of automated blinds in the past.
If you’ve been working on your own outdoor home automation gear, be sure to hit up
the tipsline
! Happy…awnings…ing? Anyway. | 30 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662377",
"author": "SayWhat?",
"timestamp": "2023-07-13T20:51:56",
"content": "I note he used a desiccant pack to protect his accelerometer. That’s a good idea. I always put a desiccant pack in outdoor electronics enclosures even sealed enclosures because… condensation. Never had a... | 1,760,372,234.63667 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/13/timekeeping-for-distributed-computers/ | Timekeeping For Distributed Computers | Bryan Cockfield | [
"clock hacks"
] | [
"clock",
"computer",
"distributed computer",
"logical clock",
"timekeeping",
"vector clock"
] | Ask any programmer who has ever had to deal with timekeeping on a computer, and they’re likely to go on at length about how it can be a surprisingly difficult thing to keep track of. Time zones, leap years, leap seconds, various timekeeping standards, clock drift, and even relativity are all problems that can creep in to projects. Issues with timekeeping are exacerbated in distributed systems as well, adding another layer of complexity when we need to reliably determine the order that a series of actions occurred across a number of different computers with a high precision. One solution to this problem is
the implementation of a vector clock
.
When using other systems such as logical clocks to attempt to keep track of the order of events on different computers, a problem that may arise is that these systems don’t always track these changes with perfect reliability due to many issues such as varying temperature, race conditions, or clock skew. The vector clock instead tracks causal relationships between events. Each separate process maintains its own vector clock, represented by a list of integers. When one of these processes performs an event, it increments its own clock and sends it out to the rest of the system. By keeping track of this clock as it is updated by various processes across the computer the distributed system can be much more confident about the order in which events took place.
Of course, there are always downsides with elegant solutions like this. In the case of vector clocks the downside is largely increased overhead for keeping track of all of the sets of integers. But in systems where the ordering of processes is of the upmost importance, this is worth the trade-off to ensure reliability. And unless we hook all of our computers up to
atomic clocks like they do for some computers at CERN
we will have to take the increased overhead instead. | 14 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662362",
"author": "Jouni",
"timestamp": "2023-07-13T19:59:13",
"content": "Or just use unix time.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6662363",
"author": "Sword",
"timestamp": "2023-07-13T20:08:30",
"cont... | 1,760,372,234.687662 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/13/how-duck-tape-became-famous/ | How Duck Tape Became Famous | Al Williams | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"History"
] | [
"duck tape",
"duct tape",
"history"
] | If you hack things in the real world, you probably have one or more rolls of duck tape. Outside of the cute brand name, many people think that duck tape is a malapropism, but in truth it is the type of cloth traditionally used in our favorite tape: cotton duck. However, as we’ll see, it’s not entirely wrong to call it duct tape either. Whatever you call it, a cloth material has an adhesive backing and is coated with something like polyethylene.
Actually, the original duck tape wasn’t adhesive at all. It was simply strips of cotton duck used for several purposes, including making shoes and wrapping steel cables like
the ones placed in 1902 at the Manhattan Bridge
. By 1910, the tape was made with adhesive on one side and soaked in rubber, found use in hospitals for binding wounds. In May 1930, Popular Mechanics advised melting rubber from an old tire and adding rosin to create a compound to coat cotton tape, among other things.
Duck Tape Needed a Champion
In case you’ve lived in a cave most of your life, here’s the kind of tape we are talking about. (“
Duck Tape
” by Evan-Amos.)
Duck tape didn’t get really famous, though, until World War II. It came down to a worker at an ammunition plant in Dixon, Illinois, named Vesta Stoudt. Her job was to pack ammunition boxes, and she realized that how they were sealed would make it difficult for soldiers to open them rapidly.
She devised a cloth tape seal with a tab that would seal the boxes adequately but come off rapidly when needed. She showed it to her management and government inspectors, but nothing came of it.
Some people might have just let it drop, but not Vesta. She went to the top, writing President Roosevelt a letter in 1943. The president passed it along to the Ordnance Department of the War Production Board. They wrote Vesta back in a few weeks to inform her they loved the idea and thought it had “exceptional merit.”
Vesta received the War Worker’s Award for her idea, and Revolite — part of Johnson and Johnson — was tasked to make a suitable cotton tape sealant. Duck tape, as we know it, was born.
It Really Stuck
Once it made its mark on ammo boxes, it was soon standard issue to repair military gear. Returning home, the soldiers wanted more duck tape to do home repairs, so it became a popular hardware store item. The Melvin A. Anderson company acquired the rights in 1950 and made a silver version and marketed it for wrapping ducts — duck tape as a duct tape. (Although ironically, modern science has shown that it’s
basically the only thing that you shouldn’t use for that purpose
.)
By 1971, the company had been sold and became Manco, and it has since gone through several other ownership changes, but it now controls about 40% of the duck tape market in the United States.
Modern tape isn’t necessarily made of cotton. Some use polyester, nylon, rayon, or fiberglass. A very thin bit of fabric laminates to low-density polyethylene. Powdered aluminum gives the tape the classic gray color, but other pigments also make colorful versions. If you want to see how it is made, check out the [Insider] video below.
Most rolls are hand-held size, but in 2005 Henkel — the owner of what had been Manco at the time — produced 64-inch rolls that weighed 650 pounds!
Starting with early Gemini missions, every NASA spaceflight carries some duck tape. It found use in fixing the oxygen situation during Apollo 13 and repaired a rover fender on Apollo 17.
While it doesn’t sound like Vesta was recognized as an engineer, we will recognize her as a fellow hacker. She saw something that could be made better, and she made it better. Then she made sure that better technology would get out in the field. If it weren’t for Vesta Stoudt, duck tape might not be the ubiquitous commodity it is today. You have to wonder what would take its place.
(Banner image: “
Duck Tape
” by Mike Mozart.) | 81 | 23 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662304",
"author": "komradebob",
"timestamp": "2023-07-13T17:16:27",
"content": "I asked an astronaut I know who convinced NASA it was worth the weight penalty to carry ‘grey tape’ and he had no idea. The original justification seems to have been lost in time.",
"parent_id": nu... | 1,760,372,234.867901 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/13/roboticized-zelda-ocarina-plays-itself/ | RoboticizedZeldaOcarina Plays Itself | Lewin Day | [
"Musical Hacks"
] | [
"musical instrument",
"ocarina",
"Self-Playing"
] | [3DSage] has long been obsessed with a certain type of musical instrument after playing
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time.
It spawned a
project to robotically control an ocarina
, which turned out beautifully.
The first step was to build an air blower that could excite the ocarina into making noise. With that completed, [3D Sage] then 3D scanned an ocarina so he could design a mechanism that would fit the instrument and let it be played. The final design uses a set of solenoids with rubber caps to plug the various holes of the ocarina to play different notes. The solenoids are actuated according to notes pressed on a printed keyboard. Alternatively, it can be programmed to play pre-stored songs by itself.
The results are charming, though the ocarina does sound a little off-pitch. Overall, though,
the project is a great use case for a 3D scanner
, since the instrument itself is such an odd irregular shape. | 10 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662285",
"author": "Drone",
"timestamp": "2023-07-13T16:21:20",
"content": "Perfect example of why I do NOT come to HaD so much these days. Less tack – more hack pleeeezz…",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6662325",
"au... | 1,760,372,235.202711 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/13/keeping-thermal-plants-cool-without-breaking-the-cooling-water-budget/ | Keeping Thermal Plants Cool Without Breaking The Cooling Water Budget | Maya Posch | [
"Engineering",
"Featured",
"Original Art",
"Science",
"Slider"
] | [
"cooling systems",
"steam generator",
"thermal cycle"
] | Steam generators in thermal (steam-cycle) power plants require a constant influx of cool water to maximize the transfer of thermal energy. How this water is cooled again in the condensor after much of the steam’s thermal energy has been spent in the steam turbines or heat exchangers is a very important consideration in the design and construction of these plants. The most obvious and straightforward system is direct “once-through” cooling, where the water is drawn straight from a nearby river or other body of water and released after passing through the condenser. This type of system is by far the cheapest, but is also impacted by both the seasons and environmental considerations.
Where cool surface water is less abundantly available, evaporative cooling in a recirculating system such as with spray ponds and cooling towers is a good alternative. Although slightly more costly, a big benefit of these is that they require far less water and have much more control over the intake water temperature, which can raise plant efficiency. Finally, dry cooling is essentially a closed-loop system, which is exceedingly useful in areas where water is scarce. This latter type of cooling is what allows thermal plants to operate even in desert regions.
As the global climate changes – with more extreme weather events – picking the right cooling solution is more important than ever, and has us looking at retrofitting existing thermal plants with more efficient solutions. If you were ever curious how power plants keep the cool side cool, read on!
Chilling Plants
Getting rid of surplus heat is a common aspect of many systems, from vehicles and building HVAC all the way to gigawatt-level thermal plants, yet the basic principles and technologies remain the same. Although office buildings tend to not use direct intake cooling, they do often have HVAC towers on the roof which use evaporative cooling in a way that is essentially a scaled-down version of a thermal plant’s evaporative cooling tower, or alternatively a closed-loop dry cooling system.
Schematic overview of once-through cooling at a coal plant with intake screens. (Credit:
Beaudrey
)
Within the different categories of thermal plants (being primarily coal, gas and nuclear), there are
a lot of similarities
between these different plant types, though also noticeable differences. Perhaps most important of all is that coal plants get rid of part (about 15%) of their surplus thermal energy in their exhaust (flue) gas, and gas plants primarily using the exhaust gases, while nuclear plants have to fully use their condensers for this.
Working principle of a combined cycle power plant (Legend: 1-Electric generators, 2-Steam turbine, 3-Condenser, 4-Pump, 5-Boiler/heat exchanger, 6-Gas turbine)
Each plant type has a few different possible configurations for their steam and coolant loops, with the common configuration for coal plants being that of the boiler which used for the combustion of fuel and which also contains the steam circuit loop that drives the steam turbines. Gas plants are the odd duck here, as their use of a gas rather than steam turbine in their first stage means that at least Open Circuit Gas Turbines (OCGTs) without a second stage do not have a steam circuit and thus condenser.
The OCGT configuration has a fairly low efficiency of ~30%, however, which is why the Combined Cycle Gas Turbine (
CCGT
) uses a second stage with a heat exchanger in the hot exhaust that creates a steam circuit with accompanying steam generator that boost overall efficiency to 50-60%. This means that CCGT plants also require a cooling solution akin to other thermal plants, although the fairly high thermal efficiency makes these cooling requirements relatively minor.
Since all of these thermal plants that have a steam cycle run a non-ideal Rankine cycle, their thermal efficiency is determined largely by the difference between the hot and cold sides. The effect of this can be observed by the thermal efficiency of a number of plants around the world, with the optimal condition being located near a body of cold water – such as a deep lake – with the steam temperature in the steam circuit being the other factor. This is why e.g. the molten salt fast neutron reactor at
Beloyarsk
3 (BN-600 FNR) hits a thermal efficiency of 41.5%, whereas light water reactors (LWRs) more commonly reach an efficiency of between 30-38%. This places high-temperature nuclear reactors like the BN-series in the same ballpark as today’s supercritical coal-fired plants (around 40% thermal efficiency).
Although in some situations part of the surplus thermal energy can be used via an additional heat exchanger for purposes such as district heating, the coolant water will always pass through the condenser for cooling.
Environmental Considerations
The Diablo Canyon NPP in California. This thermal plant uses once-through cooling. (Credit:
Doc Searls
)
As with any process that interacts with the environment, the intake and potential release of cooling water will affect the local environment and/or ecology in some manner. The obvious examples here are the intake of marine life such as fish and smaller creatures as well as eggs, and the release of warmer water into the marine environment in the case of direct-through cooling. These tend to be the highly contentious topics that are often leveraged against thermal plants, with a particular focus on nuclear plants
by anti-nuclear power groups
, despite nuclear plants using only slightly more cooling water than coal plants.
The French Chinon nuclear power power plant with its low-profile, forced-draft cooling towers. (Credit: EDF/Marc Mourceau)
Fact of the matter is that there are strict regulations for water release temperatures from thermal plants, with each nation and region having its own allowed increase in river water temperature, and thermal plants being throttled back if water intake temperatures exceed a certain threshold. Meanwhile, the removal of debris, plant matter and other particulates from intake water is a major concern, whether for
hydropower dam turbines
or
for thermal plants
. The goal is to prevent anything but water from entering through the
debris filters
, with biocides especially crucial in recirculating cooling systems to prevent the build-up of biofilms and fouling.
An effect of these debris filters and screens is that marine life can impinge on them, which tends to be fatal. Yet this is an issue that is common to all once-through cooling solutions, as well as hydropower dams. Environmental studies here such as for
Diablo Canyon
in California have indicated that while this is something that definitely happens, the total impact on the environment is negligible. Building cooling towers and recirculating water to massively reduce the required intake of cooling water is preferred these days, especially for new inland plants, where the use of cooling towers is increasingly more common.
Balancing The Budget
Spray ponds at the Volgodonsk Nuclear Power Station. (Credit: RIA Novosti)
When a thermal plant is located next to an ocean or large lake, it is hard to argue about a water budget being an issue. Where things get a lot less roomy in said budget is when the plant is located next to a river, since the water level in rivers tends to fluctuate, along with the water’s temperature. This is a factor which makes once-through cooling somewhat problematic, especially in the case of a hot summer with little in terms of rain.
A less obvious benefit of foregoing once-through cooling in favor of recirculating cooling is that of safety. This was illustrated recently during the Russo-Ukrainian war, when Russian forces blew up the Kakhovka dam that contained the reservoir which also provided cooling water to the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant (
ZNPP
). Because ZNNP was designed with a recirculating system containing a spray pond (a cheaper predecessor to cooling towers), its cooling pond contains a significant body of water that evaporates very slowly when the plant’s six reactors are in use. If once-through cooling had been used, the vanishing of the reservoir would have required immediate emergency procedures. Instead, the cooling pond can be refilled via alternate methods such as local wells, turning a would-be-emergency into an annoying logistical complication.
The Palo Verde Generating Station, in Arizona.
On the opposite end of the water budget spectrum, far away from the plentiful water off California’s coast, we find the arid state of Arizona, which gets over a third of its electrical power from the
Palo Verde Generating Station
. This thermal plant’s condenser is cooled using treated sewage from nearby cities, and demonstrates this way just how efficient even evaporative cooling towers can be.
If the water budget is even more constraint, the alternative to wet cooling towers is dry cooling, which uses the equivalent of radiators and forced airflow over its fins. Since this is significantly less efficient than wet (evaporative) cooling, it is not a method that is often considered for commercial thermal power plants. Even so, it has been employed in the past on prototype plants, such as the German THTR-300 nuclear reactor, and some coal plants use air-cooling, as in some of
Eskom’s coal plants
in South Africa, including some units
dating back
to the 90s.
Interestingly, there’s a growing interest in dry cooling retrofits for existing (fossil fuel-fired) plants, such as covered in a recent paper by Haibo Zhai et al. in
Applied Energy
. Although the local environment and climate has to be considered with such retrofits and new builds, the general trend would appear to be one away from once-through cooling, and towards the use of cooling methods that both use less water, and are less dependent on the whims of the environment, let alone human-made disasters. | 19 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662258",
"author": "KC8KVA",
"timestamp": "2023-07-13T14:33:40",
"content": "Where I live in West Virginia (Yes, the state in the United States that looks like it’s “giving the finger” to the everyone on the map…which I despise that reference…but yet I digress), There is the John A... | 1,760,372,235.065663 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/13/listening-in-on-a-deep-space-satellite-as-it-returns-home/ | Listening In On A Deep-Space Satellite As It Returns Home | Dan Maloney | [
"Space"
] | [
"dish",
"inferior conjunction",
"LNA",
"satellite",
"sdr",
"solar",
"STEREO-A",
"x band"
] | We’ve covered dozens of projects about getting images of Earth’s weather straight from the source. It’s not too much of a trick to download images straight from our constellation of weather satellites, but what about space weather? We’ve got satellites for that too, of course, but to get a good look at the Sun, they’re out of reach of most homebrew ground stations.
That’s about to change, though, as STEREO-A returns to our neighborhood after a 17-year absence,
making citizen science a reasonable proposition
. The STEREO mission — Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory — was launched in 2006 with a pair of satellites in heliocentric orbits. STEREO-B was lost in 2014 due to a navigational glitch, but STEREO-A has spent a lot of the intervening years watching the backside of the Sun relative to the Earth. As [Scott Tilley] explains, the satellite is now approaching inferior conjunction, where it will pass between the Earth and the Sun.
This close pass makes STEREO-A’s X-band deep-space beacon readily available to hobbyist-scale equipment, like [Scott]’s 66-cm dish antenna. The dish is mounted on an alt-az telescope mount for tracking, and sports a host of gear at the focus, like LNAs, filters, mixers, and an Ettus B200 SDR. It’s not a cheap setup, but compared to
what’s usually needed
to listen to STEREO-A, it’s a bargain. The process of demodulating and decoding the signals was a bit more involved, though, requiring not only SatDump and some custom code but also a lot of patience. The images are worth the wait, though; [Scott] shares some amazing shots of our increasingly active Sun as well as animations of recent sunspot activity.
If you’re interested in getting in on the STEREO-A action, you’d better get hopping — the satellite will only be in the neighborhood for a few more months before heading off for another pass around the back of the Sun. | 1 | 1 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662420",
"author": "The Commenter Formerly Known As Ren",
"timestamp": "2023-07-13T23:08:10",
"content": "“STEREO-B was lost in 2014 due to a navigational glitch,”So, they didn’t change the name to MONO?B^)",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
}
] | 1,760,372,234.905362 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/13/recreating-the-golden-era-of-cable-tv/ | Recreating The Golden Era Of Cable TV | Bryan Cockfield | [
"classic hacks",
"home entertainment hacks"
] | [
"90's",
"cable network",
"cable TV",
"nostalgia",
"retro",
"television",
"tv",
"tv network"
] | Fewer and fewer people have cable TV subscriptions these days, due to a combination of poor business practices by cable companies and the availability of alternatives to cable such as various streaming platforms. But before the rise of the Internet that enabled these alternatives, there was a short period of time where there were higher-quality channels, not too many commercials, a possibly rose-tinted sense of wonder, and where MTV actually played music. [Irish Craic Party] created
this vintage cable TV network
to capture this era of television history.
The hardware for this build is a Raspberry Pi driving an LCD display recovered from an old iPad. There’s a custom TV tuner which handles changing the channels and interfaces with an Apple Remote. Audio is sent through old computer speakers, and the case is built from 3D printed parts and some leftover walnut plywood to give it an era-appropriate 80s or early 90s feel.
We’ve seen other builds like this before
, but where this one really sets itself apart is in the software that handles the (television) programming.
[Irish Craic Party] has gone to great lengths here to recreate the feel of cable TV from decades ago. It has recreations of real channels like HBO, Nickelodeon, and FX including station-appropriate bumpers and commercials. It’s also synchronized to the clock so shows start on the half- or quarter-hour. Cartoons play on Saturday morning, and Nickelodeon switches to Nick-at-Nite in the evenings. There are even channels that switch to playing Christmas movies at the appropriate times, complete with Christmas-themed commercials.
The build even hosts a preview channel, one of the more challenging parts of the build. It continually scrolls through the channels and shows what’s currently playing and what will be showing shortly, complete with a commercial block at the top. For those who were around in the 90s it’s almost a perfect recreation of the experience of watching TV back then. It can even switch to a video game input when tuned to channel 3. There’s almost too much to go into in a short write-up so be sure to check the video after the break.
Thanks to [PCrozier] for the tip! | 55 | 23 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662166",
"author": "Joshua",
"timestamp": "2023-07-13T08:21:04",
"content": "I never had a cable TV connection, but a satellite receiver. And I’m glad about that.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6662249",
"author": "O... | 1,760,372,235.157116 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/12/horror-instrument-is-truly-astounding-to-listen-to/ | Horror Instrument Is Truly Astounding To Listen To | Lewin Day | [
"Musical Hacks"
] | [
"andes 25F",
"feedback organ",
"music",
"organ",
"recorder keyboard",
"recorder keyboards",
"talkbox"
] | Truly new musical instruments don’t come along every day; much of the low hanging fruit has already been taken. [Simon the Magpie] has been working on something that’s just a little innovative,
and built what he refers to as an “Incredible Horror Instrument.”
It’s all about feedback.
The build started with the Suzuki Andes 25F, a so-called “keyboard recorder.” It has the appearance of a melodion but produces flute-like sounds. [Simon]’s idea was to combine the breath-powered instrument with a talk box. If you’re unfamiliar, a talk box is designed for playing amplified guitar sounds through a tube that is placed in a player’s mouth so they can “shape” the guitar sound with their mouth.
In this role, though, the talk box’s input is hooked up to a microphone which captures the output of the Andes 25F. It then plays this back through a tube connected to the breath input of the Andes 25F. [Simon] thus created a feedback look that can effectively be “played” via the keyboard on the Andes 25F.
The audible results are eerie and haunting, and seem more than fitting for even a well-budgeted horror film. [Simon] also demonstrates some neat possibilities when combining the setup with a further feedback loop that feeds in other tones.
We’ve covered [Simon’s] work before
; it’s often noisy and always entertaining. Video after the break. | 9 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662141",
"author": "François Otis",
"timestamp": "2023-07-13T05:51:25",
"content": "Don’t bother to visit the link on his previous work, it is MEMBERS-ONLY CONTENT.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6662163",
"author": "Adobe... | 1,760,372,235.25003 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/12/picodebugger-makes-development-easier/ | PicoDebugger Makes Development Easier | Lewin Day | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"pi pico",
"picoprobe",
"Raspberry Pi Pico",
"rp2040"
] | Debugging a Raspberry Pi Pico is straightforward enough; it simply involves hooking up something up to the USB and SWD pins.
[Mark Stevens] whipped up the PicoDebugger to make this job easier than ever before.
The Raspberry Pi Foundation developed the Picoprobe system to allow a RP2040 to act as a USB to SWD and UART bridge for debugging another Pico or RP2040. The problem is that hooking it up time and time again can be fussy and frustrating.
To get around this, [Mark] whipped up the PicoDebugger board, which directly connects most of the important pins for you. Drop a Pico into the “Target” slot, and you can hook up the PicoDebugger to its UART lines with the flick of a DIP switch. The SWD pins can then also be connected via jumpers if so desired. It also features a 2×20-pin header to allow the target to be wired into other hardware as necessary.
It’s a neat project, and it certainly beats running a bird’s nest of jumper wires every time you want to debug a Pico project. Simply dropping a board in is much more desirable.
We’ve seen some other neat debug tools over the years, too.
If you’ve got your own development productivity hacks in the works, don’t hesitate to
let us know! | 12 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662112",
"author": "rclark",
"timestamp": "2023-07-13T02:41:07",
"content": "Cool. Looks like it could be very useful.That said, I believe the “Raspberry Pi Debug Probe for Pico and RP2040” is an off the shelf solution too. I have one, but haven’t had to use it … yet!https://www.... | 1,760,372,235.301768 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/12/ac-dc-converter-is-reliable-safe-and-efficient/ | AC-DC Converter Is Reliable, Safe, And Efficient | Bryan Cockfield | [
"hardware"
] | [
"flyback",
"flyback converter",
"power supply",
"smps",
"switched mode",
"switched-mode power supply",
"transformer"
] | When first starting an electronics project, it’s not uncommon to dive right in to getting the core parts of the project working. Breadboarding the project usually involves working with a benchtop power supply of some sort, but when it comes to finalizing the project the actual power supply is often glossed over. It’s not a glamorous part of a project or the part most of us want to be working with, but it’s critical to making sure projects don’t turn up with mysterious issues in the future. We can look to some others’ work to simplify this part of our projects, though,
like this power supply from [hesam.moshiri]
.
The power supply is designed around a switch-mode topology known as a flyback converter. Flyback converters work by storing electrical energy in the magnetic field of a transformer when it is switched on, and then delivering that energy to the circuit when it is switched off. By manipulating the switching frequency and turns ratios of the transformer, the circuit can have an arbitrary output voltage. In this case, it is designed to take 220V AC and convert it to 8V DC. It uses a simplified controller chip to decrease complexity and parts count, maintains galvanic isolation for safety, and is built to be as stable as possible within its 24W power limitation to eliminate any potential issues downstream.
For anyone trying to track down electrical gremlins in a project, it’s not a bad idea to take a long look at the power supply first. Any noise or unwanted behavior here is likely to cause effects especially in projects involving sensors, ADC or DAC, or other low-voltage or sensitive components. The schematic and bill of materials are available for this one as well, so anyone’s next project could use this and even make slight adjustments to change the output voltage if needed. And, if this is your first introduction to switched-mode power supplies, check out
this in-depth look at the similar buck converter circuit
to better understand what’s going on behind the scenes on these devices. | 25 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662086",
"author": "Daniel Dunn",
"timestamp": "2023-07-12T23:57:38",
"content": "This is why I don’t own a fancy regulated power supply. Most of the time, the power supply and other power handling stuff IS the hardest part of the project. If it can’t run on a cheap ISDT hobby ch... | 1,760,372,235.360526 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/12/building-a-digital-compass-with-an-arduino/ | Building A Digital Compass With An Arduino | Lewin Day | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"arduino",
"compass",
"magnetometer"
] | The magnetic compass has been a crucial navigational tool for around a thousand years or so, perhaps longer. While classical versions still work perfectly well, you can now get digital magnetometers that work in much the same way.
[mircemk] decided to whip up a digital compass to demonstrate the value of these parts.
The build uses a HMC5883L magnetometer. While this can detect magnetic fields in three axes, just one is necessary for building a device that operates akin to a traditional compass. The output of the device is read by an Arduino Nano, which is hooked up to a string of WS2812B LEDs and a small OLED display. The LEDs display the bearing of magnetic north, while the OLED screen shows the current angle between the compass’s arrow and magnetic north.
It’s a tidy build that would be a great educational resource for teaching both electronics and navigational skills. We’ve seen similar projects before,
like the hilarious Pizza Compass.
Video after the break. | 8 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662050",
"author": "spaceminions",
"timestamp": "2023-07-12T21:25:01",
"content": "Very cool! Surely it’s not accurate to two decimals?Either way, and especially if it is, something I find neat about precision measurements of the magnetic field is, they let you get your rough latit... | 1,760,372,235.408075 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/12/no-acid-open-ics-with-a-tesla-coil/ | No Acid: Open ICs With A Tesla Coil | Al Williams | [
"High Voltage",
"Parts"
] | [
"chip decap",
"chip decapping",
"tesla coil"
] | We’ve taken ICs apart before, but if they are in an epoxy package, it requires some lab gear and a lot of safety. Typically, you’ll heat the part and use fuming nitric acid (nasty stuff) in a cavity milled into the part to remove the epoxy over the die. While [100dollarhacker] doesn’t provide much detail, he appears to have
used a Tesla coil to do it
— no hot acid required.
Initial results were promising but took a long time to work. In addition, the coil gets very hot, and there is a chance of flames. The next attempt used a 3D printed cone with a fan to push the plasma over the chip. The first attempt shorted something out, and so far, each attempt eventually burns out the MOSFET driver.
We are always interested in the practical uses of Tesla coils and what’s inside ICs, so this project naturally appealed to us. We hope to see more success reported on the Hackaday.io page soon. Meanwhile, if you have a coil and an old IC lying around, try it. Maybe you’ll figure out how to make it work well and if you do, let us know.
The easiest chips to open are ceramic packages with a gold lid. Just use a hobby knife. There are
less noxious chemicals you can use
. If you want to use fuming nitric, be sure you know what you are doing and maybe
make some
yourself. | 21 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662004",
"author": "Bob",
"timestamp": "2023-07-12T18:39:29",
"content": "Pliers work just fine. CO2 laser as well.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6708147",
"author": "oni1ink",
"timestamp": "2023-12-15T09:3... | 1,760,372,235.466284 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/12/discussing-the-tastier-side-of-desktop-3d-printing/ | Discussing The Tastier Side Of Desktop 3D Printing | Tom Nardi | [
"3d Printer hacks",
"Hackaday Columns",
"Slider"
] | [
"3d printed food",
"bioprinter",
"food printer",
"Hack Chat",
"paste extruder"
] | Not long after the first desktop 3D printers were created, folks started wondering what other materials they could extrude. After all, plastic is only good for so much, and there’s plenty of other interesting types of goop that lend themselves to systematic squirting. Clay, cement, wax, solder, even biological material. The possibilities are vast, and even today, we’re still exploring new ways to utilize additive manufacturing.
Ellie Weinstein
But while most of the research has centered on the practical, there’s also been interest in the
tastier
applications of 3D printing. Being able to print edible materials offers some fascinating culinary possibilities, from producing realistic marbling in artificial steaks to creating dodecahedron candies with bespoke fillings. Unfortunately for us, the few food-safe printers that have actually hit the market haven’t exactly been intended for the DIY crowd.
That is, until now. After nearly a decade in development, Ellie Weinstein’s Cocoa Press chocolate 3D printer kit is expected to start shipping before the end of the year. Derived from the Voron 0.1 design, the kit is meant to help those with existing 3D printing experience expand their repertoire beyond plastics and into something a bit sweeter.
So who better to host our recent
3D Printing Food Hack Chat
? Ellie took the time to answer questions not just about the Cocoa Press itself, but the wider world of printing edible materials. While primarily designed for printing chocolate, with some tweaks, the hardware is capable of extruding other substances such as icing or peanut butter. It’s just a matter of getting the printers in the hands of hackers and makers, and seeing what they’ve got an appetite for.
So, why chocolate? It’s a pretty straightforward question to start the chat on, but Ellie’s answer might come as a surprise. It wasn’t due to some love of chocolate or desire to print custom sweets, at least, not entirely. She simply thought it would be an easy material to work with when she started tinkering with the initial versions of her printer back in 2014. The rationale was that it didn’t take much energy to melt, and that it would return to a solid on its own at room temperature. While true, this temperature sensitivity ended up being exactly why it was such a challenge to work with.
Cocoa Press in 2018
For example, the early version of the Cocoa Press Hackaday covered back when
Ellie showed it off at the 2018 World Maker Faire in New York
had an elaborate system of producing cold air using water-cooled Peltier units, which would blow across the chocolate as it exited the massive heating element. It worked, but it was a complex and expensive way to pump out custom chocolate shapes.
Ellie explained that the key was to experiment with different chocolate formulations, which ultimately allowed the temperature at which it melted and solidified to be fine-tuned. This, in turn, allowed the printer’s hardware to be simplified. It’s an interesting trade-off between chemistry and engineering, and though it does mean the printer needs to use its own custom chocolate blend, it’s worth it for the printer’s vastly reduced part count and cost.
For you amateur Willy Wonkas out there, the chat diverges at this point into a discussion of just what goes into common chocolaty treats. It’s not the sort of thing we often see in the Hack Chat, but it was fascinating nonetheless. We won’t dive too deeply into it here, but the short version is that the base of the chocolate (cocoa butter, palm oil, etc) determines how it responds to different temperatures and whether or not it requires tempering to achieve the desired “snap” when you bite into it. Never knew that chocolate needed to be tempered? Neither did we. Ellie says that’s why a chocolate bar that’s been melted is never quite the same afterwards, even if you try and throw it in the refrigerator to solidify it again.
In the end, Ellie says her formula for compound chocolate (containing palm oil and cocoa solids) prints at 33 °C (91 °F) and doesn’t require either a heated bed or an enclosed chamber. She does note however that there’s an upper limit on the ambient temperature of the room — with print quality falling off at temperatures beyond 26 °C (80 °F). As an interesting aside, that’s about the minimum temperature you’d be shooting for with an enclosed printer when working with common thermoplastics like PLA and PETG.
White chocolate text printed on commercially produced bars.
As for the mechanics of the extruder, that’s also gone through a few variations over the years. Early on Ellie was using air pressure to force the material out of the heated chamber, which had certain advantages, but again added complexity to the design. The final hardware, like most of the
DIY paste-extruding printers we’ve seen
, uses a motorized plunger. While a simple and reliable way to extrude thick substances like chocolate, one issue pointed out during the chat was the formation of air bubbles. The original pneumatic system handled them in stride, but with a physical plunger the bubbles need to be worked out of the material — usually by heating it up and vibrating the chamber. Several methods of automating this process were suggested, including using custom G-code or a small unbalanced motor to shake the extruder.
Chocolate printed with various infill patterns.
Speaking of custom G-code, one member of the chat asked if Ellie had experimented with pausing the printer at a given layer height so that the inside of the printed chocolate object can be accessed. She confirmed this can be done using the mechanism built into PrusaSlicer, and that she’s had good luck adding various solid and liquid fillings to objects mid-print. This naturally lead to a discussion about the various infill methods available, and how they would impact the types and amounts of fillings that would be possible via this method.
Towards the end of the chat, the discussion focused on what’s perhaps one of the least pleasant aspects of printing edible materials: clean up. Not only does the printer need to be cleaned to make sure it keeps working properly, but it’s obviously critical that everything is properly washed to prevent any bacterial growth that could compromise future prints. To that end, Ellie explained that it’s critical to limit the number of parts that actually touch the foodstuffs — on the Cocoa Press there’s only four. It’s also important that those parts be easily removable without the aid of tools, and that they be made of a food-safe material such as stainless steel.
We’d like to thank Ellie Weinstein for taking the time to talk with us about her experience developing the Cocoa Press, it’s a project we’ve been following on these pages for several years now, and we’re excited to finally see it so close to commercial release. Over the years we’ve seen several attempts at developing food printers, from both the hobby community and commercial players, but nothing managed to stick the landing. Here’s hoping that the Cocoa Press finally breaks the mold…literally and figuratively.
The Hack Chat is a weekly online chat session hosted by leading experts from all corners of the hardware hacking universe. (
There’s one tonight!
) It’s a great way for hackers connect in a fun and informal way, but if you can’t make it live, these overview posts as well as the
transcripts posted to Hackaday.io
make sure you don’t miss out. | 20 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6662009",
"author": "TG",
"timestamp": "2023-07-12T18:57:14",
"content": "The infill chocolate looks tasty. That would really add a new dimension to some foods, such an airy and strange collapsing texture",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"com... | 1,760,372,235.530549 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/12/cp-m-porting-in-a-few-hours/ | CP/M Porting In A Few Hours | Al Williams | [
"Retrocomputing"
] | [
"CP/M",
"retrocomputer",
"Z-80"
] | If you’ve ever wanted to watch someone
bring CP/M up on a new system
and you have a couple of hours to spare, check out the recorded live stream of [Poking Technology]. The system in question is an Agon Light, a modern board with a Z-80-derived CPU. If you want to get right to the porting part, you might want to skip about 31 minutes of the nearly 2.5-hour video.
The first half hour is more about the built-in assembler and the board in general. If you’ve ever ported CP/M before, you know it isn’t as hard as bootstrapping a modern operating system. There are two major things you need: A BIOS, which is specific to your machine, and a BDOS, which is usually taken verbatim from the operating system sources. Your programs typically call one of the 40 or so functions in the BDOS.
The BIOS has about 20 functions you must provide and is mainly called by the BDOS. While BDOS worries about things like directories and file structure, the BIOS simply reports information about disks and devices and lets a caller directly access those things.
Part of the task of creating a BIOS involves building data structures to describe the disk hardware. You also provide a jump table with a few common functions. For the original CP/M there were only 15 functions. CP/M 2 added two more. CP/M 3 added a whopping 16 functions. The functions fall into three broad categories: system management (like BOOT and WBOOT), device I/O (like CONIN and PUNCH), and disk I/O (like HOME, DETTRK, and READ).
As you’ll see in the video, it doesn’t take much to write the handful of functions you need. CP/M is small, software-wise. It can be
small physically
, too. While it is perhaps more satisfying to run it on period hardware, it is easier to run it on
new devices
and they don’t even have to be
very complex
, either. | 13 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6661972",
"author": "Joshua",
"timestamp": "2023-07-12T16:33:15",
"content": "Awesome! I just love CP/M – and MP/M, too!For one because it’s DOS like and because it can be completely understood by a single individual.My father used it back in the 70s on a Sharp MZ-80K, which he wrot... | 1,760,372,235.582173 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/12/youve-got-mail-sorting-and-the-usps/ | You’ve Got Mail: Sorting And The USPS | Kristina Panos | [
"Featured",
"History",
"Interest",
"Original Art",
"Slider"
] | [
"mail sorting",
"mail sorting machine",
"pigeon-hole",
"transorma",
"USPS"
] | Snail mail. You may not think much of it these days, but the mail doesn’t stop and it never has. Every type of mail from postcards and letters to large envelopes and packages of all sizes moves every single day all over the US, even though it isn’t typically delivered on Sundays. Dealing with the ever-increasing volume of physical mail has called for the invention and evolution of automatic mail sorting machines that are used by both postal facilities and businesses alike.
While mail sorting machines have grown and matured over the years, the human element of the task remains intact. As long as people type addresses, write them by hand, and/or print them in handwriting fonts by the hundreds, there will need to be humans on hand to verify at least a few of them that are
really
hard to read.
There are roughly a dozen different types of mail sorting machines in 2023. In this series, we’re going to take a look at most of them, along with many other aspects of the United States Postal Service and its history.
Don’t Pigeon-Hole Postal Employees
Pigeon-hole message boxen at Stanford University. Image via
Wikimedia Commons
As you may have guessed, mail was once sorted entirely by hand. This was accomplished using
pigeon-hole message boxes
— a system of cubbies, like you might see in a university office. On a larger scale, the task was broken into a hierarchy of sorting stations across the nation.
At a smaller station, a sorter might fill the cubbies based on delivery routes. Larger sorting stations had many more potential routes, so mail might be sorted by the state it is headed for, or if already there, the city. Mail would travel this system of sorting stations all the way down to the local post office, where sorters then delineate by delivery route.
This system has its limits — the sorter’s memory, for one, along with the length of their arms. It may be surprising, but that’s how it was done for much of the 20th century, until the first automated sorting machine —
Transorma
— was created.
Automatic for the People
While some early mechanical mail sorting equipment was realized and tested in the 1920s, the first real sorting machine was the Transorma, named so for ‘TRANsport and SORting’ plus the last names of the inventors, Marchland and Andriessen. It was built by a Dutch heavy industrial concern called Werkspoor.
The Transorma, with sorters sitting up top and bins below. Image via
The Postal Museum at the Smithsonian Institute
Transorma was the first of it’s kind — a large scale, multi-position sorting machine. The point was to assign more pigeon holes per sorter by way of of mechanical switching, and end up with ultimately much larger cubbies as a result of the magic of machinery.
First, a sorter would read the address and use a keyboard to select a routing code, which was then printed in colored ink on the front. This allowed aother sorter to route it by hand later on. The machine used the typed code to program its switches, then shuffled it off to the right bin. While the Transorma could potentially have
n
bins, most of them had either 250 or 300. There were also single-user machines that used a different type of sorting mechanism.
How It Worked
The big Transormas were two-story affairs
, with sorting stations on top and bins along the bottom. In operation, mail rode a conveyor belt from the bottom up to the sorting stations, where letters would be extracted from the belt and queued up for each sorter to add the two-digit routing code manually, by memory.
Looking down the barrel of the Transorma. Image via
The Postal Museum at the Smithsonian Institute
The code was printed at 90 degrees opposite the address on the front of the envelope. The letter was then dropped through the sorting machine and onto spinning wheels that moved it along to the bin area. Then, mechanical shutters corresponding to the routing code would open, allowing the letter to fall into the correct bin. The Transorma could sort 15,000 letters per hour, which, astonishingly, is just double the rate that sorters could do it manually.
The single-user Transormas were only one floor, with the sorter sitting at one end. Once coded, the letters rode a conveyor system that ran above the bins and dropped them into the correct bins. The first and only US post office to install a Transorma opted for the 5/300 model, which means that it supported 5 sorters and 300 total bins. The machine was launched on April 10, 1957 in a post office of Silver Spring, Maryland.
But Wait, There’s More
While the story of postal automation starts with Transorma, it certainly doesn’t end there. Stay tuned for more about various types of sorting machines, automated post offices, and advancements such as ZIP codes, OCR machines, and fully automated post offices, plus a little bit of postal trivia. | 52 | 15 | [
{
"comment_id": "6661913",
"author": "Ostracus",
"timestamp": "2023-07-12T14:33:11",
"content": "The bad handwriting was interesting.https://youtu.be/XxCha4Kez9c",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6661928",
"author": "NQ",
"timestamp": "202... | 1,760,372,235.899053 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/12/suse-take-on-red-hat-forking-rhel/ | SuSE Take On Red Hat, Forking RHEL | Jenny List | [
"Linux Hacks",
"News"
] | [
"linux",
"red hat",
"rhel",
"suse"
] | One of the Linux stories of the moment has come from Red Hat, with their ongoing efforts to make accessing the source of their Red Hat Enterprise Linux product a paid-for only process. This has caused consternation and annoyance alike, from the open source community angry at any liberties taken with the GPL, and from the community of RHEL users and customers concerned as to what it might mean for them.
Now a new player has entered the fray in the form of SuSe
, who have announced the creation of an RHEL fork with the intention of maintaining a freely-available Red Hat compatible operating system distribution.
This is good news for all who use Red Hat derived software and we expect the likes of Rocky Linux will be taking a close look at it, but it’s also a canny move from the European company as they no doubt hope to tempt away some of those commercial Red Hat customers with a promise of stability and their existing experience supporting Red Hat users through their mixed Linux support packages. We hope they’ll continue to maintain their relationship with the open source world, and that the prospect of their actions unleashing a new commercial challenge causes Red Hat to move away from the brink a little.
Need some of the backstory?
We’ve got you covered
.
The perfect header for this story comes via atzerok,
CC BY-SA 2.0
. | 18 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6661822",
"author": "YGDES",
"timestamp": "2023-07-12T11:14:10",
"content": "Now THIS move is why Free Software is not “just open source”.Who said Free Software was anti-capitalistic ? :-)",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6661840... | 1,760,372,235.785589 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/12/proper-decoupling-capacitors/ | Proper Decoupling Capacitors | Al Williams | [
"Parts",
"PCB Hacks"
] | [
"decoupling",
"decoupling capacitors",
"pcb"
] | If you’ve been building circuits for any length of time, you probably know you need decoupling capacitors to keep your circuits stable. But even though it’s a favorite technique of ours, just scattering some around your PCB and hoping for the best isn’t necessarily the best approach. If you want to dig deeper into the
why and how of decoupling
, check out [Stephen Fleeman’s] post on the topic.
It is easy to think of capacitors as open circuits at DC and short circuits at high frequencies, shunting noise to ground. But the truth is more complex than that. Stray resistance and inductance mean that your simple decoupling capacitor will have a resonant frequency. This limits the high frequency protection so you often see multiple values used in parallel to respond to different frequencies.
Because the stray resistance and inductance plays a part, you may want to use fatter traces — less resistance — and shorter runs for less inductance. Of course, you can also use power and ground planes on the PCB as a form of decoupling. At the end of the post, [Stephen] talks a little about the importance of digital and analog ground that interact in a specific way.
If you want to do some
empirical testing
, you can build a test rig and do the work. Or check with [Bil Herd] about
PCB inductance
. | 37 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "6661764",
"author": "Mathias",
"timestamp": "2023-07-12T08:54:23",
"content": "Somehow I expected the link to be a youtube video I could watch, zone out and not learn much from.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6661796",
"aut... | 1,760,372,237.741368 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/10/behold-a-diy-vr-headset-its-creator-will-never-build-again/ | Behold A DIY VR Headset Its Creator Will “Never” Build Again | Donald Papp | [
"Virtual Reality"
] | [
"diy",
"FOV",
"fresnel",
"headset",
"hmd",
"lenses",
"vr"
] | Unsatisfied with commercial VR headset options, [dragonskyrunner] did what any enterprising hacker would: gathered parts over time and ultimately made their own. Behold the
Hades Widebody (HWD)
, a DIY PC VR headset that aims for a wide field of view and even manages to integrate some face and eye tracking. (Editor’s note: link went dead in 2025.
You’ll find the Hades Widebody here
. Thanks [DragonSkyRunner] for keeping us in the loop!)
The Fresnel elements hugging the primary lenses provide a way of extending the display into the wearer’s peripheral vision.
[dragonskyrunner] is — and we quote — “NEVER building one of these again.” The reason is easily relatable to anyone who has spent a lot of time and effort creating something special: it does the job it was created for, but it also has limitations and is a lot of work. If one were to do it all over again, there would be a host of improvements and changes to consider. But one
won’t
be doing it all over again any time soon because it’s done now.
The good news is that [dragonskyrunner] made an effort to document things, so there is at least a parts list and enough details for any suitably motivated hacker to replicate the work and perhaps even put their own spin on it.
The Hades Widebody has a dual-lens arrangement and wide displays that aim to provide a wider field of view than most setups allow. There’s a main lens in front of the user’s eyes and a cut Fresnel lens providing a sort of extension to the side. [dragonskyrunner] claims that while there is certainly not a seamless transition between the lens elements, it does a better job than an
Ambilight
at providing a sense of visuals extending into the wearer’s peripheral vision.
The DIY spirit of making a piece of hardware to suit one’s own needs is exactly the sort of thing that would fit into our
2023 Cyberdeck content
, and while a headset by itself isn’t quite enough to qualify (devices must have some form of usable input and output), it just might get those creative juices flowing. | 14 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660974",
"author": "",
"timestamp": "2023-07-10T21:59:21",
"content": "The way the imgur album was instantly deleted and the creator claiming they would “never” make it again are some interesting coincidences.Not saying anything did happen, of course.",
"parent_id": null,
... | 1,760,372,238.012195 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/10/supercon-2022-joe-grand-and-the-thinnest-boombox/ | Supercon 2022: Joe Grand And The Thinnest Boombox | Maya Posch | [
"cons",
"Hackaday Columns",
"Slider"
] | [
"2022 Superconference",
"Hackaday Supercon",
"Supercon 2022"
] | Boomboxes are one of those status symbols that define the 1980s and part of the 1990s, being both a miracle of integration and the best way to share your love of music with as many people as possible. Naturally, this led Joe Grand to figure that it would make it a perfect subject for a modern take on such an iconic device. The primary inspiration for this came from a piezo speaker developed by TDK called the ‘PiezoListen’. These are piezo devices that can be less than a millimeter thick, while still claiming to reproduce a broad range of audio frequencies.
Just having these speakers is only part of the solution, of course, which led Joe down the rabbithole of not only figuring out the components that should go into the system, but also how to get it all on a single PCB and see how far one can push different solder mask colors with an appropriately boombox-like design. At its core is a Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W that runs
Mopidy
, to provide music server functionality. Also added are some RGB lighting and touch controls.
Super thin boombox, first prototype partially assembled.
Joe has been behind a decade of DEFCON badges, so he definitely knows his way around. Even so, this design was a pretty big challenge despite the many off-the-shelf parts. With power, audio and touch interface traces running across the PCB and still trying to get a clear audio signal out of the piezo speakers required some help from your friendly neighborhood PCB specialist.
Although at first glance and looking at the used proof-of-concept setup it may seem that you basically just need to glue some ICs and modules to the board and you can pop off for a cold one at the pub, the signaling requirements for the touch sensor, the presence of BGA parts that required vias to break out all their pads on multiple layers and wrangling the inevitable ground-related issues that pop up added countless hours of fun. Shortly before the final board design was to be submitted, a final grounding issue had to be resolved, but when the resulting board came back, the PCB stack-up and everything else worked fine.
A glimpse at the dark side of the world’s thinnest boombox.
That just left the issue of putting the entire board together and verify that the software stack played nice on the freshly assembled system, including the audio DAC and amplifier. Perhaps ironically, the thickest part of the boombox is the power source, which is a cheap USB powerbank. If these were to be replaced by a thin pouch cell, the boombox probably could be so thin that it’d you’d be afraid to accidentally fold it.
A brief audio demonstration is also provided in Joe’s presentation, which suggests that it can indeed make some noise, although the need to put the microphone right up to the grille does make us question the ‘boom’ part of this box somewhat. This may be welcome news to the adults at the local park, however, when those darn kids with their boomboxes shuffle or roll past again. | 4 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660895",
"author": "Steven-X",
"timestamp": "2023-07-10T17:52:52",
"content": "Seeing the powerbank made me thing of perhaps integrating an old phone into the build, as the audio source as well as power.Or one of those small Sansa MP3 players (I still use one when mowing or doing o... | 1,760,372,237.952843 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/10/software-for-satellites-hack-chat/ | Software For Satellites Hack Chat | Dan Maloney | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Slider"
] | [
"Hack Chat"
] | Join us on Wednesday, July 12 at noon Pacific for the
Software for Space Hack Chat
with Jacob Killelea!
In space, everything is harder. Hardware has to be built to withstand not only the harshest possible regimes of temperature and radiation but the rigors of launch. Power is at a premium, things that are supposed to stay cool get too hot, and things you want to keep warm freeze solid. It seems like everything you “send upstairs” has to be over-engineered compared with the stuff that stays down the gravity well.
But what about software? Yep, that needs special engineering too — after all, one little mistake, one uncaught exception, and millions or even billions of exquisitely crafted space hardware could become as useful as a brick. Jacob Killelea is an aerospace engineer who has done the rounds of a number of space concerns, and he’s worked on a number of space software projects, including a pulsed laser system with the potential for lunar orbital communications. He knows what it takes to write software that keeps space hardware ticking, and we’re excited to have him log into the Chat to talk about it.
Our Hack Chats are live community events in the
Hackaday.io Hack Chat group messaging
. This week we’ll be sitting down on Wednesday, July 12 at 12:00 PM Pacific time. If time zones have you tied up, we have a
handy time zone converter
.
[Banner image:
NASA’s GPM satellite
.] | 3 | 1 | [
{
"comment_id": "6661004",
"author": "The Commenter Formerly Known As Ren",
"timestamp": "2023-07-10T23:24:30",
"content": "A square hole in the center of that cyclone?Interesting…",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6661066",
"author": "N... | 1,760,372,237.441069 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/10/gas-powered-fly-swatter-slightly-over-engineered/ | Gas-Powered Fly Swatter Slightly Over-Engineered | Bryan Cockfield | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"dyneema",
"Fly Swatter",
"flyswatter",
"gas cylinder",
"pneumatic",
"steel"
] | Any good flyswatter ought to be able to break through a hefty piece of wood. At least, that is how [Finn] explains the design philosophy behind
this enormous, overpowered flyswatter
. Although we don’t know if everyone needs as robust a machine as this to deal with a minor annoyance like a house fly, we can certainly appreciate the over-engineered, extremely powerful (and dangerous) machine that can swat flies but also break through a two-by-four with ease.
The build comes to us in two parts, with
the first part
documenting the construction of some of the parts of the flyswatter, including the piston-driven gas cylinder. As a bit of a tangent, [Finn] first tests this part by using it to shoot lemons at pieces of plywood. After this initial testing of the gas cylinder, a cam mechanism is installed on the top, and the gas cylinder is slightly modified to pull on a piece of Dyneema rope attached to the cam. At the other end of the rope is a long metal lever with the flyswatter on the end, in this case, made out of a sheet of laser-cut plate steel.
With the addition of a few safety features, like a spring-assisted bumper to keep the flyswatter from swinging too far and hitting its operator, the machine is ready for use. It also eventually received some other upgrades as well including extra weights to prevent the flyswatter from bouncing after firing and a reinforced metal rod to hold the flyswatter after its demonstrations on various dimensional lumber destroyed it. In all likelihood, this is the largest insect-control device we’ve seen since
this microwave-powered bug zapper
. Now if you are
building an insect
… | 10 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660865",
"author": "Dan",
"timestamp": "2023-07-10T15:53:19",
"content": "Surveying the bite marks on my back, I’m forced to say I need this…",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6660869",
"author": "cromagnonlovesneanderthal",
... | 1,760,372,237.487297 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/10/jennys-daily-drivers-slackware-15/ | Jenny’s Daily Drivers: Slackware 15 | Jenny List | [
"computer hacks",
"Featured",
"Slider",
"Software Hacks"
] | [
"daily driver",
"linux",
"operating system",
"Slackware"
] | As a recent emigre from the Ubuntu Linux distribution to Manjaro, I’ve had the chance to survey the field as I chose a new distro, and I realised that there’s a whole world of operating systems out there that we all know about, but which few of us really
know
. Hence this is the start of what I hope will be a long-running series, in which I try different operating systems in my everyday life as a Hackaday writer, to find out about them and then to see whether they can deliver on the promise of giving me a stable platform on which to earn a living.
For that they need an internet connection and a web browser up-to-date enough to author Hackaday stories, as well as a decent graphics package. In addition to using the OS every day though, I’ll also be taking a look at what makes it different from all the others, what its direction and history is, and how user-friendly it is as an experience. Historical systems such as CP/M are probably out of the question as are extremely esoteric ones such as the famous TempleOS, but this still leaves plenty of choice for an operating system tourist. Join me then, as I try all the operating systems.
A Distro From The 1990s, Today
The Hackaday test PC gets its first outing.
When deciding where to start on this road, there was an obvious choice. Slackware was the first Linux-based distribution I tried back in 1995, I’m not sure which version it was , but it came to me via a magazine coverdisk. It was by no means the first OS that captured my attention as I’d been an Amiga user for quite a few years at that point, but at the moment I can’t start with AmigaOS as I don’t have nay up-to-date Amiga-compatible hardware.
July 2023 also marks the 30th anniversary for the distro making it the oldest one still in active development, so this seems the perfect month to start this series with the descendant of my first Linux distro. Slackware 15 comes as a 3.8 GB ISO file download for 64-bit computers, and my target for the distro was an old desktop PC with an AMD processor and a big-enough spinning rust hard disk which had been a high-end gaming system a little over ten years ago. Not the powerhouse it once was, but it cost me nothing and it’s adequate for my needs. Installed on a USB Flash drive the Slackware installer booted, and I was ready to go.
Lilo! lilo! It’s off to work we go! Hello old friend, I’ve not seen you for a couple of decades!
Slackware’s philosophy is stated as providing the most UNIX-like Linux distro, and to contain packages most faithful to their upstream sources without modifications. This isn’t a distro that’s trying to set itself apart with flashy desktop environments or semi-proprietary packaging systems, instead you’re getting the straightforward GNU/Linux experience from a pre-assembled distribution.
What this means in practice is that it’s a powerful and usable distro that doesn’t require a beard down to the waist to install, but it’s also a distro which expects the user to be prepared to get their hands dirty to some extent. This is immediately obvious when starting the installation, because the first requirement is to run
fdisk
and partition the destination disk. Pretty much every major distro will now have an option to let it choose the partitioning automatically for you, but Slackware users must do it for themselves. It’s not too difficult and anyone prepared to pull up fdisk’s help screens and maybe consult the web for assistance can pretty quickly make a main partition and a swap partition, but the overall feel is the same as distro installation in the 1990s.
The rest of the install is through a straightforward text-based installer which is easy enough to use, but those ’90s vibes are enhanced when it installs lilo instead of GRUB as a bootloader. I can’t remember, but I think it must be at least 20 years since I last had a machine with lilo on it. Finally it leaves me booted into my new system at the prompt, with only the root user as a login. I must create my normal everyday user myself with the adduser script, and once I’m logged in with normal-strength privileges I must type
startx
at the prompt if I want the graphical desktop. Nobody is holding my hand on my Slackware journey.
Not A Distro For The Novice
I now have a Slackware machine in front of me, and it’s a modern full-featured Linux distro so of course it does a fine job of being a daily driver. I chose the KDE desktop, and I can go straight into working on Hackaday. There’s thus little point in discussing its usability for my work as I might with some operating systems, instead it’s worth looking at the other ways I interface with my OS. What’s it like installing and updating software on a Slackware machine?
This is not the least scary message to find at the end of upgrading packages.
Just as on a Debian machine I’d reach for
apt
and on a RedHat descendant I’d reach for
rpm
, on Slackware the package management is done through
slackpkg
. Slackware packages are compressed archives containing all the necessary files in their paths ready for extraction into the filesystem, and reading up on them I was mildly alarmed as someone used to other distros to note that resolving dependency issues isn’t part of the equation.
Running
slackpkg update
refreshes the list of latest software, and the first time I ran it I had to uncomment a line in the mirrors file before it would let me do that. Then it was time for
slackpkg upgrade-all
, to upgrade everything to its latest version. I’m used to Debian, so I’d do the equivalent there on a new install with apt upgrade.
On many distros this would be a straightforward process of waiting for the packages to install and getting on with life, but here again we’re reminded that this is not a distro for the faint hearted. It casually informs me that since the kernel has updated I must rebuild my initrd and run lilo again, my machine is essentially now broken without more wizardry. It’s not impossible and a very quick web search reveals
/usr/share/mkinitrd/mkinitrd_command_generator.sh
which generates the commands to fix it, but it’s not a task for everyone.
My brief sojourn into Slackware nearly three decades after I first tried it has been a success, and I have a machine with a distro that’s the match for any other. It’s been an odd experience though, one of traveling back to the 1990s when Linux distro installs required patience and some level of work. As a daily driver it’s without fault, indeed I’ve written most of this piece on it, but for anyone else perhaps I’d describe it for those unafraid of diving into their distro rather than simply using it. Give it a try, you’ll come away learning stuff. | 53 | 25 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660832",
"author": "rclark",
"timestamp": "2023-07-10T14:11:57",
"content": "“back to the 1990s when Linux distro installs required patience and some level of work”I remember downloading Slack on a stack of floppies (25?) back then. I remember it was a ‘Yessss’ moment when the com... | 1,760,372,237.908051 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/10/kim-1-memory-problem-resolved/ | Kim-1: Memory Problem Resolved | Al Williams | [
"Repair Hacks",
"Retrocomputing"
] | [
"6502",
"kim-1",
"MOS",
"retrocomputer"
] | At the very start of the personal computer revolution, there were relatively inexpensive boards with little more than a CPU, some memory, a display, and switches or a keypad. Some of these had expansion ports meant to allow you to build up, and some were just “trainers” to learn about computers. While you could argue that the Altair fell into this category, it had a case and a proper bus. The computers we are thinking about were usually just on a single board and — with luck — had an edge connector for expansion. Perhaps the most famous of these was the
KIM-1
and [Old VCR] shows us how he brought one back to life.
These were highly popular mainly because of the low price of $245 back in 1976. For that price you got a calculator-style keyboard and LED display, 1K of RAM, and 2K of ROM. [Old VCR] has several and noticed that one was developing memory problems.
Some basic troubleshooting found the culprit to be the memory chip at U10 on the schematic. Piggybacking a good RAM chip proved the chip was at fault, and, of course, there was no socket, so surgery ensued!
On the old boards, it is hard to remove a part without damaging traces and this was no exception. Silver conductive ink fixed the trace, but the repair was unsuccessful. That’s when the diagnostic board — a design from [Dwight Elvey] makes an appearance.
Spoiler alert: the culprit was a solder bridge, also easy to do on these old boards. Removing the short put the old computer back in tip-top shape.
If you want
your own KIM-1
, you can do a modern build one pretty easily and save most of the $5,000 or so that a real one would cost. Or
grab an Arduino
. If you do the latter, you can also make it into
a passable COSMAC Elf
. | 20 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660801",
"author": "Owlman",
"timestamp": "2023-07-10T11:41:05",
"content": "“… and save most of the $5,000 or so that a real one would cost.”Really? I have one sitting in a drawer, complete with manuals and all sorts of stuff. Good job I never gave it away as I intended to! I wond... | 1,760,372,238.073147 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/10/the-thinkpad-you-all-wish-you-had-with-a-brain-thats-not-ancient/ | The ThinkPad You All Wish You Had, With A Brain That’s Not Ancient | Jenny List | [
"laptops hacks",
"Retrocomputing"
] | [
"Framework laptop",
"IBM Thinkpad",
"Thinkpad 701c"
] | An IBM (or, later, Lenovo) ThinkPad is a popular choice in our community. They’re prized for their rugged design, longevity, and good software support. Over the many years that the line has been available, there have been a few models which have captured the attention more than others, and among those, probably the most sought-after is the ThinkPad 701c. It would be an unremarkable mid-1990s 486 laptop were it not for the party piece of that flip-out butterfly keyboard (see video, below). [Karl Buchka] has one that’s profoundly dead, and rather than use it as a novelty paperweight,
he’s giving it a new lease of life with a Framework motherboard
.
This is very much a work in progress, so there will be plenty more to come, but so far, he’s taken the display panel from an iPad and made it work with the Framework board, and designed an entirely new lower case for the Thinkpad. This will hold the Framework board with its USB-C ports at the edge, so in the place of its USB-based expansion modules, he’s made a custom external port replicator. Meanwhile, a Teensy handles that unique keyboard. We’re told that the design files will all eventually be put online should anyone else want to try.
We’d normally be slightly upset were someone to butcher something as unusual as a 701c, however, in thic ase we can see that it turns a broken computer into one that should see quite a bit of use. We can’t help envying him this project.
Understandably not many 701c owners have dived inside their machines, but we have previously brought you
a contemporary processor upgrade
. If you’ve never seen the 701c’s keyboard — or you just want to see it again — here you go:
Thanks [Ł. Juszczak] for the tip. | 26 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660775",
"author": "C",
"timestamp": "2023-07-10T08:58:36",
"content": "Amazing! I love the keyboard!I’m currently building a laptop too, but I’m using a mechanical keyboard which is not foldable. I’m using a NUC-like motherboard as a base and use a 8 inch Samsung tablet display. I... | 1,760,372,237.807014 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/11/high-school-student-builds-inexpensive-centrifuge/ | High School Student Builds Inexpensive Centrifuge | Bryan Cockfield | [
"chemistry hacks"
] | [
"centrifuge",
"equipment",
"lab",
"microcentrifuge",
"student",
"tools"
] | Having a chemistry lab fully stocked with all necessary equipment is the dream of students, teachers, and professors alike, but a lot of that equipment can be prohibitively expensive. Even in universities, labs are often left using old or worn-out equipment due to cost. So one could imagine that in high schools this is even a more pronounced problem. High school student [Aidan Miller] has
solved this problem with at least one piece of lab equipment
, bringing the cost for a centrifuge down to around $10 USD.
Part of the savings is due to the fact that [Aidan] has put together a smaller sized centrifuge, known as a micro-centrifuge. The function is still the same though, spinning samples to separate them out the constituents by weight. The 3D printed base of the centrifuge houses a switch and 9 V battery and also holds a small motor which spins the rotor. The rotor itself is also 3D printed, and needed to be a very specific shape to ensure that it could hold the samples properly at high RPM and maintain reasonable balance while spinning.
As a project it’s fairly simple and straightforward to build, but the more impressive thing here is how much it brings down the cost of lab equipment especially for high school labs that might otherwise struggle for funding. Of course it requires the use of a 3D printer but the costs of those have been coming down significantly as well, especially for things like
this portable 3D printer
which was also built by a high school student. | 31 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "6661701",
"author": "haaad",
"timestamp": "2023-07-12T06:31:57",
"content": "Points for being inventor – but there should not be patting in back and no words “good job”…Before using it – it should go thro some construction/safety scrutiny.It is intended for chemical classes – you do... | 1,760,372,237.554722 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/11/phone-thermal-cameras-get-open-source-desktop-tools/ | Phone Thermal Cameras Get Open Source Desktop Tools | Tom Nardi | [
"Software Hacks",
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"open source software",
"thermal camera"
] | Whenever phone-based thermal cameras are brought up here on Hackaday, we inevitably receive some comments about how they’re a bad investment compared to a standalone unit. Sure they might be cheaper, but what happens in a couple years when the app stops working and the manufacturer no longer feels like keeping it updated?
It’s a valid concern, and if we’re honest, we don’t like the idea of relying on some shady proprietary app just to use the camera in the first place. Which is why we’re so excited to see open source software being developed that allows you to use these (relatively) inexpensive cameras on your computer. [Les Wright] recently sent word that
he’s been working on a project called PyThermalCamera
which specifically targets the TOPDON TC001, which in turn is based on a project called
P2Pro-Viewer developed by LeoDJ
for the InfiRay P2 Pro.
Readers may recall
we posted a review of the P2 Pro last month
, and while the compact hardware was very impressive, the official Android software lacked a certain degree of polish. While these projects won’t help you on the mobile front in their current form, it’s good to know there’s at least a viable “Plan B” if you’re unwilling or unable to use the software provided from the manufacturer. Naturally this also opens up a lot of new possibilities for the camera, as being connected to a proper Linux box means you can do all sorts of interesting things with the video feed.
The two video feeds on the left are combined to produce the final thermal image.
Speaking of the video feed, we should say that both of these projects were born out of a
reverse engineering effort by members of the EEVblog forums
. They figured out early on that the InfiRay (and other similar models) were picked up as a standard USB video device by Linux, and that they provided two video streams: one being a B&W feed from the camera where the relative temperature is used as luminance, and the other containing the raw thermal data cleverly encoded into a green-tinted video. With a little poking they found an FFmpeg one liner that would combine the two streams, which provided the basis for much of the future work.
In the video below, you can see the review [Les] produced for the TOPDON TC001, which includes a demonstration of both the official Windows software and his homebrew alternative running on the Raspberry Pi. Here’s hoping these projects inspire others to join in the effort to produce flexible open source tools that not only unlock the impressive capabilities of these new thermal cameras but save us from having to install
yet another
smartphone application just to use a device we purchased. | 14 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6661558",
"author": "The Commenter Formerly Known As Ren",
"timestamp": "2023-07-12T02:28:53",
"content": "Without Spyware apps, buying one of these just went up in probability.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6661598",
... | 1,760,372,238.131567 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/11/tearing-down-and-improving-a-professional-power-supply/ | Tearing Down And Improving A Professional Power Supply | Al Williams | [
"Repair Hacks",
"Teardown"
] | [
"HP",
"power supply",
"teardown"
] | [OZ2CPU] has an
HP power supply
that is about 30 years old. It looks brand new, though, and has three outputs and includes tracking for the adjustable positive and negative supply. After a quick demo of the unit’s features, he tears it all down so we can see inside. You can catch the video below.
Some similar supplies offer a 10-turn adjustment knob, but this one doesn’t. Inside is a beefy transformer and quite a few through-hole components. There was room to change the main adjusted pot to a 10-turn unit, so he made the mod.
Testing was mostly good, but there was some oscillation in certain situations. To tackle that, he worked through it with another unit in the second video below. The new unit had the same behavior. He probed around and found that one capacitor leaked electrolyte, which didn’t fix the problem.
Analyzing the schematic was more productive. A feedback transistor had excessive gain at high frequency. This appears to be a design problem, and adding a resistor into the feedback loop makes it work as expected.
It is hard to go wrong with a name-brand power supply, but, as this shows, they are not always perfect. You can, of course,
roll your own
. You can make them
very fancy
if you like. | 11 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6661457",
"author": "The Commenter Formerly Known As Ren",
"timestamp": "2023-07-11T23:14:35",
"content": "I would like to mention Gerry Sweeney’s blog for repairing an HP E3634A power supply.https://gerrysweeney.com/hpagilent-e3634a-power-supply-teardown-repair/",
"parent_id": ... | 1,760,372,238.180429 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/11/an-open-source-antikythera-mechanism/ | An Open-Source Antikythera Mechanism | Bryan Cockfield | [
"3d Printer hacks"
] | [
"3d printer",
"antikythera",
"laser cutter",
"recreation",
"replica"
] | When the Antikythera Mechanism was first discovered, it wasn’t viewed as the wonder that we know it today. Originally the divers who found the device and the first scientists to look at it wrote it off as an astrolabe or other some other common type of clock. It wasn’t until decades later when another set of scientists x-rayed the device and surveyed more of the shipwreck where it was found that it began to become one of the more important archaeological discoveries in history. There have been plenty of attempts to recreate this device, and
this replica recreates the mechanisms of the original
but is altered so it can be built in a modern workshop.
The build, which took the creators several years of research and development to complete, started off with the known gear schemes found on the original device. However, the group wanted to make it with modern technology including 3D printers and laser cutters, so although they worked from an understanding of the original 2000-year-old device there are some upgrades and changes to accommodate those who want to build this in a modern workshop. Gears made from plastic instead of brass have more friction, which needed to be reduced by building custom bearings machined out of brass. And to complete the machine a number of enclosures of various styles are available to use as well.
Additionally, all of the designs and schematics for this build are open source for anyone to build or modify as they would like, although the group putting this together does plan to sell various parts for this as well. There will be some issues with use, as they point out, since the ancient Greeks didn’t have a full enough understanding of cosmology to get a machine like this to stay accurate for two thousand years, but it’s a fascinating build nonetheless. Reasearchers are still discovering new things about this device too,
including the recent find of an earliest possible start date for the machine
. | 21 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6661323",
"author": "n0body",
"timestamp": "2023-07-11T20:08:58",
"content": "if it isnt hand made by clickspring, i dont want it.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6661346",
"author": "Chris Muncy",
"timestamp":... | 1,760,372,238.334788 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/11/linux-device-drivers-in-only-a-few-years/ | Linux Device Drivers In Only A Few Years | Al Williams | [
"Linux Hacks",
"Software Development"
] | [
"kernel driver",
"linux device driver"
] | [Johannes 4GNU_Linux] has been filming
a video series on how to write Linux device drivers
for a couple of years now, but luckily, you won’t need that long to watch them or to create your own driver. He’s added some recent videos to the series, like the one below, but might want to rewind a few years and start at the beginning.
If you build your own hardware for Linux, you’ll probably eventually want to write a driver which runs as a privileged program. While there are many things you can do in user space, for the ultimate control and performance, you can’t beat a driver.
One problem, though, is that drivers can really crash your system in a big way. In the old days, it was common to have a dedicated system for driver development. Today, for many drivers, you can get away with running a virtual machine that you can crash and reload without much trouble.
The videos cover diverse topics like interrupts, completions, polling, and threads. He even uses a Raspberry Pi, which will be very useful for many embedded projects. Of course, the trend these days is to have one driver — like the USB driver — and have it provide user-space access so that everyone doesn’t have to write their own drivers. But, as usual, that only goes so far.
We aren’t sure how many more videos there will be, but if you make it through the first 31, maybe more will be waiting for you. It has been a while since we looked at
SPI drivers in Linux
. As an example of why you might want to roll your own, consider
a custom FPGA driver
. | 10 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6661411",
"author": "Todd3465",
"timestamp": "2023-07-11T22:03:09",
"content": "any reccomends on reading material source would be appreciated!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6661439",
"author": "Kirby",
"time... | 1,760,372,238.270944 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/11/retrotechtacular-better-living-through-a-bombs/ | Retrotechtacular: Better Living Through A-Bombs | Al Williams | [
"History",
"Retrotechtacular",
"Slider"
] | [
"abomb",
"atomic bomb",
"nuclear",
"project plowshare"
] | Usually, if you are listening to people debate about nuclear issues, it is one of two topics: how to deal with nuclear weapon stockpiles or if we want nuclear power plants in our backyard. But there was a time when the US and the USSR had more peaceful plans for nuclear bombs. While peaceful plans for nuclear bombs might sound like an oxymoron, there was somewhat of a craze for all things nuclear at some point, and it wasn’t clear that nuclear power and explosives wouldn’t take over many industries as the transistor did, or the vacuum tube before it.
You may have heard about Project (or Operation) Plowshare, the US effort to find a peaceful use for all those atom bombs. The Atomic Energy Commission video below touts the benefits “for all nations.” What benefits? Mostly moving earth, including widening the Panama Canal or creating a new canal, cutting highways through mountains, assisting mining and natural gas production, and creating an artificial harbor. There was also talk of using atomic blasts to create new materials and, of course, furthering the study of the atom.
The Lawrence Livermore lab also commissioned a film about a part of the project that you can watch below (You might think it is the wrong video until you get about three minutes in.) If nothing else, there is some great video of vintage test equipment in the lab footage.
So What Really Happened?
You might think that nothing came of this. After all, blasting nukes in harbors and mines would leave a messy radiation field behind. But there were 27 test blasts, some of which used more than one bomb, between 1961 and 1973. Most of the devices were fairly small, but at least one was over 100 kilotons. For reference, the bombs used in Japan were about 16 kilotons and 21 kilotons.
As you might expect, some of these blasts didn’t go well. One test blast vented radioactive steam over a press gallery full of reporters. A later blast threw up a huge radioactive dust cloud 12,000 feet into the air that started heading east.
One reason stimulating oil and gas production was attractive is because oil and gas are sometimes radioactive naturally, so processing already considers that.
Meanwhile, in Moscow
This wasn’t just an American thing. The USSR had the typically named “Nuclear Explosions for the National Economy” program with similar aims. Since their original position was to ban all testing, they were a little late to the party, starting their program in the mid-1960s.
However, they made up for it with 156 explosions up through 1989. That includes six actual uses that were not considered tests, including capping errant gas wells. They also had mishaps. One explosion was supposed to unearth diamond-rich ore, but the results were disappointing, and water in the area was polluted with plutonium. Other explosions vented radioactive steam, and monitors in Japan and the United States were able to detect some of the radioactivity.
You can find
a US report about the Russian program
that includes some historical background on Plowshare online.
Aftermath
While we are always fans of futuristic tech, we are happy our next freeway won’t be excavated with an atom bomb. Of course, a common excavation project in the 1960s was, in fact, a
backyard bomb shelter
, so there would have been some irony in using bombs to dig bomb shelters.
The nuclear craze wasn’t just limited to digging and mining, however. Even Ford showed off a concept for a
nuclear-powered car
in 1958. And we talked more about the science behind
capping oil wells with nukes
if you would like to find out more. | 42 | 13 | [
{
"comment_id": "6661241",
"author": "the_3d6",
"timestamp": "2023-07-11T17:12:50",
"content": "Nowadays nuclear debate is mostly about whether nuclear bomb will be used by russia and whether a conventional weapons response is adequate in case of a single tactical nuke",
"parent_id": null,
"... | 1,760,372,238.425143 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/11/reverse-engineering-helps-typesetting-machine-punch-paper-tape-again/ | Reverse-Engineering Helps Typesetting Machine Punch Paper Tape Again | Dan Maloney | [
"Retrocomputing",
"Reverse Engineering"
] | [
"Linotype",
"paper tape",
"PLD",
"retrocomputing",
"typesetter"
] | [Scott M. Baker] wants a paper tape punch for his retrocomputer collection. That’s fine with us, we don’t judge. In fact, these electromechanical peripherals from the past have a lot going for them, especially the noise. But alas, such things are a little hard to come by these days, and rolling one from scratch would be a difficult proposition indeed. What to do?
Luckily, we live in the future, and eBay holds all sorts of wonders, including
these typesetter keyboards from the 1970s
, which [Scott] promptly reverse-engineered. We’ll get to the details in a minute, but first, can we just take a moment to think about the workflow these things were part of? These aren’t terminals — they lack any kind of IO apart from the punched paper tape they spewed out. The operator’s job was to punch in copy without any kind of feedback that they were hitting the right keys, and just sent the paper tap record of the session off to the typesetting machines. And you think your job sucks.
To give this thing an interface, [Scott] first had to revive the power supply, whose capacitors had seen sunnier days. With that out of the way, he set about understanding the CPU-less machine by analyzing its 7400-series logic, as well as planning how to make the native 6-bit output into a more manageable 8-bit. Thankfully, the tape punch already had solenoids for the top two bits, but finding a way to drive them wasn’t trivial.
The solution was to bypass a buffer so that the bits for the desired character can be set with a Raspberry Pi and an ATF22V10 programmable logic device. That’s enough to force the punch to do its thing; actually getting it to talk to something else, perhaps even
[Scott]’s Heathkit H-8 computer
. | 15 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6661249",
"author": "Observer",
"timestamp": "2023-07-11T17:52:29",
"content": "Where do you buy the (blank) paper tape? Anyone still making that stuff?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6661256",
"author": "cliff",
... | 1,760,372,238.664155 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/11/displayport-a-better-video-interface/ | DisplayPort: A Better Video Interface | Arya Voronova | [
"Featured",
"hardware",
"Interest",
"Original Art",
"Slider"
] | [
"computer",
"display",
"display port",
"hdmi",
"monitor",
"standards",
"video"
] | Over the years, we’ve seen a good number of interfaces used for computer monitors, TVs, LCD panels and other all-things-display purposes. We’ve lived through VGA and the large variety of analog interfaces that preceded it, then DVI, HDMI, and at some point, we’ve started getting devices with DisplayPort support. So you might think it’s more of the same. However, I’d like to tell you that you probably should pay more attention to DisplayPort – it’s an interface powerful in a way that we haven’t seen before.
By [Belkin+Abisys],
CC BY-SA 3.0
The
DisplayPort (shortened as DP)
interface was explicitly designed to be a successor to VGA and DVI, originating from the VESA group – an organization created by multiple computer-display-related players in technology space, which has previously brought us a number of smaller-scale computer display standards like EDID, DDC and the well-known VESA mount. Nevertheless, despite the smaller scale of previous standards, DisplayPort has since become a hit in computer display space for a number of reasons, and is more ubiquitous than you might realize.
You could put it this way: DisplayPort has all the capabilities of interfaces like HDMI, but implemented in a better way, without legacy cruft, and with a number of features that take advantage of the DisplayPort’s sturdier architecture. As a result of this, DisplayPort isn’t just in external monitors, but also laptop internal displays, USB-C port display support, docking stations, and Thunderbolt of all flavors. If you own a display-capable docking station for your laptop, be it classic style multi-pin dock or USB-C, DisplayPort is highly likely to be involved, and even your smartphone might just support DisplayPort over USB-C these days.
Video Done Right
Just like most digital interfaces nowadays, DisplayPort sends its data in packets. This might sound like a reasonable expectation, but none of the other popular video-carrying interfaces use packets in a traditional sense. VGA, DVI, HDMI and laptop panel LVDS all work with a a stream of pixels at a certain clock rate. HDMI is way more similar to VGA than it is to DP. With DisplayPort, the video is treated like any regular packetized data stream, making the interface all that much more flexible! Physically, desktop/laptop DisplayPort outputs come in two flavors: full-size DisplayPort, known for its latches that keep the cable in no matter what, and miniDisplayPort, which one would often encounter on MacBooks, ThinkPads, and port-space-constrained GPUs.
By [Jena Selle],
CC BY-SA 2.0
There are a number of cool features of DisplayPort that set it apart from all the other modern display interfaces. On the low level in particular, DisplayPort is way more flexible. For a start, unlike HDMI and VGA, DP doesn’t need a separate clock diffpair or wire. The full version of DisplayPort needs five diffpairs: four for the four lanes of the main link, and one for AUX link.
However, if you don’t need the full bandwidth that four lanes can give you, a DP link can consist of only one or two main lanes resulting in two and three diffpairs respectively, with less bandwidth but also less wiring. This is perfect for laptop and embedded applications, where DisplayPort has taken hold, and certainly beats HDMI’s “four diffpairs at all costs” requirement. The advantages don’t end here, but I’d like to note that DisplayPort is also way more hackable – of course, I’ll show you!
For more advantages, the DisplayPort sideband channel, AUX, is a great improvement over I2C, which we’ve been using as a sideband interface for VGA and HDMI. It’s a lower-speed bidirectional single-diffpair link that doesn’t just bring backwards compatibility with EDID (display identification) and DDC (display control), but is also used for DisplayPort link training communications, as well as gives developers control over a number of low-level aspects from the DP transmitter side. Audio travels over AUX too, and it’s future-proof. For instance, features like CEC can be implemented over the AUX layer, instead of the single-wire kludge that is HDMI CEC.
All of these aspects have resulted in an interface that’s pretty friendly for modern-day tech. Thunderbolt has coexisted with DisplayPort in particular — TB1 and TB2 have been using miniDisplayPort connectors that you might’ve encountered on Apple laptops, bearing the lightning bolt symbol. When it comes to TB3 and TB4, those coexist with DisplayPort on USB-C connectors, and DisplayPort is a first-class guest in the Thunderbolt ecosystem, with DisplayPort tunneling being an omnipresent feature in Thunderbolt peripherals.
By [Heavysilence],
CC0 1.0 Public Domain
Also, packetized transfers gave DisplayPort an ability to embed multiple video streams within a single link, a feature called Multi-Stream Transport (MST). Often, your GPU might have four video ports in total, but the GPU chip itself will support a larger number of displays — and if it supports MST, you can buy an MST hub and make use of those extra display outputs. Some DisplayPort monitors have an MST-enabled chip inside and have a DisplayPort output socket, which lets you chain monitors. If you’re running MacOS, however, watch out — MacOS doesn’t support MST, neither on DisplayPort outputs nor through Thunderbolt, which incapacitates extra display outputs of docking stations, for instance. This is ironic, since it makes Apple’s expensive fancy laptops not fully support expensive fancy docking stations.
Embrace, Extend, Embed
DisplayPort isn’t just for consumer-use monitors, however — remember the flexibility about number of lanes? This alone is a big win for DisplayPort when it comes to internal connectivity, and, considering the sheer number of features already making it embedding-friendly and low-power, the embedded DisplayPort standard (eDP) was developed, compatible with DP in almost every aspect. If you have a laptop or an iPad, it’s highly likely to be using eDP under the hood – in fact, the first time we mentioned eDP over on Hackaday, was
when someone reused high-res iPad displays
by making a passthrough breakout board with a desktop eDP socket. Yes, with DisplayPort, it’s this easy to reuse laptop and tablet displays – no converter chips, no bulky adapters, at most you will need a backlight driver.
eDP came in handy right as we started pushing against the limits of FPD-Link, which you might have heard called LVDS in the laptop panel space. Ever since mid-2010s, you’ll be hard pressed to find any newly designed laptop that still has an LVDS panel, and nowadays it’s all eDP. The advantage is noticeable – what LVDS needs six or eight diffpairs for, eDP can do with two or three, letting designers use cheaper wiring and freeing up PCB space, and enabling extremely high resolution displays with just four pairs. Unlike classic LVDS implementation laptops which aren’t required to use I2C for EDID purposes, the AUX channel provides EDID for free – which also might mean that your laptop might just work if you are to plug in a display with a higher or lower than factory resolution; something that isn’t a guarantee with LVDS.
Oh, and all this flexibility didn’t just help with laptop displays – it also made DisplayPort a perfect match for the video backbone of USB-C, to the point where, if you see a USB-C dock with any kind of video output connector, you can basically be sure that the video output capability is powered by DisplayPort. We will talk more later about the DisplayPort altmode in way more depth in the next weeks. Until then, I’ll note that all those strengths of DisplayPort, undoubtedly, contributed to
the HDMI altmode dying out
– especially the ability to run an extra USB3 link alongside DisplayPort through the same USB-C cable. I’d like to assure you, however, that the HDMI altmode dying out is a win for us all.
Plus, It’s Not HDMI
Another large advantage of DisplayPort is that it’s not HDMI. We’ve all gotten used to HDMI, but if you’ve been lurking in related tech discussions, you’ll know that HDMI has got a few nasty aspects to it. The reason is fundamental – HDMI is backed by media interests vested in things like home theater and TV, as opposed to the personal computing field where the VESA group comes from. The HDMI group claims to value interoperability when, say,
protesting against the sale of certain products
, but the recent
HDMI 2.1 debacle
has shown us that it isn’t truly a focus of theirs. My observation so far has been that the HDMI group is
averse to competition,
marketing and branding considerations are significant driving forces in their decisionmaking, and so is extracting per-device royalties from manufacturers –
steep for players small and large alike.
Bringing a good product appears to be secondary.
Neither DP nor HDMI standards are openly available — however, HDMI is restricted way more NDA-wise, to the point where AMD is
unable to implement features like FreeSync
and
higher resolutions
in their open-source Linux drivers specifically in HDMI; DisplayPort isn’t burdened to such an extent. When it comes to devices we buy, especially from a hacker viewpoint,
certain HDMI certification requirements
may bring us worse products when they’re included. A carefully shaped money-backed lever over the market is absolutely part of reason you never see DisplayPort inputs on consumer TVs, where HDMI group reigns supreme, even if the TV might use DisplayPort internally for the display panel connection.
By [Pittigrilli],
CC BY-SA 4.0
Oh, and given all these, it should be no surprise to read that HDMI isn’t hacker-friendly either — the HDMI group is
known to strongarm chip manufacturers
into requiring HDMI IC and devboard buyers to cough up the HDMI adopter fee first – if you’re not in the club, you don’t even get to play with a devboard.
Sure, the Raspberry Pi CM4 might have two HDMI links exposed, but if you aren’t careful while marketing your board or the product it goes in,
you’re in legal limbo at best
— DisplayPort has no such issue. That cool
$10 open-source HDMI capture card
we covered a few months ago? If you want to manufacture and sell them, you better talk to a competent lawyer first, and lawyers savvy in HDMI licensing issues aren’t quite commonplace – putting this idea out of reach for a hobbyist who just wants to order a few open-source boards and sell them to others.
If you see a DisplayPort interface on your board where you’d usually expect HDMI, that might just be because the company decided to avoid HDMI’s per-device royalties, and do firmly believe that this is a good thing. Consider this – if your monitor has HDMI, but your GPU or laptop has DisplayPort, you’re way better off than you might expect, for a very interesting reason.
The Shapeshifting Interface
When it comes to DisplayPort connectors on our GPUs and laptops, there’s an even cooler thing you can do – switch it into HDMI compatibility mode, a feature called DP++. All you need is a dongle that has a logic level shifter inside so that the signals are re-shaped as needed, presents those signals on a HDMI connector, and shorts two pins on the DisplayPort connector, signaling the GPU to do a mode switch. Oh, and if you’re wondering how AUX could be compatible with I2C in case of DP++ – the GPU puts an I2C bus on the AUX pins instead. We buy these dongles as DisplayPort to HDMI converters, but in reality, the dongle doesn’t do much on its own, mostly telling the GPU to start outputting HDMI – it’s cheap, efficient and has low power consumption as a side effect.
By [PantheraLeo1359531],
CC BY 4.0
As a result, you can get a desktop/laptop DisplayPort to HDMI adapter for $3, and the reason for that is that it likely costs 50 cents to manufacture. HDMI can’t do that – HDMI to DP port converts must be active, they’re less ubiquitous, and more expensive as a result. On the other hand, if you ever need active DP to HDMI conversion specifically for whatever reason, it can be tricky to find it among the sea of passive adapters- though, still not impossible, as DisplayPort to HDMI active conversion chips are actively being made for embedded use and therefore more available. All in all, if you have a DisplayPort output, you can easily get to HDMI; HDMI to DisplayPort isn’t as rosy.
As you might see now, DisplayPort is a friendly interface, perhaps way friendlier than you might have expected! Since its introduction, Intel and AMD have made big bets on DisplayPort – and now, it’s basically a staple of portable devices, even if you don’t see a DisplayPort connector on the outside. Not even talking about eDP or the DP altmode – nowadays, even for a typical HDMI connector on your modern-day laptop, the backbone is DP, or a lower-level interface like Intel and AMD’s DDI interfaces tailored towards producing DP first and foremost, with HDMI being a bit of a second-class citizen. After all, DisplayPort has enough advantages to deserve such first-class treatment.
Now, these are mostly consumer-facing benefits of DisplayPort, but I hope that they can give you insights on what makes modern DisplayPort tick. Next time, I’d like to show you all the new things that a hacker can get out of DisplayPort – more in-depth about eDP aka embedded DisplayPort, a bit of insight into the AUX channel, designing our own PCBs with DisplayPort links, and some of the intricacies of cabling. | 79 | 26 | [
{
"comment_id": "6661188",
"author": "arcdoom",
"timestamp": "2023-07-11T14:03:21",
"content": "If you’re going to talk about the merits of the protocol then you probably shouldn’t use a pun on a saying used by a particularly large company famous for killing products after supposedly supporting it."... | 1,760,372,239.159095 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/11/the-demoscene-now-an-irreplaceable-piece-of-cultural-heritage/ | The Demoscene, Now An Irreplaceable Piece Of Cultural Heritage | Jenny List | [
"Art"
] | [
"Culture",
"demoscene",
"Netherlands"
] | Break out your tuxedo or your evening gown, we’re going to take in some highbrow culture. A night at the opera perhaps, some Tchaikovsky from the symphony orchestra, or maybe a bit of Shakespeare? No, we’re going to a demo party, because the demoscene is the latest art form to be accepted as officially a
part of the national cultural heritage of the Netherlands
. This builds on successes adding the scene to the cultural heritage registers of Finland, Germany, and Poland, and should provide a boost to other bids in countries such as Switzerland and eventual UNESCO world acceptance.
It’s all very cool that one of our wider community’s art forms is at last being taken seriously rather than being dismissed by the establishment, because along with greater recognition comes other benefits. Sadly we don’t expect any cities to shell out for a demo auditorium next to the shiny new opera house any time soon, but we can see that it could be used to the benefit of for example a hackerspace chasing grants. meanwhile, feast your eyes on a bit of cultural heritage
courtesy of the Dutch Centre For Intangible Cultural Heritage
(Dutch language,
English translation
).
Not sure what the demo scene is?
We’ve taken you to a demoparty before
.
Header image: People Celebrating Evoke 2019 –
Foto Darya Gulyamova | 21 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "6661146",
"author": "dave",
"timestamp": "2023-07-11T11:28:23",
"content": "Nothing to do with Finland/Scando/Germany/Sweden, but I don’t think anything will ever beat the the-then internet excitement build-up on the News Groups alt.rec.ibm.pc.demos to the release of Future Crew’s... | 1,760,372,239.030067 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/11/soviet-era-pong-console-is-easy-to-repair/ | Soviet-EraPongConsole Is Easy To Repair | Robin Kearey | [
"Games",
"Retrocomputing"
] | [
"elektronika",
"pong",
"Soviet electronics"
] | Many early home video game consoles were developed by American and Japanese companies: think Nintendo, Commodore, and Atari. But on the other side of the Iron Curtain, which was still very much in place in the 1980s, an entirely separate industry was built on names like Tesla and Elektronika. As a resident of the republic of Georgia, [Thomas] over at
Workshop Nation
has built up a sizeable collection of such Soviet-era hardware. A while back, he stumbled upon an Elektronika Video Sport 3, a 1990-vintage
Pong
-like video game console made in the USSR, and made
a delightful video that shows him bringing it back to life
.
Like its Western counterparts, the Video Sport 3 is built around a dedicated chip, in this case a K145IK17. This is a Soviet clone of the GI AY-3-8500 that powered nearly every TV
Pong
console in the West, allowing it to run several variations of
Pong
as well as a simple target shooting game. Interestingly, the Video Sport 3 also has a “test” mode in which it outputs a test signal to help you adjust your TV settings — quite useful in the days of analog CRTs. It also came with a comprehensive user manual, as well as full schematics to help you repair it in case anything breaks.
[Thomas]’s device didn’t immediately work, which is why he opened it up and tried to find any errors. The main board he found inside was a beautifully hand-made, single-layer board with around a dozen chips and lots of discrete components. Nothing seemed obviously broken, but [Thomas] decided to replace a few electrolytic capacitors as a precaution. This turned out to be enough to get the console working again — dodgy caps truly are a universal problem with older hardware.
A small Elektronika black-and-white TV that [Thomas] found earlier forms a perfect complement to the Video Sport 3. Together, they give us a glimpse into what a typical video game setup may have looked like in an early 1990s Soviet home. In fact, the Eastern Bloc supplied
a reasonably wide selection of home computers
, although not many people could actually buy them. Some
truly bizarre machines
were also produced for professional users. | 16 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6661109",
"author": "Andrew",
"timestamp": "2023-07-11T08:48:25",
"content": "In Soviet Russia, you repair Pong!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6661116",
"author": "Scarlett",
"timestamp": "2023-07-11T09:00:01... | 1,760,372,238.783515 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/10/microlisp-lisp-for-microcontrollers-now-has-lisp-based-arm-assembler/ | MicroLisp: Lisp For Microcontrollers Now Has Lisp-Based ARM Assembler | Maya Posch | [
"Microcontrollers",
"Software Development"
] | [
"arm",
"microcontroller",
"ulisp"
] | In a way it feels somewhat silly to market a version of Lisp as targeting resource-constrained platforms, considering the systems it ran on back in the 1960s, but as time goes on, what would have given 1970s Big Iron a run for its money is now a sub-$5 microcontroller that you can run uLisp (MicroLisp) on. This particular project now even has
an ARM assembler that is written in Lisp
whose
source code
(
GitHub
) fits on a mere two A4-sized pages.
ULisp
currently supports five platforms, being AVR-nano (ATmega328 and similar low-cost AVRs), AVR, ARM, ESP (8266 and 32), as well as RISC-V. The purpose of this assembler is to execute native ARM instructions when running on an ARM board, since uLisp itself runs a Lisp interpreter on the platform. When executed natively like this, a considerable speed-up of the task can be expected, as illustrated by a number of
ARM assembler examples
in the documentation.
Running a Fibonacci sequence that takes 24.6 seconds with the Lisp version on an Adafruit Metro M4 is reduced to a mere 61 ms when ARM assembly is used instead. This shouldn’t be too shocking, since this assembler essentially bypasses the Lisp runtime, coming closer to what would be the performance of firmware written in e.g. C. However, it also demonstrates that with this ARM assembler it is possible to have your Lisp and still get native performance when you want it, all using Lisp code. | 12 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6661077",
"author": "Ostracus",
"timestamp": "2023-07-11T05:13:46",
"content": "” This particular project now even has an ARM assembler that is written in Lisp whose source code (GitHub) fits on a mere two A4-sized pages.”Ah, the good old days when big things came in small packages.... | 1,760,372,238.72266 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/10/suc-aims-to-replace-slack-in-five-lines-of-bash/ | Suc Aims To Replace Slack In Five Lines Of Bash | Bryan Cockfield | [
"Software Development"
] | [
"bash",
"Bash script",
"philosophy",
"software",
"unix"
] | The design philosophy of Unix is fairly straightforward. Software should do one thing as simply as possible, and do that one thing only. As a design principle this is sound advice even well outside of the realm of Unix, and indeed software in general, but that doesn’t stop modern software packages from being too large for their own good. So, if you’re tired of bloated chat programs like Slack or Mattermost with their millions of lines of code,
you might instead favor something like Simple Unix Chat (suc)
.
The idea is that suc can perform almost all modern chat functions in only five lines of Bash, supporting rich-text chat, file sharing, access control, and encryption. These five lines, though, only perform the core function of suc — which is to write text to a file on the system. Indeed, suc makes liberal use of plenty of other Unix services which do not add to the line counts, such as the use of SSH to handle authentication. It also relies on some other common Unix system features to handle things like ownership and access for the text files that host the text for the chat.
As channels are simply text files, it makes writing bots or other tools exceptionally simple. You can also easily pipe the output of commands directly into suc with one-liners that can do things like dump the output of
make
into a specific channel if compilation fails.
While it’s not likely that everyone will ditch tools like Slack to switch to something like this, it’s still an impressive demonstration of what can be done when designing around the Unix philosophy and taking advantage of system tools that already exist rather than reinventing the wheel and re-programming all of those tools into the application. Practices like this might decrease development time and increase the ease of developing cross-platform applications but
they often also produce a less than desirable user experience
. | 43 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "6661055",
"author": "The Commenter Formerly Known As Ren",
"timestamp": "2023-07-11T02:27:52",
"content": "Uh no, I’m not going to write something that will get me thrown off of Hackaday.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "666106... | 1,760,372,238.86858 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/10/the-man-whose-scopes-we-all-wanted-to-own-walter-lecroy/ | The Man Whose ‘Scopes We All Wanted To Own: Walter LeCroy | Jenny List | [
"Business"
] | [
"Digital storage oscilloscope",
"lecroy",
"Walter Legroy"
] | We’re sorry to say that back in May we missed
the passing of Walter LeCroy
, the man whose name appeared on some of the most desirable and higher-spec oscilloscopes to be found. If you’ve never used a LeCroy ‘scope then you’ll still have benefited from his work, as a pioneer of storage oscilloscopes even the more modest instruments which now grace our benches owe much to his legacy.
The linked article about his life comes from the successor to his company, and describes his early experience in scientific instrumentation and in particular in the field of high-energy physics,before the development of the first digital storage oscilloscopes. In particular it mentions the 1971 “Waveform Digitizer”,a device that used a transmission line and a series of sample-and-hold circuits to grab and digitize a sequence of readings with a single ADC. It goes on to describe the model 9400 series from the 1980s which with its successors are probably are what come to mind for many of us when thinking of a LeCroy ‘scope, the familiar big square box with integrated computer-style CRT, floppy drive, and small printer.
Here in 2023 it’s not beyond the bounds of possibility to design your own digital oscilloscope simply by pairing a fast microcontroller with an appropriately expensive ADC chip. To look back at the effort required to produce one with a high bandwidth using 16-bit microcomputer parts and 1980s silicon is to be reminded that we stand upon the shoulders of giants.
Thanks [Daniel Valuch] for the tip. | 11 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6661006",
"author": "The Commenter Formerly Known As Ren",
"timestamp": "2023-07-10T23:31:20",
"content": "I have 2 LeCroy O-scopes in the garage 100MHz digital sampling.Total cost $75",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6661025",... | 1,760,372,239.202471 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/10/toyota-makes-grand-promises-on-battery-tech/ | Toyota Makes Grand Promises On Battery Tech | Bryan Cockfield | [
"Transportation Hacks"
] | [
"car",
"electric vehicle",
"hydrogen",
"solid-state battery",
"toyota",
"transportation",
"vehicle"
] | Toyota is going through a bit of a Kodak moment right now, being that like the film giant they absolutely blundered the adoption of a revolutionary technology. In Kodak’s case it was the adoption of the digital camera which they nearly completely ignored; Toyota is now becoming similarly infamous for refusing to take part in the electric car boom, instead placing all of their faith in hybrid drivetrains and hydrogen fuel cell technologies. Whether or not Toyota can wake up in time to avoid a complete Kodak-style collapse remains to be seen, but they have been
making some amazing claims about battery technology
that is at least raising some eyebrows.
What Toyota are claiming is that they have a new
solid-state battery
, one that has a much higher energy density than current mass-produced batteries, and perhaps one that will go into their fleet of electric vehicles (whenever they start making them). Of course they haven’t released any information about these batteries which might verify these claims, and even if they do have a revolutionary technology there’s no guarantee that they will be able to scale it up, or that other EV manufacturers don’t make similar gains in between the present and the murky and uncertain future where Toyota is actually selling electric vehicles.
There are also claims that Toyota hasn’t completely dropped its interest in hydrogen, a technology which not only relies on a hydrogen-powered drivetrain to be adoped in the vehicles themselves but is also completely dependent on a currently non-existent hydrogen infrastructure. The electric grid already exists for moving energy around, and banking on hydrogen to do that instead seems a little bit like Toyota is falling for the sunk cost fallacy. But hopefully the interest in solid-state batteries is a sign that Toyota is finally starting to get with the EV times. | 125 | 23 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660926",
"author": "john A ferguson",
"timestamp": "2023-07-10T20:07:21",
"content": "What, Kodak amost completely ignored the digital camera? Didn’t they make the first one in the late ’60s?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6... | 1,760,372,239.412291 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/09/enhance-vr-immersion-by-shoehorning-an-ambilight-into-a-headset/ | Enhance VR Immersion By Shoehorning An Ambilight Into A Headset | Donald Papp | [
"LED Hacks",
"Video Hacks",
"Virtual Reality"
] | [
"ambilight",
"FOV",
"headset",
"hmd",
"rgb",
"valve index",
"video",
"vr"
] | Everyone wants a wider field of view in their VR headsets, but that’s not an easy nut to crack. [Statonwest] shows there’s a way to get at least some of the immersion benefits with a bit of simple hardware thanks to the
VR Ambilight
.
RGB strip tucked behind a diffusor panel.
A few years ago the
Ambilight
showed up as a way to spice up TV viewing by using an RGB strip mounted to the back of the TV. The RGB lighting would create a sort of ambient halo of color around the screen, but the kicker was that the colors were chosen to match what was happening on-screen, giving the impression that the screen content was spilling out into the surrounding area.
It was a neat effect that spawned
remakes and improvements
, and one day someone got the idea to combine the concept with VR headsets. [Statonwest] added a tiny Ambilight to the Valve Index, making use of the spare USB port on the front of the device which is
a nice piece of hacker-friendly design
.
The VR Ambilight puts the RGB lighting into the user’s peripheral vision, and just like the original Ambilight, the colors are chosen to match what’s happening at the edges of the on-screen content. It involves only an Arduino, some small RGB strips, and a piece of software. If you’re curious, it might make a good weekend PC VR project. You just might that stuff already hanging around in your parts bin.
If you want to add a DIY Ambilight to your TV,
that’s not too hard
. The best ones will handle
any video source
. | 6 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660763",
"author": "Then",
"timestamp": "2023-07-10T08:02:40",
"content": "Was just thinking of this after seeing a review of a AR headset with crappy limited view. But also in a decent pair this has great potential. I think we will see this in the next gen of headsets…",
"pare... | 1,760,372,239.249596 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/09/a-quick-look-at-the-hilbert-transform/ | A Quick Look At The Hilbert Transform | Al Williams | [
"Radio Hacks"
] | [
"dsp",
"Hilbert transform",
"signal processing"
] | While the Fourier transform gets all the attention, there are other transforms that engineers and mathematicians use to transform signals from one form to another. Sometimes you use a transform to make a signal more amenable to analysis. Other times, you do it because you want to manipulate it, and the transform is easier to change than the original signal. [Electroagenda] explains the
Hilbert transform
, which is often used to generate single-sideband signals.
The math behind the transformation is pretty hairy. However, if you understand the Fourier transformer, you can multiply the Fourier transform by -i sgn(ω), but that isn’t really going to help you much in a practical sense. If you don’t want to bog down in the math, skip immediately to section two of the post. That’s where it focuses more on the practical effect of the transform. You can think of the transform as a function that produces a 90 degree phase shift with a constant gain. For negative frequencies, the rotation is 90 degrees and for positive frequencies, the shift is negative.
Section 3 shows how mixing a signal with its own Hilbert transform can produce single sideband signals. Typically, a signal is transformed, and the result is multiplied by j (the square root of negative one). When you mix this with the original signal, the negative parts cancel out, while the positive frequencies reinforce each other. If you prefer, you can subtract to get the opposite effect and, thus, the opposite sideband.
There are practical concerns. You must approximate the Hilbert transform, and that will require a filter that has a delay. You’ll need an equalizing delay in the main signal so that the parts that mix together are from the same input time. It also means the phase isn’t as clean as you expect from the theoretical model. If you want to model it all in Matlab, you might find
this post enjoyable
. If you want a more ham radio take on the same material, check out
[K6JCA’s] article
on the topic, or watch [ZL2CTM’s] video on the topic below.
If you aren’t ready to swim on the deep end of the signal processing pool, maybe start with some
spreadsheets
. Once you have a good grip on how IQ can
demodulate and modulate
, you’ll have an easier time with the Hilbert transform. | 30 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660721",
"author": "David",
"timestamp": "2023-07-10T03:39:15",
"content": "I wish HaD did more stuff like this. Much more useful and interesting than seeing how somebody renovated a 50 year old piece of gear that hardly anybody ever used anyway.",
"parent_id": null,
"dept... | 1,760,372,239.478105 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/09/hackaday-links-july-9-2023/ | Hackaday Links: July 9, 2023 | Dan Maloney | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Hackaday links",
"Slider"
] | [
"cinema",
"commodore",
"demoscene",
"dlp",
"et",
"extraterrestrial",
"fireworks",
"ford",
"hackaday links",
"helicopter",
"Ingenuity",
"interstellar",
"Jezero",
"mars",
"parking brake",
"Perseverance",
"pm2.5",
"pollution",
"recall",
"retrogaming",
"rover",
"spherule",
"S... | Good news this week from Mars, where
Ingenuity
finally managed to check in with its controllers after a long silence
. The plucky helicopter went silent just after nailing the landing on its 52nd flight back on April 26, and hasn’t been heard from since. Mission planners speculated that
Ingenuity
, which needs to link to the
Perseverance
rover to transmit its data, landed in a place where terrain features were blocking line-of-sight between the two. So they weren’t overly concerned about the blackout, but still, one likes to keep in touch with such an irreplaceable asset. The silence was broken last week when
Perseverance
finally made it to higher ground, allowing the helicopter to link up and dump the data from the last flight. The goal going forward is to keep
Ingenuity
moving ahead of the rover, acting as a scout for interesting places to explore, which makes it possible that we’ll see more comms blackouts.
Ingenuity
may be more than ten-fold over the number of flights that were planned, but that doesn’t mean it’s ready for retirement quite yet.
As hackers, most of us probably bear the “fixing a hardware problem in software” mark of shame. It’s understandable, of course — a few clicks on a keyboard beats dragging out the soldering iron to replace components, or waiting for a redesigned part to print. But should car manufacturers really be doing the same thing? Apparently they are, as
Ford is now under investigation for pushing a software fix for a strictly mechanical problem
. The underlying problem, which affects a quarter-million Explorers in the US, happens when a bolt holding the rear axle breaks, potentially resulting in the driveshaft coming disconnected. The problems this could cause if it happens while the car is moving are intuitively obvious to even the least mechanically inclined. But, Ford decided to concentrate on a different failure mode — the bolt fracturing while the vehicle is parked. This could, and apparently has, led to runaway cars in driveways and parking lots, an admittedly serious problem but really only half the story. Their genius solution was not to fix the mechanical issue, but to push a software update to apply the vehicle’s electric parking brake if the driveshaft disconnects. Let that one just sink in for a bit.
We’ve got to think there’s more to this story that we don’t know, because we don’t want to live in a world where engineers can’t see the unintended consequences of such a fix. This seems to be happening already; drivers are reporting erratic behavior on fixed Explorers, which has caused at least one accident. Scotty Kilmer has some strong opinions on this in the video below — we know Scotty is an acquired taste, but he’s got a point.
We’ve been following a weird story where Harvard professor Avi Loeb speculates that he may have
recovered fragments of extraterrestrial technology from the floor of the sea
. The story goes that in January 2014, a fireball was spotted off the coast of Papua New Guinea by US Department of Defense satellites. Based on the nature of the original object’s orbit and velocity, it appeared to be of interstellar origin and was dubbed IM-1. The US Space Command confirmed that their data matched Dr. Loeb’s in 2019, and gave him the approximate location where the meteor’s debris would have ended up, which he narrowed down further using seismographic data. Armed with that information, Loeb
et al
mounted a major expedition to recover fragments of the meteor from the seabed with a magnetic sled, which has just concluded. Their efforts recovered around 50 sub-millimeter metallic spherules, composed mainly of iron and silicon with magnesium, titanium, and trace elements. Importantly, no such material was recovered from a control area outside the predicted impact zone of IM-1. Regardless of what you think of
Dr. Loeb’s conjectures on extraterrestrial visitors
, recovering tiny fragments of a probable interstellar meteor from the seabed is an amazing technical accomplishment, especially given
the amount of junk that’s down there
. “Paint buckets per square kilometer” is our new favorite unit.
We found a neat little hack where
someone with a Commodore SX-64 got access to a digital cinema projector
, with predictable results. No, there was no malfeasance; everything appears on the level here. The hardware needed to connect the 40-year-old computer to the projector was surprisingly simple — just a RetroTINK 2X-Mini retrogaming video adapter and a couple of cables. There wasn’t much time to play, though; apparently, the 1920s art deco theater was about to be used for some classic film screenings. And while we admit that the retrogaming experience on such a big screen would be pretty cool, think about the demoscene!
And finally, for those of us in the United States, this past Tuesday was Independence Day, known almost universally as the Fourth of July. Our celebration of this day is pretty well known, with cook-outs, sports, and general summer fun, followed at nightfall by raucous fireworks shows, by both professional pyrotechnicians and…let’s call them
freelancers
. This writer’s neighborhood was ablaze all evening long, and the show was fantastic — even getting hit in the face by a chunk of shrapnel from a nearby mortar round didn’t dampen my enthusiasm. I was taken aback, though, by the air quality alert I got on my phone around 10:00 PM — we usually only see those when forest fire smoke sweeps in. When I checked AirNow.gov the next day, I was pretty surprised to see what all our celebrating had wrought:
Wow. | 8 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660750",
"author": "Bob",
"timestamp": "2023-07-10T06:28:16",
"content": "Avi Loeb is a publicity-seeking crackpot. Read one of his recent “papers”, just brain farts written down.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6660758",
... | 1,760,372,239.528613 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/09/reviving-interlisp-with-the-medley-interlisp-project/ | Reviving Interlisp With The Medley Interlisp Project | Maya Posch | [
"Artificial Intelligence",
"Software Development"
] | [
"Interlisp",
"lisp"
] | Within the Artificial Intelligence and natural language research communities, Lisp has played a major role since 1960. Over the years since its introduction, various development environments have been created that sought to make using Lisp as easy and powerful as possible. One of these environments is Interlisp, which saw its first release in 1968, and its last official release in 1992. That release was Medley 2.0, which targeted various UNIX machines, DOS 4.0, and the Xerox 1186. Courtesy of the
Interlisp open source project
(
GitHub
), Medley Interlisp is available for all to use, even on modern systems.
The documentation contains information on
how to install
Medley on Linux but also Mac and Windows (via WSL1 or WSL2). For those just curious to give things a swing, there’s also an
online version
you can log into remotely. What
Medley Interlisp
gets you is an (X-based) GUI environment in which you can program in Lisp, essentially an IDE with a debugger and the (in)famous auto-correction tool for simple errors such as typos, known as the
DWIM
(Do What I Mean), which much like the derived version in Emacs seeks to automatically fix simple issues like misspellings without forcing the developer to fix it and restart the compilation.
Thanks to [Pixel_Outlaw] for the tip and for also telling us about a project they wrote using Medley Interlisp for the Spring Lisp Game Jame 2023 titled
Interlisp Fifteen Puzzle
. | 21 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660658",
"author": "The Commenter Formerly Known As Ren",
"timestamp": "2023-07-09T20:23:20",
"content": "I’m thurprithed that Lithp ith thtill thomething people are interethted in uthing!B^)",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6... | 1,760,372,239.58735 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/09/miniware-ts1c-a-cordless-soldering-iron-with-a-station/ | Miniware TS1C: A Cordless Soldering Iron With A Station | Maya Posch | [
"Reviews",
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"cordless soldering iron",
"soldering station"
] | Most soldering irons in the market seem to fall into a few distinct categories. They either provide a full-blown station to which the soldering iron is wired, powered straight by mains, or an iron powered by DC power. The Miniware TS1C takes up an interesting position here in that it features both a station you put the iron into and adjust the temperature, as well as a fully cordless iron. Sounds too good to be true, perhaps, but
a recent Tom’s Hardware review
by [Les Pounder] seems to think it has real merit.
Behind the glossy exterior and marketing, we find a cordless soldering iron that uses a supercapacitor to power itself when it is not inserted into the station, with communication between the iron and station performed using Bluetooth. This way, you can keep an eye on both the tip temperature and the remaining charge left, which [Les] found to be sufficient for soldering about 80 smaller joints, with the marketing claiming it can solder 180 size 0805 SMD parts with one charge.
The advantage of having a station is that it is the part that is wired to a power bank or wall wart, with the temperature setting performed using a chunky dial. The station also provides a place for the iron in between soldering sessions, but in order to recharge the iron, the brass bands near the front have to be pushed into the holder for them to make contact. This also makes one-handed removal of the iron from the holder not as easy as you’d hope.
With the $125 price tag for the TS1C, it does raise a lot of questions about the intended audience, when for about the same price, a (65 Watt) Hakko FX-888D can be obtained. What you gain over said Hakko with the TS1C is the ability to power the station from USB-PD (45 Watt) and the lack of a cord between the station and iron. The TS1C also seems to have an unfortunate design flaw in that the hot iron’s tip has to be navigated past melty plastic bits and the fragile OLED display permanently disfiguring those, as [Les] discovered to his dismay.
Would you get a TS1C, or is a TS101,
Pinecil
, or a mains-powered station more your jive? Or would you rather just
roll your own
? | 19 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660624",
"author": "hartl",
"timestamp": "2023-07-09T17:43:24",
"content": "Strange stuff. The marketing blurb on the manufacturers website lists “Capacitor Undervoltage Protection” as a safety feature. Is the supercap actually a Li-whatever cell in disguise?I’ll better stick with ... | 1,760,372,239.738675 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/09/clock-escapement-uses-rolling-balls/ | Clock Escapement Uses Rolling Balls | Bryan Cockfield | [
"clock hacks"
] | [
"3d printed",
"ball bearing",
"clock",
"escapement",
"kitchen",
"rolling ball",
"time-keeping",
"timer"
] | The escapement mechanism has been widely used for centuries in mechanical clocks. It is the mechanism by which a clock controls the release of stored energy, allowing it to advance in small, precise intervals. Not all mechanical clocks contain escapements, but it is the most common method for performing this function, usually hidden away in the clock’s internals. To some clockmakers, this is a shame, as the escapement can be an elegant and mesmerizing piece of machinery, so [Brett] brought his
rolling ball escapement to the exterior of this custom clock
.
The clock functions as a kitchen timer, adjustable in 10-second increments and with several preset times available. The rolling ball takes about five seconds to traverse a slightly inclined, windy path near the base of the clock, and when it reaches one side, the clock inverts the path, and the ball rolls back to its starting place in another five seconds. The original designs for this type of escapement use a weight and string similar to a traditional escapement in a normal clock. However, [Brett] has replaced that with an Arduino-controlled stepper motor. A numerical display at the bottom of the clock and a sound module that plays an alert after the timer expires rounds out the build.
The creation of
various types of escapements
has fascinated clockmakers for centuries, and with modern technology such as 3D printers and microcontrollers, we get even more off-the-wall designs for this foundational piece of technology like [Brett]’s rolling ball escapement (which can also be seen at
this Instructable
) or even
this traditional escapement that was built using all 3D-printed parts
. | 15 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660605",
"author": "PWalsh",
"timestamp": "2023-07-09T16:29:36",
"content": "These types of escapement were actually used in old clocks. I remember seeing one working at some museum somewhere in my youth. Invented by Sir William Congreve at the beginning of the 1800’s.Google “rolli... | 1,760,372,239.682029 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/09/2023-cyberdeck-challenge-yahrc-takes-its-power-seriously/ | 2023 Cyberdeck Challenge: YAHRC Takes Its Power Seriously | Donald Papp | [
"contests",
"Cyberdecks"
] | [
"2023 Cyberdeck Challenge",
"cyberdeck",
"raspberry pi",
"rugged"
] | Cyberdecks are all about custom builds, and [f4drj]’s
YAHRC
(Yet Another Ham Radio Cyberdeck) takes its ruggedization and power seriously. There are some great power management features, and the enclosure even has a layer of RF shielding.
YAHRC is a Raspberry Pi-based build with a generously-sized screen that tucks a small Bluetooth keyboard into a storage area for input in a pinch. Everything is secured behind custom panels, and behind those panels are some really great build details. There’s active cooling via fans, an SSD for data, and [f4drj] even made a custom riser for the GPIO header by soldering together a couple of headers to act as an extender. This exposes the GPIO header right beside a clear area for prototyping, with easy access to USB ports next to the screen in the top panel.
Behind the clean panels? A load of hardware, along with the requisite cable management, that every Cyberdeck builder must deal with.
The power features are worth mentioning separately. For starters, there’s a very generously sized internal battery pack made from spare 18650 cells that gives this deck more than enough juice for any conceivable job. The screen, USB hub, and Raspberry Pi can each be individually powered or turned off as needed; even the internal battery can be isolated from the rest of the hardware.
As an alternative to the huge internal battery, the unit can be powered from an external 5 VDC source or any external power ranging from 3.8 to 32 VDC, such as a solar panel. Clearly, there’s a lot of focus on providing the user with flexible power options to account for any situation.
This build is chock full of thoughtful design bits, so be sure to look through
the photo gallery
. You might come away with inspiration or even a few tips! | 5 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660537",
"author": "forced laborer",
"timestamp": "2023-07-09T11:49:14",
"content": "An old floodlight with cooling fins could be a nice passive cooled case.Of course you have to solder a piece of copper to bridge the distance to the CPU.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
... | 1,760,372,239.634107 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/09/stirring-up-3d-printed-lab-equipment/ | Stirring Up 3D-Printed Lab Equipment | Bryan Cockfield | [
"chemistry hacks"
] | [
"3d printed",
"Chemistry",
"lab",
"laboratory",
"magnetic",
"magnetic stirrer",
"mixture",
"solution"
] | Magnetic stirrers are a core part of many chemistry labs. They offer many advantages for ensuring the effective mixing of solutions compared to other methods of stirring, including consistency, precise control, operation within closed systems, and of course, hands-free automatic operation. With so many reasons for employing a magnetic stirrer, it’s not too surprising that [Joey] would want one. He
built his using 3D-printed parts
rather than purchasing it.
The magnetic stirrer uses a 3D-printed enclosure for the base. Inside is a PWM controller which sends power to a small DC motor. A 3D-printed arm is attached to the motor, which hosts a pair of magnets. As the arm spins inside the enclosure, the magnetic fields from the magnet couple with the stir bar inside the mixture, allowing it to spin without any mechanical link to the stirring device and without any input from the user. [Joey] has also made all the 3D-printed parts for this build
available on Printables
.
While magnetic stirrers aren’t the most complicated of devices (or the most expensive), building tools like this anyway often has other advantages, such as using parts already on hand, the ability to add in features and customizations that commercial offerings don’t have, or acting as a teaching aid during construction and use. It’s also a great way to put the 3D printer to work, along with this
other piece of 3D-printed lab equipment
designed for agitating cell cultures instead. | 18 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660497",
"author": "MarB",
"timestamp": "2023-07-09T08:27:36",
"content": "Nice build, but an overhead stirrer would be more practical because you could use it in conjunction with a hotplate or heating mantle.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
... | 1,760,372,240.213533 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/08/clock-runs-computer-in-slow-motion/ | Clock Runs Computer In Slow-Motion | Bryan Cockfield | [
"computer hacks",
"Microcontrollers"
] | [
"6502",
"clock",
"computer",
"hertz",
"monostable conditioner",
"pendulum",
"sensor"
] | At the heart of all computers is a clock, a dedicated timepiece ensuring that all of the parts of the computer are synchronized and can work together to execute the instructions that the computer receives. Clock speeds for most modern off-the-shelf computers and smartphones operate around a billion cycles per second, and even clocks that tick at a human-dizzying speed of a million times per second have been around since at least the 1970s. But there’s no reason a computer can’t run at a much slower speed, as [Greg] demonstrates in
this video where he slows down a 6502 processor to a single clock cycle per second
.
To reduce the clock speed from the megahertz range down to a single hertz or single clock cycle per second, [Greg] is using the pendulum from an actual clock. He attaches a small magnet to the bottom of the pendulum which is counted by a sensor as it swings past. Feeding that pulse into a monostable conditioner yields a clock signal which is usable for one of his 6502-based computers, and at this extremely slow rate, it’s possible to see the operation of a lot of the computers’ inner workings a step at a time. In fact, he optimized the computer’s operation as this slow speed let him see some inefficiencies in the program he was running.
It helps if your processor is static, of course. Older CPUs with dynamic storage for registers and some with limited-range PLLs would not work with this technique. The 8080A, for example, required a clock of at least 500 kHz.
Not only can this computer use a pendulum clock as the basis for its internal clock, but [Greg] also rigged up a mechanism to use a heartbeat. Getting in a little bit of exercise to increase his heart rate first will noticeably increase the computer’s speed. And, if you’re looking to get a deeper glimpse into the inner workings of a computer, we’d recommend looking at one
which forgoes transistors in favor of relays
. | 27 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660482",
"author": "Joshua",
"timestamp": "2023-07-09T07:11:52",
"content": "That’s really cool! I really appreciate this unconventional idea. ^^Btw, blink LEDs and their ancestors, flashing lights can be used as ~1 Hz clock generators.(Those little incandescent lamps with a bimeta... | 1,760,372,240.404466 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/08/hackaday-prize-2023-supercapacitors-let-solar-speaker-work-in-darkness/ | Hackaday Prize 2023: Supercapacitors Let Solar Speaker Work In Darkness | Robin Kearey | [
"Portable Audio Hacks",
"Solar Hacks"
] | [
"bluetooth",
"boom box",
"class-d",
"loudspeaker",
"solar cell",
"supercapacitor",
"USB C"
] | Solar panels are a great way to generate clean electricity, but require some energy storage mechanism if you also want to use their power at night. This can be a bit tricky for large solar farms that feed into the grid, which require enormous battery banks or pumped storage systems to capture a reasonable amount of energy. It’s much easier for small, handheld solar gadgets, which work just fine with a small rechargeable battery or even a big capacitor. [Jamie Matthews], for instance, built
a loudspeaker that runs on solar power but can also work in the dark thanks to two supercapacitors.
The speaker’s 3D-printed case has a 60 x 90 mm
2
solar panel mounted at the front, which charges a pair of 400 Farad supercaps. Audio input is either through a classic 3.5 mm socket or through the analog audio feature of a USB-C socket. That same USB port can also be used to directly charge the supercaps when no sunlight is available, or to attach a Bluetooth audio receiver, which in that case will be powered by the speaker.
The solar panel sits right next to the passive radiator before both are covered with speaker fabric.
The speaker’s outer shell, the front bezel, and even the passive radiator are 3D-printed and spray-painted. The radiator is made of a center cap that is weighed down by a couple of M4 screws and suspended in a flexible membrane. [Jamie] used glue on all openings to ensure the box remains nearly airtight, which is required for the passive radiator to work properly. Speaker fabric is used to cover the front, including the solar panel – it’s apparently transparent enough to let a few watts of solar power through.
A salvaged three-inch Bose driver is the actual audio source. It’s driven by a TI TPA2013D1 chip, which is a 2.7 W class-D amplifier with an integrated boost converter. This enables the chip to keep a constant output power level across a wide supply voltage range – ideal for supercapacitor operation since supercaps don’t keep a constant voltage like lithium batteries do.
[Jamie] has used the speaker for more than nine months so far and has only had to charge it twice manually. It probably helps that he lives in sunny South Africa, but we’ve seen similar solar audio projects work just fine
in places like Denmark
. If you’re taking your boombox to the beach,
a sunscreen reminder feature
might also come in handy.
The
Hackaday
Prize 2023
is Sponsored by: | 13 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660462",
"author": "Wenhelt",
"timestamp": "2023-07-09T04:41:39",
"content": "Writing the user manual of an electronic equipment, I average two design issues. In the ritual chapters, the safety instructions recommends to avoid the heat sources.As the speaker has a solar panel, it i... | 1,760,372,240.07818 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/08/using-an-old-satellite-to-see-the-earth-in-a-new-light/ | Using An Old Satellite To See The Earth In A New Light | Dan Maloney | [
"Space"
] | [
"Coriolis",
"dish",
"HackRF",
"helical",
"LNA",
"microwave",
"radiometer",
"RHCP",
"S-band",
"satellite",
"sdr"
] | Snooping in on satellites is getting to be quite popular, enough so that the number of people advancing the state of the art — not to mention the wealth of satellites transmitting signals in the clear — has almost made the hobby too easy. An SDR, a homebrew antenna, and some off-the-shelf software, and you too can see weather satellite images on your screen in real time.
But where’s the challenge? That seems to be the question [dereksgc] asked and answered by
tapping into S-band telemetry from an obsolete satellite
. Most satellite hunters focus on downlinks in the L-band or even the VHF portion of the spectrum, which are within easy reach of most RTL-SDR dongles. However, the Coriolis satellite, which was launched in 2003, has a downlink firmly in the S-band, which at 2.2-GHz puts it just outside the high end of an RTL-SDR. To work around this, [dereksgc] bought a knock-off HackRF SDR and couple it with a wideband low-noise amplifier (LNA) of his own design. The dish antenna is also homebrewed from a used 1.8-m dish and a custom helical antenna for the right-hand circular polarized downlink signal.
As the video below shows, receiving downlink signals from Coriolis with the rig wasn’t all that difficult. Even with manually steering the dish, [dereksgc] was able to record a couple of decent passes with SDR#. Making sense of the data from WINDSAT, a passive microwave polarimetric radiometer that’s the main instrument that’s still working on the satellite, was another matter. Decoded with
SatDump
and massaged with Gimp, the microwave images of Europe are at least recognizable, mostly due to Italy’s distinctive shape.
Despite the distortion, seeing the planet’s surface via the microwaves emitted by water vapor is still pretty cool. If
more traditional weather satellite images
are what you’re looking for, those are pretty cool too. | 6 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660502",
"author": "Michael Black",
"timestamp": "2023-07-09T08:46:17",
"content": "In QST for April 1971, Paul Wilson described his 2.3GHz converter. Likely used for moonbounce, but a bit later he used it to hear an Apollo mission.Nobody had SDRs, so they just did things the old ... | 1,760,372,240.025852 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/08/hackaday-prize-2023-wear-a-chorder-lets-discreet-chording-keyboards-do-the-talking/ | Hackaday Prize 2023: Wear-a-Chorder Lets Discreet Chording Keyboards Do The Talking | Donald Papp | [
"The Hackaday Prize"
] | [
"2023 Hackaday Prize",
"chording keyboard",
"text to speech",
"voicebox"
] | Being mute or speech-challenged can be a barrier, and [Raymond Li] has an interesting project to contribute to the 2023 Hackaday Prize: a pair of discreet chording keyboards that
allow the user to emit live text-to-speech
as quickly as one can manipulate them.
Rapid generation of input to high-quality speech helps normalize interactions.
The project leverages recent developments to deliver high-quality speech via an open-source web app called
VoiceBox
, while making sure the input devices themselves don’t get in the way of personal interaction. Keeping the chorders at waist level and ensuring high-quality speech is generated and delivered quickly goes a long way towards making interaction and communication flow more naturally.
The VoiceBox software is doing the heavy lifting, and there’s not yet much detail about the rest of the hardware used in the prototype. It’s currently up to the user to figure out a solution for a wearable computer or a suitable chording keyboard. Still, the prototype looks like the
Charachorder
with a 3D-printed mounting solution to locate them at one’s beltline. Of course, the beauty of the underlying system being so standard is that one can use whatever is most comfortable.
The
Hackaday
Prize 2023
is Sponsored by: | 9 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660373",
"author": "Evaprototype",
"timestamp": "2023-07-08T20:31:16",
"content": "Love to send my private conversations to google. ;(",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6660400",
"author": "hartl",
"timestamp": ... | 1,760,372,240.266208 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/08/the-other-way-to-fight-software-rental/ | The Other Way To Fight Software Rental | Jenny List | [
"Art",
"Software Development"
] | [
"adobe",
"software",
"software rental"
] | It’s been a distressing trend over the last decade, that of taking commercial software from a paid-for licence model and moving into the cloud and onto a rental model. In out line, we’ve seen this with CAD packages and notably with EAGLE PCB CAD, but it’s hit other sectors in exactly the same way. The art and design communities, in particular, are feeling the pinch from Adobe Suite going towards a rental model, and now the artist and perennial thorn in the side of anyone who seeks to own a colour, [Stuart Semple] is doing something about it.
He’s launching a competing suite called provocatively, Abode, which will follow an affordable paid-for licence model
. It’s a development that raises interesting questions for the open source community, so it’s definitely worth a second look from that perspective.
Taking on software rental can only be a good thing, and we hope that the new package gains a foothold for that reason. But since we’re sure that there will be open-source enthusiasts asking the question: why are the established open-source equivalents such as GIMP and Inkscape not the obvious alternatives to the Adobe suite? In there may be some uncomfortable moments of soul searching for the software libre world around usability and interfaces.
Whatever your take on open source versus paid software, it’s extremely encouraging to have somebody mount a high-profile challenge to the software rental model. We hope that Abode makes it to market and that it succeeds in making the graphics software market a little more open. Meanwhile, we’ve mentioned [Stuart Semple] before
for his colour activism over the blackest of blacks,
and
for previously taking on Adobe over Pantone pricing
. | 208 | 44 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660316",
"author": "make piece not war",
"timestamp": "2023-07-08T17:09:38",
"content": "Logo and name too close to avoid being sued by you know who.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6660317",
"author": "Thovthe",
... | 1,760,372,240.697932 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/08/99-partspriation/ | 99% Partspiration | Elliot Williams | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Slider"
] | [
"inspiration",
"newsletter",
"parts",
"round display"
] | Thomas Edison once said that genius was 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration. That doesn’t leave much room for
partspiration
.
I’m working on a top-secret project, and had to place a parts order on AliExpress with a minimum order quantity of five in order to get decent shipping times. No big deal, financially, and it’s always great to have spares as backup for the ones you fry.
But as I started lighting up the little round smartwatch displays to put them through their paces, I started thinking of all sorts of ways that I could use something like this. I had no idea how easy to drive they were, or frankly, how good they looked in person. When you get a round display in your hands, you find that you need dial indicators everywhere.
And then my son came by and said “Oh neat. I want one!” and started thinking up all sorts of gizmos that I could put them in. Two of them would make awesome eyes, and he’s been on a chameleon kick – the animal, you know. So we’re looking for chameleon eye animations online.
And all of a sudden, I have more projects lined up than I have remaining screens. I’m calling this phenomenon “partspiration”. You know, when you figure out how to use something and then you see uses for it everywhere? Time to place another Ali order.
Gearing Up for the Hackaday Prize
And don’t forget, we just started the next round of the
Hackaday Prize: Gearing Up
. In this challenge round we want to see your best DIY tools, jigs, and workflow accelerators. Custom reflow plates, home-built power supplies, or even software tools – as long as it helps you get the job done, it has a place here. You’ve got until Aug. 8 to get your entry finished, but head on over to
Hackaday.io
and get started now.
This article is part of the Hackaday.com newsletter, delivered every seven days for each of the last 200+ weeks. It also includes our favorite articles from the last seven days that you can see on
the web version of the newsletter
.
Want this type of article to hit your inbox every Friday morning?
You should sign up
! | 37 | 14 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660280",
"author": "The Commenter Formerly Known As Ren",
"timestamp": "2023-07-08T14:06:34",
"content": "That’s a mighty big round display on the bench in the Title Picture!B^)",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6660296",
"au... | 1,760,372,240.342673 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/08/thermochromic-treatment-keeps-solderless-breadboards-smokeless/ | Thermochromic Treatment Keeps Solderless Breadboards Smokeless | Dan Maloney | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"magic smoke",
"overload",
"paint",
"pigment",
"power dissipation",
"solderless breadboard",
"Thermal",
"thermochromic"
] | There’s a point in a component’s thermal regime that’s between normal operation and overloaded to the point of obvious failure. That’s a dangerous region, because the component isn’t quite hot enough to release the Magic Smoke, but hot enough to singe any finger you poke around with the see if everything’s running right. So if you’re looking to keep your fingerprints unmodified, but you don’t want to invest in a thermal camera, you might want to let
this thermochromic breadboard
point the way to overloaded components.
We’re not sure where this tip came from, but judging by the look of the website it was sometime in the late 90s. We’re also not sure who’s behind this little hack, so we’ll just credit [improwis]. The idea is pretty simple — white acrylic paint is mixed with thermochromic pigment, and the mixture is carefully painted onto the plastic surface of a standard-issue solderless breadboard. Care is taken to apply thin coats, lest the paint gets into the contacts and really muck things up. Once the paint is dry you’re ready to build your circuit. We have to admit we’re surprised at how sensitive the paint is; judging by the pictures, the heat coming off a 1/4-watt resistor dissipating 350 mW is plenty, even when the body of the resistor is well above the surface of the breadboard. We’d imagine the paint would point out not only hot components but probably the breadboard contacts too, if things got really toasty.
This seems like such a great application of thermochromism, one that’s a bit more useful than
clocks
and
Pi Day celebrations
. If you’re going to try this yourself, you’ll have to track down your own supply of thermochromic pigment, though — the link in the article is long dead. That’s not a problem, though, as
Amazon sells scads of the stuff
, seemingly aimed mainly at nail salons. The more you know. | 17 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660252",
"author": "Thomas Shaddack",
"timestamp": "2023-07-08T11:46:05",
"content": "This is me.There are more shenanigans done with that idea.A good way is to mix several thermochromes with different threshold temperatures, for a wider indication range.https://www.improwis.com/20... | 1,760,372,240.751651 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/08/roll-your-own-simple-tube-tester/ | Roll Your Own Simple Tube Tester | Al Williams | [
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"tube",
"tube tester"
] | You can easily get carried away when trying to test things. For example, if you want to know if your car is working, you could measure the timing of the ignition and put the car on a dynamometer. Or you could just start it and figure that if it runs and moves when you put it in drive, it is probably fine.
When [Thomas Scherrer] wanted to test some tubes, he made the same kind of assumption. While tubes can develop wacky failure modes, the normal difference between a working tube and a failing tube is usually not very subtle. He made
a simple test rig to test tubes
at DC and one operating point. Not comprehensive, but good enough most of the time. Have a look at what he did in the video below.
The tester is just a few resistors, a tube socket, and some bench power supplies. Of course, you may have to adapt it to whatever tube you are testing. If we had a lot of tubes to do, we might make the rig a bit more permanent, but for an afternoon of testing, what he has would be fine.
In addition to the power supplies, you’ll need at least one, preferably two, volt meters. He was able to validate his results with a proper tube tester. The results matched up well. While this won’t solve all your tube testing problems, it will give you a quick start.
You can build your own
modern tube tester
, of course. Or pick up a vintage one.
Our favorite one uses punched cards
. | 5 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660225",
"author": "Stephen Walters",
"timestamp": "2023-07-08T08:22:06",
"content": "For the cost of one of those FLUKE multimeters you can buy a valve tester, and for the cost of two FLUKE’s, you can buy a good valve tester.G7VFY",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"repl... | 1,760,372,240.451253 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/07/show-em-what-youre-made-of-with-this-repair-logo/ | Show ‘Em What You’re Made Of With This Repair Logo | Tom Nardi | [
"hardware",
"Repair Hacks"
] | [
"logo",
"open source hardware",
"repair"
] | The only thing better than getting your hands on a repairable piece of hardware is actually finding the thing in the first place, which is why we love this “official”
repair logo created by [Yves Parent]
. Our predilection for crossed wrenches had (almost) nothing to do with it.
We’ve got a soft spot for logos that work well on dark web pages.
Designed to mimic the ubiquitous “Recycle” logo, [Yves] originally created the icon for
Repair Café Roeselare
— but realizing that it had wide practical applications, he got the OK to put it up on GitHub for others to use. Whether you’re a hobbyist creating your first PCB or a pro designing a commercial product for a particularly forward-thinking client, slapping this logo on signifies that your creation is destined for better things than the scrap heap.
[Yves] has helpfully provided the logo in both vector format (SVG) and PNG, the latter at several scales for your convenience. We’d love to see it offered in various production and CAD formats as well, so it can be dropped into as many projects as possible. So if you end up creating a DXF or STL version, be sure to submit a pull request.
While getting others onboard with this logo is just a ground roots effort currently, who knows what the future may bring? Today we take it for granted, but the official open source hardware “gear” logo has
only been around for about a decade
. | 27 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660226",
"author": "Dave",
"timestamp": "2023-07-08T08:33:20",
"content": "Love it! Thanks Yves!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6660228",
"author": "NBP",
"timestamp": "2023-07-08T09:10:29",
"content": "Nice idea ... | 1,760,372,240.818795 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/07/watch-those-1-resistors/ | Watch Those 1% Resistors | Al Williams | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"components",
"resistors",
"tolerance"
] | Decades ago, electronic components were not as easy to acquire as they are today. Sure, you could get some things at Radio Shack. But you might not have many choices, and the price would be on the high side. TV repair components were another option, but, again, big bucks. Some places sold surplus parts, which could be cheap. These often came from manufacturing runs where a company bought 10,000 components and made 8,000 products. But today, you can order parts inexpensively and get them on your doorstep in a day or, sometimes, even less. Are these inexpensive parts really any good? [Denki Otaku] likes to find out. In a recent video, he
checks out some Amazon-supplied 1% resistors
to find out how good they are. You can watch his results below.
He starts with two resistor kits and examines them quite closely. For example, a magnet revealed that one brand of resistor had iron leads which are not as conductive as copper leads. They look the same because they are both coated with tin, but the magnet tells the difference.
The Elegoo kit measured the expected resistance value within the tolerance band. The sample size was a little small to draw a solid conclusion, but it does look like the resistor were well within their advertised tolerance. The Longrunner resistors, however, did not fall in range. Some of the resistors were within 1% of the marked value, but others were as far out as 1.4%. That doesn’t sound like much, but if you bought them for their 1% tolerance, a 1.4% error is way off the mark.
We liked the test jig he built to do the four-wire resistance measurements more easily. Simple but effective. He did some experiments with hot air to determine the temperature coefficient and the power handling capability of the resistors. That led to an accidental smoke release. Later, he had more of a planned smoke release.
If you need general-purpose resistors that are within a few percent of their marked values, these kits are probably fine. But if you are relying on precise values, you might be disappointed. On the other hand, you would probably hand-match anything important, anyway, but it is still good to be aware that the markings on the resistors might not reflect reality.
We recently saw a case where being out of spec with cheap parts was
much more dangerous
. If you want to know more about
4-wire resistance measurements
, you are in the right place. | 54 | 19 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660182",
"author": "Joshua",
"timestamp": "2023-07-08T02:59:40",
"content": "“Decades ago, electronic components were not as easy to acquire as they are today. Sure, you could get some things at Radio Shack. But you might not have many choices, and the price would be on the high si... | 1,760,372,240.912334 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/07/a-controller-for-more-than-thumbs/ | A Controller For More Than Thumbs | Bryan Cockfield | [
"News"
] | [
"body position",
"game controller",
"keyboard",
"multiplayer",
"opencv"
] | As virtual reality continues to make headway into the modern zeitgeist, it is still lacking in a few key ways. There’s not yet an accepted standard for correlating body motion to movement within a game, with most of the mainstream VR offerings sidestepping this problem by requiring the user to operate some sort of handheld controller to navigate the virtual world. And besides a brief Kinect fad from the 2010s, there hasn’t been too much innovation in this area. But computers have continued to increase in capabilities and algorithms for tracking movement have improved, so [Fletcher Heisler] aka [Everything Is Hacked] leveraged these modern tools into
a full-body controller configurable for any video game
.
This project builds heavily on a previous project by [Fletcher] which took body position information and turned it into keyboard input, leveraging OpenCV and posture detection software to map keys to specific body positions. It only needed slight modification to work for gaming with regards to the ability to hold down keys or mash buttons, but essentially works by mapping certain keystrokes from the previous project to commands in games. In addition to that step he also added support for multiplayer by splitting the image captured by the camera into two halves so it can keep track of two people simultaneously.
There aren’t a lot of games which lend themselves naturally to this controller style, although [Fletcher] does note that it’s possible to get a great workout by doing things like mapping leg lifts to Mario Kart steering commands or arm movements to Flappy Bird. While there are some games that take to this style better than others, he also built his own games specifically to take advantage of the controller style, including one where cute animals need to be petted to score points and which also includes a heart rate monitor to automatically adjust its difficulty. As a game controller it seems much more effective than simply
using one’s body as a keyboard
as he demonstrated in his previous project. | 4 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660198",
"author": "Greg Chabala",
"timestamp": "2023-07-08T04:13:05",
"content": "“built his own games … including one where cute animals need to be petted”Your pony died because it wasn’t pretty enough.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comm... | 1,760,372,240.952685 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/07/russian-weather-satellite-reuses-name-yields-images/ | Russian Weather Satellite Reuses Name, Yields Images | Al Williams | [
"Radio Hacks",
"Space"
] | [
"sdr",
"weather satellite"
] | Which Russian weather satellite has the name Meteor 2? According to [saveitforparts], pretty much all of them. He showed how to grab images from an earlier satellite with the same name a while back. That satellite, though, met with some kind of disaster, so he’s posted a new video about
reading data from the new Meteor 2
and you can watch it below.
The interesting part, we thought, was that the software he’s using, Raspberry-NOAA v2, doesn’t know about this incarnation of the bird which has only been up for a few weeks. That means he had to find a satellite with similar orbital parameters. Eventually, the program will have the setup for this satellite.
We marvel that computer technology is to the point that he can casually say, “I have another Linux computer up on the roof…” In addition to using Raspberry-NOAA, he acquires data from the pass directly with his SDR. Things didn’t go very well, but watching the steps he tries is instructive. He uses a variety of tools and finally gets a better result.
The image was higher quality than the NOAA satellites, but he had gaps in the pictures, and he couldn’t figure out why multiple runs of satdump didn’t produce the same results. If you have an SDR dongle and an antenna, you can find links to all the software and try it yourself.
If you need an antenna or want to listen to NOAA satellites, we know
someone who can help
. While the video pokes fun at the Meteor 2 satellites failing, all these kind of
satellites do eventually go offline
. | 13 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660108",
"author": "asheets",
"timestamp": "2023-07-07T20:51:40",
"content": "Been looking for an excuse to put the turnstyle antenna back up. If LRPT is as easy now as throwing up a RasPi image, I may just do it.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{... | 1,760,372,241.0029 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/07/a-shutter-speed-tester-with-frickin-lasers/ | A Shutter Speed Tester With Frickin’ Lasers! | Jenny List | [
"digital cameras hacks"
] | [
"camera",
"shutter",
"shutter speed"
] | Buying old cameras is one of the best ways yet found to part a geek from their money, but if you don’t mind finding a few duds along the way it’s still possible to pick up something nice without paying the excessive scene tax of an Etsy seller or an online store. The trouble is, in the many decades during which your purchase went from being pride and joy to forgotten in a drawer to lying on the shelf of a thrift store, its performance may have degraded a little. Does the shutter still operate as it should? How long is a split second anyway? You need a shutter speed tester, and luckily for us,
[Stuart Brown] has one
.
There are no sharks involved in this build, but it does rely on laser diodes as a light source. There are three of them as well as three sensors, packaged photodiodes with a Schmidt trigger. These feed an Arduino which is hooked up to a TFT display, and the software measures how long each diode receives the light. We’re told it can also measure the raise time on curtain shutters, another important metric.
There’s little in the way of usage examples, but we’re guessing it requires positioning the camera between lasers and photodiodes. We’re curious as to how such an instrument would perform on a camera with a fixed lens, or whether it’s only suitable for those with access to the shutter itself. If this subject interests you,
it’s not the first shutter speed tester we’ve shown you
.
Header image: Runner1616,
CC BY-SA 4.0
. | 12 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660071",
"author": "Severe Tire Damage",
"timestamp": "2023-07-07T18:39:27",
"content": "No sharks were harmed in this build.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6660147",
"author": "Garth Bock",
"timestamp": "202... | 1,760,372,241.066096 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/05/exploring-a-new-frontier-desktop-edm-is-coming/ | Exploring A New Frontier: Desktop EDM Is Coming | Tom Nardi | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Slider",
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"EDM",
"Hack Chat",
"wire EDM"
] | To say that desktop 3D printing had a transformative effect on our community would be something of an understatement. In just a decade or so, we went from creaky printers that could barely extrude a proper cube to reliable workhorses that don’t cost much more than a decent cordless drill. It’s gotten to the point that it’s almost surprising to see a project grace these pages that
doesn’t
include 3D printed components in some capacity.
Cooper Zurad
There’s just one problem — everything that comes out of them is plastic. Oh sure, some plastics are stronger than others…but they’re still plastic. Fine for plenty of tasks, but certainly not all. The true revolution for makers and hackers would be a machine that’s as small, convenient, and as easy to use as a desktop 3D printer, but capable of producing metal parts.
If Cooper Zurad has his way such a dream machine might be landing on workbenches in as little as a month, thanks in part to the fact that its built upon the bones of a desktop 3D printer. His open source Powercore device allows nearly any 3D printer to smoothly cut through solid metal using a technique known as electrical discharge machining (EDM). So who better to helm this week’s
Desktop EDM Hack Chat
?
While Cooper is still riding high from the
phenomenal success of the Powercore Kickstarter earlier this year
, which brought in over $192,000, he certainly didn’t limit questions to his own project. He’s a firm believer in EDM, and whether you’re using his device or trying to DIY your own solution, he’s always happy to talk shop. That said, he did clarify at the beginning of the chat that the first wave of Powercores should be shipping before the end of July. The source for the project will be opened up around the same time as well, Cooper said it was important to the team that paying customers got their hardware before DIY clones started popping up.
Powercore lets your 3D printer do EDM
Early questions in the chat focused primarily on the electrodes, which are naturally a very important element of EDM. As the sparks erode the workpiece, they also wear down the electrode itself. This needs to be compensated for during the machining process, or eventually the spark gap will become too great.
Luckily, a modified 3D printer has more than enough Z travel to counteract this issue. Cooper explains that they’ve prepared a special fork of the LaserWeb4 for use with EDM that will constantly lower the Z height at the proper rate to counteract the electrode itself becoming shorter over time. There was also discussion about electrode materials and shapes, including an interesting hollow variant that could have dielectric flushed through it while cutting deep holes.
While discussing what’s required to convert a standard 3D printer for EDM, Cooper explained that the process is quick enough that you don’t technically need a dedicated machine for it. This is made possible by the fact that, at least on the Ender 3 they’ve been using for testing, no firmware modifications are necessary. You simply remove the hotend and replace it with the electrode holder. That said, if you’re going to be doing a lot of EDM, it would make sense to have a dedicated setup, especially when you consider how cheap you can get an Ender 3 these days.
Eventually the discussion migrated towards the types of materials you can cut with a desktop EDM setup, and where the future might take things. Cooper says all of their testing with the Powercore has been with relatively thin aluminum, and indeed that’s all that’s been promised in the Kickstarter.
Wire EDM adds additional mechanical complexity.
That being said, they’ve made progress with steel, though he thinks that switching the electrode from a brass rod to a thin wire is likely to be the key going forward. The far thinner electrode will cut faster, but the mechanics involved will be considerably more complex than simply bolting a brass rod to a 3D printer.
For one thing, the wire needs to be held in tension. That means it needs attachment points above and below the workpiece. The wire is generally kept moving as well, being pulled from a supply spool and getting wound around a take-up spool on the other end. None of this is impossible for a DIY machine,
and we’ve already seen early attempts
, but it’s going to take more work to make it practical on a hobbyist budget.
Which in the end, is sort of the point. By the end of the chat, which ran over two hours, the general feeling was that an exciting adventure was ahead. First generation DIY EDM rigs like the Powercore are only the beginning, not the final result. Once a few hundred hackers have these machines on their benches and can start working on them, it will pave the way towards the next evolution of the hardware. To put it another way, this is the Makerbot Cupcake era of home EDM — these are the days folks will look back on in 15 or 20 years as the first steps towards putting this powerful technology in the hands of the individual.
We’d like to thank Cooper Zurad for stopping by the Hack Chat, and wish him nothing but luck with the Powercore. We’re eager to see what the early-adopters will be able to do with the hardware, and also look forward to the design going open source so others can tweak and improve on it. There was a time when 3D printers and laser cutters simply didn’t exist outside of high-end R&D labs, and now we can pick them up on Amazon. It’s hard to say if the same will eventually be true for EDM machines, but we’re excited to find out.
The Hack Chat is a weekly online chat session hosted by leading experts from all corners of the hardware hacking universe. It’s a great way for hackers connect in a fun and informal way, but if you can’t make it live, these overview posts as well as the
transcripts posted to Hackaday.io
make sure you don’t miss out. | 27 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "6659425",
"author": "adrian",
"timestamp": "2023-07-05T17:17:12",
"content": "Brass seems an odd choice. Why not graphite or tungsten ?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6659456",
"author": "D",
"timestamp": "202... | 1,760,372,241.296941 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/05/gearing-up-with-the-2023-hackaday-prize/ | Gearing Up With The 2023 Hackaday Prize | Elliot Williams | [
"contests",
"Hackaday Columns",
"Slider"
] | [
"2023 Hackaday Prize",
"Gearing Up"
] | You know how it goes. You’re working on a project, and you need to do some ultra-precise probing, so you end up making a custom PCB probing octopus along the way. Or you find that you spend more time making the jig to hold down a part for machining than you do machining it. Hackers are not merely a tool-using species, we’re a tool-making species – it’s in our nature to want to build the tools that make it easier to get the job done.
The
Gearing Up round of the Hackaday Prize
celebrates the tool makers. If you’ve got a project that maybe isn’t an end in itself, but rather one of those utility project that can make all the difference, we want to see it here. Maybe it’s obscure measurement gear, maybe it’s a test rig or a bolt sorter, maybe you’ve built your own reflow hot plate. This is the challenge round for you!
The Gearing Up round runs from yesterday, July 4th, until August 8th. As with all of the 2023 Hackaday Prize rounds, ten finalists will receive $500 and get entered for the big prizes to be announced in November.
Inspiration
A benchtop power supply is an absolutely classic gear project. Whether you choose to go all-out like [The Big One]’s
Bench Power Supply
or choose to go minimal like [John Loeffler]’s
Open Power
, we love to see what powers your projects. Another classic is the DIY soldering iron, like [vlk]’s OLED
RT Soldering Pen
or [Thomas Leputsch]’s
USB-PD version
.
Or how about building your own microscope? [Braun’s CNC] has
a nice monocular Pi scope
based on the camera module v 1.3 and the [FabLab München] doubles down with
the Stereo Ninja
, which couples two cameras with innovative display options.
Bench Power Supply
Open Power
RT Soldering Pen
USB-PD Soldering Pen
Braun’s Microscope
Stereo Ninja
Sometimes you need to build your own tools because nobody else out there is going to do it for you. That was certainly the case with [Colin O’Flynn]’s 2nd-place winning entry into the first-ever Hackaday Prize,
the Chip Whisperer
. Nobody else was making an affordable chip glitcher. Or take [Jiří Praus]’s lovely
Precise Wire Bending Machine
that he uses to make exquisite freeform circuit sculptures. We’re not sure which is the real piece of art. And from way out in left field, we still love [michimartini]’s
Masking Tape Plotter
. It’s a tool that fills a need we didn’t even know we had!
And don’t forget software! When developing embedded firmware, nothing comes in handy as often as a nice
serial port plotter
, and [Hasan Yavuz Özderya]’s is a great one. Any time I need a quick laser or CNC-cut box, I reach for [Florian Festi]’s
box designer, Boxes.py
.
Chip Whisperer
Precise Wire Bending Machine
Masking Tape Plotter
Boxes.py
SerialPlot
You get the idea, right? If it’s a project that helps you make other projects, it’s a tool project, and it’s a great fit for the Gearing Up Challenge. All that remains for you to do is
write it up on Hackaday.io
, check out
the contest rules
, and
enter it into the Hackaday Prize
. We can’t wait to see what you’re up to!
The
Hackaday
Prize 2023
is Sponsored by: | 3 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6659470",
"author": "ey54e5y54ey",
"timestamp": "2023-07-05T19:48:25",
"content": "armachat and any mesh chat in my opinion is winner",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6659575",
"author": "Bec",
"timestamp": "2023-07-06T03... | 1,760,372,241.228354 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/05/animatronic-alexa-gives-amazons-echo-a-face/ | Animatronic Alexa Gives Amazon’s Echo A Face | Robin Kearey | [
"Robots Hacks"
] | [
"Amazon Alexa",
"Amazon Echo",
"animatronic eyes",
"crt"
] | Today, we’re surrounded by talking computers and clever AI systems that a few decades ago only existed in science fiction. But they definitely looked different back then: instead of a disembodied voice like ChatGPT, classic sci-fi movies typically featured robots that had something resembling a human body, with an actual face you could talk to. [Thomas] over at
Workshop Nation
thought this human touch was missing from his Amazon Echo, and therefore set out to
give Alexa a face in a project he christened Alexatron
.
The basic idea was to design a device that would somehow make the Echo’s voice visible and, at the same time, provide a pair of eyes that move in a lifelike manner. For the voice, [Thomas] decided to use the CRT from a small black-and-white TV. By hooking up the Echo’s audio signal to the TV’s vertical deflection circuitry, he turned it into a rudimentary oscilloscope that shows Alexa’s waveform in real time. An acrylic enclosure shields the CRT’s high voltage while keeping everything inside clearly visible.
To complete the face, [Thomas] made a pair of animatronic eyes according to
a design by [Will Cogley]
. Consisting of just a handful of 3D-printed parts and six servos, it forms a pair of eyes that can move in all directions and blink just like a real person. Thanks to a “person sensor,” which is basically a smart camera that detects faces, the eyes will automatically follow anyone standing in front of the system. The eyes are closed when the system is dormant, but they will open and start looking for faces nearby when the Echo hears its wake word, just like a human or animal responds to its name.
The end result absolutely looks the part: we especially like the eye tracking feature, which gives it that human-like appearance that [Thomas] was aiming for. He isn’t the first person trying to give Alexa a face, though: there are already
cute Furbys
and
creepy bunnies
powered by Amazon’s AI, and we’ve even seen Alexa
hooked up to an animatronic fish
.
Thanks for the tip, [htky], [Kris] and [TrendMend]! | 17 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6659379",
"author": "David",
"timestamp": "2023-07-05T15:11:59",
"content": "Just finished watching the video and boy wasn’t that a video for the ages.. from the cinematography to the storytelling and the sheer coolness of the final product alone. This is something i’ll never forget... | 1,760,372,241.476385 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/05/remote-driving-controversial-in-uk-but-its-already-here/ | Remote Driving Controversial In UK, But It’s Already Here | Lewin Day | [
"Current Events",
"Featured",
"News",
"Original Art",
"Slider"
] | [
"autonomous car",
"car",
"law",
"legislation",
"remote driving",
"transport",
"uk",
"United Kingdom"
] | The automotive industry is rushing towards autonomous vehicles as a futuristic ideal. They haven’t got the autonomous part sorted just yet. However, as part of this push, the technology to drive vehicles remotely via video link has become mature.
In the United Kingdom, there has been great controversy on whether this should be allowed, particularly for vehicles piloted by individuals outside the country’s borders. That came to a head with a Law Commission repot published
earlier this year
, but since then, innovative companies have continued to work on remote driving regardless. Let’s dive in to the current state of play.
Why Go Remote?
Prototype autonomous cars often have head office staff keeping an eye on things from a distance. In contrast, remotely-driven vehicles charge a human with the whole driving task – they’re just not sitting in the car.
Cruise
Limited remote-driving technologies are already in common use, such as in industrial sites, mines, or the parking-summon features available on some new cars. However, full remote driving on public roadways is the key matter of interest of late, which would offer serious productivity improvements to a variety of industries.
A prime example is to allow the convenient delivery of rental cars. Typically, to deliver a rental car, a driver would have to drive the to the customer from the storage depot, and then make their way back by another means of transport. It’s a time consuming and inconvenient task. Ihe car could be remotely driven by a worker at a computer, this issue would be eliminated. Once one delivery was complete, the worker could log in to another vehicle and drive it to the next customer without ever leaving their seat. It’s not hard to imagine similar benefits for the trucking industry and other transit sectors.
New Rules Needed
However, the technology has drawn the ire of
the Law Commission of England And Wales.
The independent statutory body is charged with reviewing and making recommendations on the law of the land, and published advice to the government concerning remote driving
earlier this year.
By the nature of the way vehicles used to work, there is currently no rule in the UK that drivers must be inside the vehicle they are controlling. This would naturally open the doors for remote control of vehicles on UK roadways. However, the commission has recommended that the government bring in new legislation to control and restrict remote driving. Key concerns surround the issue of responsibility. Presently, a driver who causes a harm out on the road can be held responsible for their actions. With the rise of remote driving, however, this becomes more difficult. Presently, if somebody remotely controlling a vehicle from outside the country were to recklessly cause a crash in the UK, it would be difficult or impossible to hold them responsible for the incident.
The report notes that there should be robust rules that ensure remote drivers are responsible for their actions just as if they were directly behind the wheel. However, at the same time, drivers shouldn’t be held accountable for issues beyond their control, such as a crash caused by a temporary loss of connectivity to the vehicle. International agreements would be required to enforce liability across borders. Failing that, the report suggests remote drivers from overseas should not be allowed to control vehicles operating in the UK.
The overall thrust of the report from the Law Commission is that while the technology promises exciting benefits, there is a need for new legislation to ensure it is used appropriately and safely. It also highlighted issues around cybersecurity, in which remotely-driven vehicles could be potentially hijacked by bad actors. Beyond that, it also explored the human factor—where drivers may inadvertently be less attentive or alert when driving a vehicle remotely. The review advised that new laws would be required to shore up these issues, while also making it definitively clear whether remote driving was legal in the UK, and on what grounds.
The State of Play
While the Law Commission’s report takes a very conservative approach, that hasn’t stopped innovators in the field from charging ahead with their work. Imperium Drive has been a leader in this area. The company has recently rolled out remote driving with its Fetch vehicle system
after 18 months of trials in Milton Keynes.
It’s not the only player in the industry, but it’s a forefront player in the UK’s nascent remote driving space.
Fetch
uses cars that are remotely controlled by operators at the company’s head office. The cellular network is used to let the cars communicate back to base, with 360-degree cameras used to provide the remote driver a complete view of the road. The remote driver controls the car with a steering wheel and pedals, while taking in the view via an array of screens.
View this post on Instagram
A post shared by Fetch (@fetchmeacar)
Customers can hail a Fetch car via a mobile app within four miles of the Milton Keynes city center. The car is then remotely driven to the customer by a Fetch operator. The customer can then drive the car themselves just like a regular rental car, with a remote operator then driving the car back to base when the rental is concluded. The company states that for short trips, the service is as convenient as a taxi or rideshare, while it comes in significantly cheaper for customers travelling longer distances. Customers will be liable for paying an insurance excess while they are driving the vehicle, just like any other rental car. Obviously, this won’t apply in the event the car has an issue while being remotely driven.
Imperium Drive hopes that in time, its system could replace the need for private car ownership. The company is working on full autonomy as well in pursuit of this goal. For now, it operates four electric cars in Milton Keynes, with plans to add city-to-city and airport transfer services in future.
The company has had to develop a range of technologies to support its remote driving system. While lag or dropouts are frustrating in an online game, when driving a real vehicle on the road, they spell disaster. Imperium Drive employs advanced algorithms to predict and assess the quality of its vehicle’s data links. It uses this information to prioritize sending the most crucial data for driving the vehicle safely. Beyond that, its vehicles have been programmed to gracefully handle signal losses and other link issues to avoid interference or network problems from causing crashes out on the road.
Going Forward (Remotely)
Industry groups and investors alike will welcome clear regulation on remote driving going forward. At least as far as the UK is concerned, it may require companies wishing to operate remote-drive services in the country to offer some kind of guarantee as to taking responsibility for any incidents caused out on the road. New legislation is yet to land, and in the meantime, the technology is seemingly outpacing the rules currently on the books. Expect that to change as governments around the world prepare for the rise of remote and autonomous driving in future. | 46 | 16 | [
{
"comment_id": "6659357",
"author": "Sok Puppette",
"timestamp": "2023-07-05T14:12:53",
"content": "> However, at the same time, drivers shouldn’t be held accountable for issues beyond their control, such as a crash caused by a temporary loss of connectivity to the vehicle.“Beyond their control”, m... | 1,760,372,241.569804 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/05/a-faulty-keyboard-from-a-single-led/ | A Faulty Keyboard From A Single LED | Jenny List | [
"Peripherals Hacks",
"Repair Hacks"
] | [
"keyboard",
"led",
"mechanical keyboard"
] | When the chance arrived to buy a mechanical keyboard for not a lot, naturally, [Hales] jumped at it. Then it started having odd intermittent problems with some keys appearing stuck,
which led to a teardown and some fault finding
. The culprit was a white LED — but
why
this was the case is a fascinating story.
Stripping it down there didn’t seem to be an obvious culprit, but eventually, the trail led to a lack of diodes in the matrix. This keyboard had an extremely clever yet rather cursed design in which it used LEDs as both illumination and as a diode in the keyboard matrix circuit, and the faulty LED had a reverse breakdown condition that could be triggered under certain operational conditions.
More unexpectedly, it would sometimes hold on to its reverse breakdown state even after power off. Just when you think you understand a component’s properties, there’s always room for surprise. And we can safely say we’ve learned something about the design of cheaper keyboards in reading the account. It’s clear that when it comes to ‘boards,
it’s best to take no chances
. | 19 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6659326",
"author": "rasz_pl",
"timestamp": "2023-07-05T12:30:09",
"content": ">LEDs are not meant to be used as diodes.leds are diodes, its right in the name> LEDs are almost always only ever used in the forward direction and every circuit I’ve seen that potentially subjects them t... | 1,760,372,241.36769 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/05/cheap-ham-radio-improves-the-low-end/ | Cheap Ham Radio Improves The Low End UI If Not The RF | Al Williams | [
"Radio Hacks",
"Reviews"
] | [
"ham radio",
"talkpod"
] | There was a time when buying a new radio was something many hams could never afford to do. Then came the super cheap — and super controversial — VHF and UHF radios from China. But as they say, you get what you pay for. The often oddly named handhelds like Baofeng and Wouxun are sometimes odd to work with and may have questionable RF outputs. A new radio has a less tongue-twisting English name and many improved features for about $50 — the Talkpod A36Plus and [Josh]
shows us how they work
in a video that you can see below.
The new features are generally good. For example, the radio can pick up AM in the aircraft band, something most of these cheap radios won’t do. It works on VHF and UHF bands but also picks up FM broadcasts. The USB-C connector is welcome, and the screen is large and colorful. It has 500 channels and IP5 water resistance.
There were a few issues, though. If you want to use it as a scanner, it’s not very fast. The radio comes with a programming cable, but apparently, it uses an odd USB chipset that may give you some driver issues. The biggest problem, though, is that it has, according to the video, excessive spurious emissions. The power isn’t that high, and the antenna probably filters off some of it, too. But creating interference across the band isn’t very polite.
How bad are the harmonics? Well, [Josh] hooks up a spectrum analyzer and also shows how a radio tuned to the second harmonic easily picks up the transmission. Of course, no radio is perfect, but it seems like it does have very strong harmonic emissions. Of course, it may or may not be any worse than similar cheap radios. They are probably all above the legal limits, and it is just a matter of degrees.
These little radios won’t directly work the world — you need an HF radio for that, generally. They will let you connect to
local repeaters
, though. Some of those
cheap radios can lead to interesting projects
, too. | 17 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6659271",
"author": "alialiali",
"timestamp": "2023-07-05T08:43:35",
"content": "> The often oddly named handhelds like Baofeng and WouxunJust had to look these up.Baofeng is a county in China known for industry since the 12 century, the word itself means storm (named after the smel... | 1,760,372,241.419141 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/04/a-dusty-boat-anchor-back-from-the-brink/ | A Dusty Boat Anchor Back From The Brink | Jenny List | [
"Radio Hacks",
"Repair Hacks"
] | [
"ham radio",
"heathkit",
"linear amplifier"
] | Many of us will have found dusty forgotten pieces of electronics and nursed them back to health, but we were captivated by [Don]’s tale of electronic revival. Instead of perhaps a forgotten computer or television, his barn find was
a Heathkit linear amplifier for radio amateurs
. In that huge box underneath an impressive layer of grime were a pair of huge tubes, along with all the power supply components to give them the 2 kV they need. It should have been good for a kilowatt when new, can it be made to go on air again?
Perhaps understandably with such an old device, after cleaning away the dust of ages he replaced the power supply circuitry with new parts and PCBs. A linear amplifier is surprisingly simple, but because of the voltages and power concerned there’s a need to treat its power circuits with respect. On first power-up the filaments work and the rails come up, so when given some RF drive it comes alive. Coupled with a case restoration you’d never know how dreadful a state it had been in.
We like to see classic Heathkit devices here at Hackaday, though
we’ve followed their more recent reappearance too
. | 16 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6659301",
"author": "Shirley Marquez",
"timestamp": "2023-07-05T10:15:45",
"content": "The SB200 was rated for 1kW INPUT power. Output will be in the 500-600W range. That’s still a useful step up for a typical 100W HF radio.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
... | 1,760,372,241.625487 |
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