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Jam A USB Hub Into Your Keyboard

Frank — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 04:45:43 +0000

Here’s a hack that isn’t only simple to do, but extremely practicle; Adding a USB hub to your USB keyboard.

Most people’s desks are already crowded and having a USB hub laying around can only add to that clutter. Michael decided to take apart a USB keyboard and a USB hub. He wired the USB cable from the keyboard into the hub and then wired one of the hub ports back to his keyboard. What he was left with was three free ports that he could place anywhere in the keyboard.

All that was left was finding a spot in the keyboard housing to cut to accommodate the three new ports. This is an unpowered hub, so you won’t be able to charge your iPhone or smartphone, but adding a powered hub is just as easy!

[Via Hack-a-Day: Adding A USB Hub To A Keyboard]

Jam A USB Hub Into Your Keyboard originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2012/01/23. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

NES Controller MP3 Player

Frank — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 23:46:16 +0000

Some might say that it is a mortal sin to mod vintage hardware, but when you can take said piece of hardware and make it functional again it’s forgivable. Such is the case with this NES controller that has been repurposed as an enclosure for a portable MP3 player.

Quite a bit of modding was needed to cram the MP3 into the enclosure. The case had to be cut to accommodate the headphone jack, USB port and the LCD screen. The buttons on the controller have also been patched into the controls on the MP3 board, not only making this one slick mod but a functional one as well.

All-in-all this is one slick and clean mod. I would like to see a built in rechargeable battery that can be charged via the USB port.

[Link to NES MP3 Controller]

NES Controller MP3 Player originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2012/01/20. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Add A Solar Charger To Your E-Book Reader

Frank — Fri, 09 Sep 2011 04:06:46 +0000

E-Book readers have really revolutionized the world. You can now fit a virtual library in your briefcase or purse. Let’s not forget that it has gotten most of us geeks to go outside from time to time to read thanks to their awesome e-ink displays.

One of the key differences between an e-book reader and a good old fashion dead tree book is that you require electricity to power the reader. We’ll since you’re heading outside to catch up on some reading why not kill two birds with one stone?

Instructables user Flapke shows us how a simple hack to his Kobo reader yields some solar juice for the battery. Although the how-to mainly focuses on the Kobo, the concept is universal; Make some room in the back panel for some small solar panels, solder in a few capacitors and an IC and you’ll be rocking an e-book reader that never needs to be changed via a cable (if you do venture outside or read right by a window that is).

[Link to Solar Charginig E-Reader]

Add A Solar Charger To Your E-Book Reader originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2011/09/09. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Etch-A-Sketch Computer

Frank — Wed, 09 Feb 2011 14:04:50 +0000

Who needs a touch screen when you can have you very own etch-a-sketch computer. Modder Martin Raynsford created this etch-a-sketch computer with some MDF and a few bottle caps. There is actually a little more involved than that, but it definitely is a cool mod.

By reusing the X and Y axis rollers, the LED and opto sensor of a trackball mouse the bottle caps can be used to move the mouse. The left and right click sensors were also places behind the bottle cap knobs.

It probably won’t get you many girls, but it will raise your geek-cred. Check out Martin’s site for a complete write up on the project.

Etch-A-Sketch Computer originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2011/02/09. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Android 3.0 Running On A Nook Colour

Frank — Sat, 29 Jan 2011 23:40:37 +0000

The Android 3.0 (Honeycomb) SDK has only been released for a few days and enterprising hackers have already created a ROM for the Nook Colour. It’s not exactly fast, but it is a hack after all.

The crafty hackers combined the Nook’s kernel with the SDK to come up with a “zombie”. Hardware acceleration is a big part of getting Honeycomb’s UI to be nice and snappy and hacker dhoshman over at the XDA forums says that he will be working on it over the weekend.

I’d like to see 3.0 for my Elocity A7, and since I know for a fact they will only be releasing it in the upcoming A10, I sure hope someone smarter than me will put a ROM out for it.

If you haven’t seen all of the Honeycomb goodness yet, check out our sneak peek here.

Android 3.0 Running On A Nook Colour originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2011/01/29. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Super Mario Bros – Backwards

Frank — Mon, 24 Jan 2011 02:52:46 +0000

As a true gamer you must have already finished the original NES version of Super Mario Bros. You have probably already finished it in a variety of ways like fastest game, collecting all the coins, or killing all the turtles. Why not try beating it in reverse as well.

Much like reading in the western world, the original game was played from left to right. Hacker JJ decided playing Super Mario Bros the traditional was was boring and went about reversing the horizontal deflection coil wires of an old CRT TV which produced a mirror image.

Play the game backwards wasn’t enough, he also swapped the buttons on his NES controller just to get the full experience. I wonder if this is how people play games in the UK

[Link to Backwards Mario]

Super Mario Bros – Backwards originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2011/01/23. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Official Kinect SDK Coming Soon

Frank — Wed, 19 Jan 2011 06:02:03 +0000

Balmer let the world know during CES that Microsoft would be releasing an SDK for their popular Xbox 360 add-on the Kinect. Sources say that Microsoft may be preparing the release of the SDK sooner than they anticipated, in just a few months. “Sources familiar with the plans” told WinRumors that an official SDK and drivers are being prepped for a beta release “in the coming months,” potentially arriving with an upcoming XNA update dubbed the “Community Technical Preview.”

Ever since the release of the Kinect, hackers have been having a field day with it. Unofficial USB drivers for the Windows environment have already been developed and there are countless hacks out there from X-Ray vision to controlling World of Warcraft.

Now that Microsoft has acknowledged the popularity of the product and will be officially releasing the SDK maybe we might see another revolution in PC gaming, one that could rival the early 90′s.

Official Kinect SDK Coming Soon originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2011/01/19. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

DIY: Quiz-O-Tron 3000

Frank — Sun, 16 Jan 2011 19:16:27 +0000

Instructables modder RoysterBot has a dilemma over the holidays, build a quiz system for a party he was headed to. He needed the buzz-in buttons to be sturdy and responsive so his obvious choice were Staple’s “Easy Button’s”. Super easy to hack, all he needed to do was add an Arduino and some custom software and the project was complete.

The custom Arduino software is super responsive and locks out other players once someone has buzzed in. This ensures that multiple people can’t buzz in and avoid arguments ensuing as to who buzzed in first. Now you can play [Insert Favorite Game Show Here] with all your friends.

[Link to Quiz-O-Tron 3000]

DIY: Quiz-O-Tron 3000 originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2011/01/16. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Geohot 1 – Sony 0

Frank — Sat, 15 Jan 2011 02:44:40 +0000

You must be living under a rock if you didn’t hear about Sony filing suit against fail0verflow and Geohot for their distribution of the PS3 jailbreak firmware. The first step in Sony’s legal battle involved a temporary restraining order (TRO) against them to stop the distribution of the code. That TRO case was heard earlier today in California and it was tabled as the Judge wasn’t satisfied that she had juristiction to rule on the matter since Geohot actually hacked the PS3 in the state of New Jersey.

Sony based their decision to file suit in California on the fact that PayPal, Twitter, and YouTube are all based there. Twitter and YouTube were used to spread the code and they claim that Geohot received donations via PayPal. The Judge said that Sony’s basis was absurd and if that logic were true then anyone who uses any of the websites mentioned in the world would fall under his juristrisction.

For the time being Geohot has put the code back up on his site, but in reality the damage is done. We all know that once you put something on the Internet it lives forever. Sony might just be trying to save face and they very well might succeed with their TRO, but what will they do about the rest of the world? Get TRO’s against every Internet user?

Geohot 1 – Sony 0 originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2011/01/14. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

iOS 4.3 Jailbreak Already Available

Frank — Fri, 14 Jan 2011 03:35:53 +0000

The iOS 4.3 SDK has only been available for one day and it’s already been jailbroken. A new version of the famous PwnageTool can now jailbreak iOS 4.3. This just solidifies the fact that Apple can’t patch the limera1n venerability that groups like the iPhone Dev Team and the Chrome Dev Team are using.

The masterminds behind the hack are speculating that Apple might fix the venerability in the upcoming CDMA iPhone that Verizon will be selling starting February 10th of this year. It’s a new phone with a new radio, it would be real easy for Apple to address the exploit in a hardware revision. The same could be said for the rumoured iPad 2, but new hardware that fixes old problems also brings with it new problems.

The cat and mouse game will continue and my money is on the dedicated community that has worked so hard to bring the jailbroken openness to a set of devices that should have been open from the very start. Way to go guy and keep up the good work.

iOS 4.3 Jailbreak Already Available originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2011/01/13. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

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Seas0nPass: 2nd Gen Apple TV Jailbreak

Frank — Fri, 14 Jan 2011 03:04:33 +0000

The guys over at fireCore have just released Seas0nPass, an application that will jailbreak your second generation AppleTV. Seas0nPass requires you to tether your AppleTV briefly during boot in order to preform the jailbreak by loading custom IPSW files onto your AppleTV.

fireCore is a name that is synonymous with AppleTV hackers. The group also released aTV Flash, unlocking software for the first generation AppleTV that added additional functionality like XBMC and a browser.

Seas0nPass is open source and free and only works on the second generation AppleTV, so don’t try using it on your iPad or iPhone. It currently only works with OS X 10.6 or later and a Windows version is currently under development.

Remember, jailbreaking an Apple device can lead to rendering your device useless if you don’t know what your doing. By the looks of it over at fireCore’s website most people seem to agree that jailbreaking the second generation AppleTV is riskery than other Apple devices. If your okay with the risk you can grab Seas0nPass here.

Seas0nPass: 2nd Gen Apple TV Jailbreak originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2011/01/13. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

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Review: eLocity A7 Android Tablet

Frank — Thu, 13 Jan 2011 04:18:35 +0000

I’ve been playing with this surprisingly fast Android tablet for about a week now and so far I am impressed. Stream TV’s eLocity Android 2.2 powered tablet might not be an iPad killer, but it sure puts up a good fight.

The solid 7-inch tablet is powered by NVIDIA’s dual core Tegra 2 processor, comes with Froyo out of the box, is rooted by default and can output a crazy amount of video formats at 1080p via it’s included HDMI port. Although it shows some impressive stats in the video arena, the eLocity does more than that. 4GB of internal storage, a USB port and a MicroSD expansion slot coupled together with the super beefy Tegra 2, the A7 acts more like a powerful computer in your pocket than a PMP.

Not only is the video playback smooth and crisp, this is the only Android device I have ever used that can actually do Flash well. Even when you are on a website with multiple Flash ads watching a video, the A7 came through without a single hiccup. Mix that in with the fact that the device is rooted out of the box, you have one powerful device that is open and free, unlike the “other” guy’s tablet. The only problem I have seen so far is the unit’s battery life. I’ve been able to get about 4 hours out of it with moderate use and only about 2.5 hours of video play. This is more than likely due to the processor as the dual core Tegra 2 could easily power a full size laptop.

The unit doesn’t come with the Android Marketplace out of the box, but a crafty hacker has already created an alternate ROM that offers the Marketplace as well as Ad Hoc networking support. The eLocity A7 is currently WiFi only, by using the Ad Hoc network you can tether your unit to an existing smartphone’s 3G connection. Stream TV is toying with the idea of partnering up with a carrier and offering a 3G model.

At time of print there still is no word on any accessories for the unit, but it does have an expansion port on the bottom that will probably be used for a dock at a later day. A dock would be greatly welcomed, the fact that it can do 1080p without a problem makes this device a perfect addition to your home theater setup.

If your looking for an alternative to the iPad and don’t want to pay a monthly cost for something like the Galaxy Tab, Stream TV’s eLocity A7 is perfect. Priced at $350 it’s a great deal for such a powerful little unit.

[Link to eLocity A7]

Review: eLocity A7 Android Tablet originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2011/01/12. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

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Sony Could Remotely Disable PS3s

Frank — Thu, 13 Jan 2011 00:30:24 +0000

Now that the PS3′s key have been leaked, its open territory for homebrew and hacking. Many people have been wondering what type of action Sony will be taking to combat this so called “piracy”. We have seen how ruthless they are with the PS3′s little brother the PSP and it’s no doubt that they will be just as ruthless with the PS3.

Digital Foundry claims that Sony can take some drastic measures including remotely disabling a jailbroken or hacked PS3. Even if you have never signed up for a PSN account, the PS3 communicates with the Sony mother-ship each time it’s turned on. The initial boot-up call back is used to upload error logs and download updates to the “What’s New” modules. It also sends a list of recently run apps.

Just that capability alone gives Sony a lot of power. Will they remotely disable systems? Who knows, but if they start to do that they open the door for some serious legal action. You know when the first PS3 that someone paid hundreds of dollars for gets killed and their unit is clean, Sony will be in a PR nightmare.

Sony Could Remotely Disable PS3s originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2011/01/12. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

DIY: Camera Flash Softbox

Frank — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 21:15:10 +0000

Diffusing light is the key to warm, soft shots. If you do a lot of portrait photography then you know how valuable a softbox can be, but the cost can sometimes be prohibitive. You can add a white card to your flash to diffuse light, buy a diffusing cap for your flash or you can buy a Komplement collapsable fabric box from Ikea for a few bucks and build yourself one kick ass softbox.

Crafty hacker Thomas from Denmark picked up one of these fabric boxes (they come in various sizes, he used the 20cm x 20cm one), cut a hole in the side for his flash and using a flash cord had himself a cheap softbox.

He added some support to the cut-outs to hold his flash in place and as you can see from the pictures it collapses down nicely for stoarge.

This DIY camera softbox and the DIY FlashRing are a perfect addition to your photography toolkit.

DIY: Camera Flash Softbox originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2011/01/10. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

DIY: Twittering Coffee Pot

Frank — Thu, 06 Jan 2011 15:44:57 +0000

You can use Twitter for just about anything these days and thanks to an Arduino you can now schedule your coffee from Twitter.

This is a simple hack and a great one if you have been wanting to play with an Arduino but felt a bit intimidated by it. The idea behind the project is to have the Arduino turn on an AC device; this doesn’t necessarily have to specific to the coffee pot. You could have it turn on a radio or TV or anything that connects to an AC outlet.

The code is pretty straight forward and you probably don’t have to do much changing to get it to work. Check out the video after the break of it in action.

[Link to Tweet-a-Pot]

DIY: Twittering Coffee Pot originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2011/01/06. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

CO2 Powered Nerf Gun

Frank — Wed, 05 Jan 2011 13:24:53 +0000

Instructables hacker Philysteak527 modified a Nerf gun, making it semi-automatic thanks to the modern marvel of compressed air. This mod isn’t for the faint of heart since it involves the design and manufacture of a bolt-action the fit’s the specific gun you are using.

Philysteak527 used some polyoxymethylene plastic and a CNC lathe to create the parts needed for the bolt. Toss in some brass fittings, a solenoid, tubing, and some electronics and your set. Check out the footage of it in action after the break. You will definitely be the big boy in the school yard with this. You might very well have the SWAT team called in as well.

[Link to Semi-Automatic NERF Longshot]

CO2 Powered Nerf Gun originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2011/01/05. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

PSP Keys Hacked

Frank — Mon, 03 Jan 2011 02:54:40 +0000

First is was fail0verflow crippling the PS3 security and now Mathieulh has revealed that he has found the KIRK encryption/decryption keys that are used to sign PSP code.

What does all of this mean? Much like the PS3 keys that were discovered last week during a presentation at the CCC, any piece of software for the PS3′s little brother the PSP can now be signed as if it was actually from Sony. Sony and the PSP homebrew community have been playing a cat and mouse game for years and it now looks that it will all come to and end.

Homebrew for the PSP can now be signed with the proper keys and therefore make it look like legitimate software. No more custom firmware or loaders needed in the near future, a homebrew modders dream come true.

PSP Keys Hacked originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2011/01/02. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Control Your TV From Your Phone

Frank — Sun, 02 Jan 2011 06:23:50 +0000

Sure, you can control modern day video equipment like you Slingbox or satellite receiver via the web, but what if you have some old school gear that can only accept commands via good old fashioned Infa-Red? Instructables hacker nmcclana has put together a small embedded web server that transmits IR signals (Video after the break).

The Web Clicker, as it’s called, uses a Propeller Platform USB and E-Net Module and can play back any recorded IR command via an AJAX web interface. The unit is small, sleek and uses next to no power. You can purchase most of the componets pre-built or you can live on the wild side and download the PCB designs and etch the boards yourself.

This can be used to control anything that accepts and IR signal, not just a TV or DVR. You could add IR modules to just about anything these days so this project would be great for home automation.

[Link to Instructables]

Control Your TV From Your Phone originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2011/01/02. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

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iPod Nano Recovery Mode

Frank — Sat, 01 Jan 2011 19:47:29 +0000

After discovering James Whelton’s SpringBoard.plist hack for the 6G iPod Nano, Steve Throughton-Smith decided to play around with his Nano to see what else he might find.

Steve may very well have stumbled on some kind of DFU-like recovery mode, much like the recovery mode that allows customized firmware (or jailbreaking) to be injected into the iPhone/iPod touch.

Discovered what may be DFU mode: hold down the restart buttons until you get a black screen (it reboots twice) and iTunes sees the device and alerts you.
Afterwards, modified iRecovery to work with the iPod nano (had to add its DFU/Recovery USB ID) and allow it send files, and tested with some files I had extracted from the iPod nano 6G firmware

It seems that people are getting closer and closer to a working jailbreak for the Nano. I might just get back video playback on my Nano sooner than I thought.

iPod Nano Recovery Mode originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2011/01/01. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Eavesdropping On GSM

Frank — Fri, 31 Dec 2010 05:30:07 +0000

Speaking at the Chaos Computer Club on Tuesday, a pair of researchers demonstrated a method of eavesdropping on encrypted GSM calls and text messages by using a few cheap pay-as-you-go cellphones and a variety of open source software.

The ability to listen in on cellphone calls has been available to law enforcement agencies for a while, but even if the average person could they would have to invest in about $50,000 of hardware to do so, until now. The modern day phreaking takes advantage of security flaws in the GSM network and puts the power within the reach of almost any tech-savvy user.

By using custom firmware that they built in a few cheap Motorola cellphones, they created a bunch of cell phone "sniffers" that send real time raw cell network data back to a computer via a USB connection. By sending a target phone an SMS, they were able to determine what random network ID number belonged to the target.

All that was left was to decrypt the raw information they captured. This was easily accomplished with the use of a 2 GB rainbow table.

I’m sure with time, the software and firmware that was used in the demonstration will make it’s way into the average Joe’s hands and we will all be doomed. It’s not really modern day phreaking, back then all of us were just curious. There is no other use for this besides grabbing peoples personal communications.

Eavesdropping On GSM originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2010/12/31. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

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iPhone HTC GB Mutant

Frank — Thu, 30 Dec 2010 03:05:44 +0000

What do you get when you mash together a fake white iPhone 4, and HTC Aria and an old Game Boy? You get this cool yet useless mashup.

Hacker Goteking hollowed out and old Game Boy and dropped in his Aria. Wait, now it looks like he also has a fake white iPhone in there as well.

Alright, I’m utterly confused now as to what this does, maybe this video below can explain what Goteking is up to with this unholy creation

Nope, I’m still completely lost, but as someone who is always trying to make things do what they are not suppose to I can appreciate the work that was done here. Granted, the LED matrix in the fake iPhone is pretty cool.

[Link to Goteking's GB/HTC/iPhone Mutant]

iPhone HTC GB Mutant originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2010/12/29. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

PS3 Private Key Hacked

Frank — Wed, 29 Dec 2010 21:11:08 +0000

During the Chaos Communications Conference 27C3, hackers calling themselves failOverflow gave a presentation in which they claim to have the private key used by Sony to authorize code to run on the PS3. This essentially would give full control of PS3 systems without the need of a USB device

The group plans to show off a demo tomorrow at the conference and they say they will explain more about their discovery when their website launches. This hack isn’t designed for piracy but to enable software to be authorized to run on the PS3. Essentially this would open up the homebrew market and allow Linux to run on the PS3 regardless of firmware version.

PS3 Private Key Hacked originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2010/12/29. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

iPod Nano Hack

Frank — Tue, 28 Dec 2010 06:47:50 +0000

By booting up his iPod Nano with a modified SpringBoard.plist file hacker James Whelton was able to remove an app from his screen and replace it with a blank space (Video after the break).

Now this isn’t quite a jailbreak like hack, but it is a small start in the right direction. Today we can remove an app, tomorrow we might be able to add a new one and a week from now we might be able to write our own iPod Nano apps and cause Apple to open a whole new app store dedicated to the nano. Alright so maybe that’s pushing it a bit far, but just think if we could modify the sleep settings of the unit. Yes, we could finally have that iPod Nano watch we have all been waiting for.

iPod Nano Hack originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2010/12/28. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Android On Your iPhone

Frank — Mon, 27 Dec 2010 06:37:25 +0000

I love my iPhone 4, don’t get me wrong, but the old additive of the grass is always greener on the other side alway creeps up. Both the iPhone and an Android based device have their pros and their cons. Unless you can justify dishing out some big bucks monthly for an iPhone and Android based phone, your stuck with one or the other.

But, if you own an iPhone, you might be able to dual boot both the iPhone iOS and Android. Lifehacker has put together some easy steps to dual boot iOS and Android on your jailbroken iPhone.

Much like any time you try to put a square peg in a round hole it comes with it’s drawbacks. A few critical things don’t work and it runs quite slow, but as time goes on I’m sure they will work out the kinks and when that happens you might be able to run Android as smoothly on your iPhone as you can run Windows on your Mac.

Android On Your iPhone originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2010/12/27. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Doorbell Control

Frank — Sun, 26 Dec 2010 23:51:42 +0000

Do you find that your doorbell system lacks that little bit of luster? Tired of it doing nothing more than ringing when pressed? Hardware hacker Nicholas Skinner felt the same way and decided to do something about it. By using the Synapse RD Engine which is easily scriptable by using Python he took his door bell to the next level. His doorbell now does all these cool things:

Sense Bell Press – Allowing for triggering of other events on press, such as additional remote ringers in other parts of the house, computer popup notification and possibly cameras / camera display (e.g. via scart triggering on TV) etc in the future.
Disable Bell Ringer – From either a remote physical switch or PC (for periods when we do not want to be disturbed by doorstep salesmen).
Ring Bell – Allowing the bell to keep ringing for a certain minimum duration even if the button is just pressed quickly to save missing callers who do not hold in the button for an adequate duration.

Nicholas has a complete write up on his site here.

Doorbell Control originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2010/12/26. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Yikes: Build A Fusion Reactor

Frank — Sat, 25 Dec 2010 16:21:19 +0000

I’ve tried a few thing to cut our electricity cost. I’ve priced out both a solar and wind powered system to power all of the computers we have in the house that run around the clock. I’ve also added timers everywhere to help with the soaring cost of electricity in our neck of the woods. One think I haven’t considered is building our own fusion reactor. Now that I come to think of it, I’m not even gonna consider this.

Besides the obvious fact that this is ridiculously dangerous and potentially fatal to you and your neighbors this could easily land you in jail for a very long time. If you willing to take this insanely stupid risk then there is a write-up over at Instructables to show you just how to put it all together. The parts list if far from your average run to Radio Shack, so be warned. Like a neutron radiation detector, deuterium gas and our course, a large lead shield.

Remember, if I haven’t said it yet, THIS IS VERY DANGEROUS and shouldn’t be done. You can probably follow the build to get a grasp of how fusion reactors work, but putting this together will easily have a few black helicopters landing on your front lawn real quick.

[Via Instructables]

Yikes: Build A Fusion Reactor originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2010/12/25. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

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Happy Holidays

Frank — Sat, 25 Dec 2010 06:30:26 +0000

Here is to wishing all our readers a happy and safe holiday season. May Santa stuff all the tech you have ever wanted in your stocking. As the new year approaches the tech.nocr.at team wishes you all the best in 2011.

We are revamping tech.nocr.at in the new year to bring you a fresh new spin on the world of technology. More reviews, gadgets, news, and hardware hacking tips to keep you going the whole year strong.

Be safe and enjoy.

Happy Holidays originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2010/12/25. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Rubber Band Gatling Gun

Frank — Tue, 14 Sep 2010 19:43:02 +0000

Do you remember the Disintegrator that shot 40 rubber bands per second? Well how about a rubber band gatling gun that shoots 100 bands a second? It will cost you $500 but if you have money to burn or are just crazy then it will be perfect for you.

The unit weighs nearly 20 pounds and even has varying length barrels for different size rubber bands. It comes with it’s own stand so that it can be used as a turret (can you say arduino hack to turn this into a sentry) and works off of crank power.

Just keep in mind that at $500 you could go out and buy a real gun but if you live somewhere where guns are frowned upon this is perfect for you.

[Rubber Band Gatling Gun]

Rubber Band Gatling Gun originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2010/09/14. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

IR Jammer

Frank — Fri, 10 Sep 2010 04:04:25 +0000

We have talked about the awesome TV-B-Gone device before, you know, the device that can turn off any TV within distance. The only downside to it is that all people have to do it turn then back on. I know that you can just turn them back off but that would just be suspicious. What if you could jam the IR of the TV once you turn it off? Now you can.

The guys over at hackedgadgets.com sell just that, an IR jammer kit. Created by Alan Parekh, the unit will jam any infrared remote controlled device. It works across all 6 of the major IR frequencies and corrupts the data that is being sent by normal remote controls.

If your ambitious you can build your own from scratch or you could order a kit here and just slap it all together.

[Via HackedGadgets]

IR Jammer originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2010/09/10. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Advertising

Frank — Fri, 10 Sep 2010 03:02:45 +0000

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Advertising originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2010/09/09. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

NES Controller With Android

Frank — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 05:31:18 +0000

Now that mobiles phones have advanced to the point that they are great gaming machines why not have a proper game controller to enjoy them? That’s an itch that hacked Sk3tch just had to scratch. By hacking together an original NES controller, an Arduino and a blueSMRF Bluetooth module he was able to use the controller via bluetooth and even demo’s the hack by playing Super Mario Brothers 3 in an emulator in the video after the break.

He says that the mod it Alpha at best, but from the video it looks great to me. All he needs to do now if slap everything together in a nice case or better yet, find a way to put all of the components in the NES controller itself.

NES Controller With Android originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2010/09/03. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Shogo Linux Powered Tablet

Frank — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 04:45:24 +0000

Looks like someone is trying to de-throne Apple’s iPad. Japanese company Redstar are taking pre-orders on their Linux powered tablet.

The 10″ tablet is multi-touch friendly, comes with 1024×600 resolution and is powered by a Freescale iMX-37. It will also include 4GB of internal memory, 256MB of RAM, WiFi, Bluetooth, 3G and a SDHC memory card slot.

No pricing information or shipping date has been set yet, but I know as a happy hacker I can’t wait to get my hands on one, especially since it will run Linux. Imagine all the possibilities. If you know Japanese, then you can hit their website to get more info, otherwise, check the video below of the unit in action.

Shogo Linux Powered Tablet originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2010/08/30. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Old School GPS

Frank — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 04:19:32 +0000

Come on, we have all experience the dreaded “Satellite Lost” syndrome when using a GPS unit. A crafty hacker has created his own low-tech steampunk navigation system.

He soldered together a couple of brass tubes to a backplate and added a crystal face. Now all he has to do is print out step by step directions from Google maps and he will never have to worry about a lack of a clear sky view or even batteries. Plus, check out the resolution of that bad boy, perfect.

[Via Hack A Day]

Old School GPS originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2010/08/24. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Magstripe Hacking

Frank — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 04:12:19 +0000

Is there anything an Arduino can’t do? Instructable user sketchk3tch built this Arduino Magstripe Emulator which can spoof a card reader into thinking a card has been swiped. I can’t even begin to list the possible uses for this tool. Can you say “Hollywood style hotel door hacking device”. Not that we are encouraging that type of behaviour, but it would be fun to write some code that would quickly cycle through all of the possibilities. Check out the video of it in action after the break.

Magstripe Hacking originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2010/08/24. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

iPhone For Pen Testing

Frank — Thu, 19 Aug 2010 19:56:04 +0000

The iPhone has quickly become more than your average smart phone, it really is a computer in your pocket. So why not use it as one?

The guys over at HackADay have a great write up on setting your iPhone up as a penetration testing tool with all the goodies like Aircrack-ng and Ettercap.

The first step is to jailbreak your device and setup OpenSSH so that you can tunnel in for the rest of the setup. From there the rest of the setup is just acquiring build tools and compiling pentesting programs

Head on over to HackADay for the write up

iPhone For Pen Testing originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2010/08/19. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

All In One MacBook Air

Frank — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 15:44:23 +0000

Remember the good old C64, the home PC that was all enclosed in a keyboard? Kinda like the first laptop sans screen. A crafty hacker has done just that. By using the guts of a MacBook Air, a thin Mac keyboard and Apple’s new trackpad he has created an all in one keyboard based Mac.

Not ‘quite’ there yet with the case. I have to add some small mounting points for the keyboard and trackpad to rest on and attach the left hand side of the case where the USB ports are. However everything is in its place, the motherboard is bolted down so it can’t move about and everything else is held in place in the most hack friendly method ever….black duct tape.

If you interested in the project you can visit the modder’s site here

All In One MacBook Air originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2010/08/18. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

RFID Reader For Your iPhone

Frank — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 03:22:58 +0000

Benjamin Blundell built a hardware interface for his jailbroken iPhone that reads RFID signals. By patching in his homebrew hardware to his iPhone via a standard iPhone USB cable the reader detects low-frequency tags and will soon be able to read MIFARE tags as well.

You can bet you will never see this app approved in the official Apple app store, but just imagine how cool it would be to read RFID tags with your iPhone. Check out the video after the break

[Link via Hack a Day]

RFID Reader For Your iPhone originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2010/03/16. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

WiFi Door Opener

Frank — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 04:41:26 +0000

We have seen our fair share of door opening hacks. Remember the secret knock door lock? That was pretty awesome, but what if I tell you that you can unlock your door from any wifi device?

The guys over at Sunlight Labs have done just that. By using a WRT54GL and some creative hacking that have wired up their wireless router to buzz open their front door.

So how does this all work? Well, let’s start with the router. It’s a Linksys WRT54GL, a still-Linux-friendly descendant of the WRT54G, the router which jump-started the custom firmware scene. There are a lot of custom router firmwares available — DD-WRT, Tomato, Gargoyle — and they can all make your consumer-grade router do some professional-grade things. For this project I used OpenWRT, the system on which many of those other projects are based. It’s got a much steeper learning curve than those other distros — you definitely need to be comfortable with the command line — but it lets you build a custom firmware with exactly the components you want. With some tweaking I was able to create a firmware that included a stripped-down version of Python, but which still fit into the WRT54GL’s meager 2MB flash memory. (Like the Arduino, Python turned out to be overkill, but at the time I expected to need it — and it’s always nice to have it handy.)

Link to Door Opener Science Project

WiFi Door Opener originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2010/02/24. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

© tech.nocr.at 2010 | Permalink | 2 Comments | Read more in Hacking And Security | Explore more in: 2010, ac, air, arduino, buzz, command line, dd-wrt, distro, door, ds, ea, firmware, flash, hack, hacking, hacks, ir, knock, light, links, linksys, linux, loa, lock, make, nda, open, openwrt, os, pen, python, rip, router, secret, tech.nocr.at, time, ui, unlock, wifi, wire, wireless, wrt54g | Add to del.icio.us | Stumble it | Reddit

Brushduino – Arduino Meets Toothbrush

Frank — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 17:59:12 +0000

You knew it was bound to happen. We have seen Arduino’s used in everything from toasters to coffee machines and now we see the Brushduino. The cool hacks knows when you are brushing via an accelerometer that you attach to your toothbrush. By knowing what your doing the unit will tell you when it’s time to move to the next section of your mouth.

“It’s basically all LED’s. There are 6 white LED’s that correspond to the six regions of the mouth that I want to highlight, there are four green LED’s for showing progress and there’s a speaker I pulled out of some broken toy that’s there to entertain the children while they brush. The multi-strand wire connected to the three analog inputs on the Arduino also supplies 3.3v and ground to the accelerometer. The cable itself is an old ADB keyboard cable from my old Mac SE/30 from back in the day. It’s been laying in my junk box for ages. There are also some current limiting resistors for the LED’s and a bunch more of that lovely AWG30 solid core wire I like so much.”

Link to Brushduino

Brushduino – Arduino Meets Toothbrush originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2010/02/23. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

© tech.nocr.at 2010 | Permalink | Comments | Read more in Hacking And Security | Explore more in: 2010, ac, arduino, cable, coffee, ds, ea, green, hack, hacks, hd, ical, id, ir, key, keyboard, led, light, loa, Mac, machine, mit, nes, pen, tech.nocr.at, time, toast, toaster, toothbrush, tor, ui, white, wire | Add to del.icio.us | Stumble it | Reddit

Roll Your Own 3D Video For Under $300

Frank — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 13:53:08 +0000

You’ve gone out and seen Avatar and now your ready to summon your inner Cameron and shoot the next blockbuster 3D movie but you just can’t seem to come up with the millions of dollars needed to purchase the camera gear you would need, fear now more because you too can now create a super-duper 3D film for under $300 (how was my infomercial pitch there?).

Some great weekend hackers have put together a shopping list of materials needed to pull this off.

A couple Kodak Zx1 Digital Camcorders
L-Shaped bracket
Some nylon washers, wingnuts and screws
A basic tripod

I’m sure you could use other cameras and adjust the bracket to suit, but the concept is pretty simple. They have a full write up on how the pulled it off including all the editing that is needed to produce the stereo image. Check out the video after the break of some home made 3D footage.

Roll Your Own 3D Video For Under $300 originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2010/02/22. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

DIY RJ-45 Cable Tester

Frank — Sun, 21 Feb 2010 05:14:00 +0000

Cable testers can be super expensive, but if your trying to trouble shoot a cable drop or run then you know how valuable one can be.

Our favorite kids over at Instructables have a great how to on building your own on the super cheap. A quick trip to your local big box home improvement store and your favorite electronics store (hell even radio shack should it all) and a few bucks is all you will need to build this.

Besides your basic DIY hacking tools you will also need the following …

8 LED’s
20cm of Cat5 Cable
9V Battery Clip and Battery
Wall Mount Box
2 RJ-45 Female Jacks
220ohm Resistor
Female RJ-45 Mount Plate

Once you have all your components assembled head on over to Instructables and make your way through all the sets.

DIY RJ-45 Cable Tester originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2010/02/21. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

© tech.nocr.at 2010 | Permalink | Comments | Read more in Hacking And Security | Explore more in: 2010, ac, battery, cable, cable tester, cat, cat5, cheap, diy, ds, ea, electronics, ethernet, expensive, follow, hack, hacking, id, instructable, jack, led, loa, make, pen, radio, rip, rj-45, tech.nocr.at, tool, tor, tron, ui | Add to del.icio.us | Stumble it | Reddit

The C64 iPhone Emulator Is Back Baby

Frank — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 20:35:38 +0000

People in their 30′s rejoice, you may now relive your youth on your iPhone, again. The Commodore 64 emulator is available again in the iTunes App Store. (Check the video of it in action after the break)

If you don’t remember, back in June Apple removed it from the app store claiming that it violated the rules on launching executable code (Uhmmm, isn’t that what all emulators do?).

The only downside to this new version is that it can only play games that are downloaded from the App Store itself, no uploading of your own ROMs. I’m hoping someone out there will whip up a hack so that we can get such classics as “California Games” and “Bards Tale” back on. Oh the memories.

[Link to iPhone C64 Emulator]

The C64 iPhone Emulator Is Back Baby originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/11/13. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

PSP GO FW 6.10 Hacked?

Frank — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 20:19:13 +0000

A video that has been flowing around the inter-tubes shows a PSP Go running firmware 6.10 running a Genesis Emulator. This can only mean that the Go’s 6.10 firmware has been hacked, no?

According to PSP Hacks ….

Good News! – Well Neon says it is and if this video is anything to go by then we may be inclined to believe him. The video shows a PSP Go running a Genesis Emulator and the hack is apparently a kernel level exploit.
Now for the bad new, Neon says he has no plans on releasing the hack, whether he is just playing hard to get is not yet apparent but it will no doubt lead to many pessimists insisting that the cake is a lie.

Does this mean that we might soon be able to use the internal 16 GB of memory in the Go for custom firmware goodness? I sure hope so.

[Via PSP Hacks]

PSP GO FW 6.10 Hacked? originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/11/13. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Turn Any NAS Drive Into A Time Machine Drive

Frank — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 17:20:08 +0000

Time Machine is a great built-in feature in OS X. When Apple first announced that they would be offering the ability to backup and restore your files and system with the ease of use that we have come to know and love from Apple I was ecstatic. Then I found out that you had to have a physical drive connected to your machine to utilize it, or you’d have to purchase an expensive Apple made NAS product (Time Capsule) to use it without a physical drive connected to the machine.

Many hacks have been released that allow you to use any NAS drive as a Time Machine drive. All you really need to do is some shell code and create a sparse image, but now someone has taken all of the dirty work away from you and released a simple AppleScript that will get you up and running with any headache’s.

[Link to Time Machine NAS AppleScript]

Turn Any NAS Drive Into A Time Machine Drive originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/11/13. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

NCube: Portable Gamecube Goodness

Frank — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 06:46:38 +0000

I’ve seen my fair share of portable Gamecube systems, but this has got to be one of the slickest I have ever see.

Designed and hacked together by a Ben Heck apprentice, the NCube is a beautiful creation. The case is a seriously modded Datamax Kid’s Delight and the screen is an unmodded Zenith PSone display. The unit also has a 2-way switch so you can choose to run off batteries or AC, a memory card slot and a rear-mounted disc drive.

You can read up on the 90 hour journey to create this or just skip right down to the end of this article to see it in action.

[Link to NCube Design]

NCube: Portable Gamecube Goodness originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/11/12. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Hackintosh Atom Fix In The Works

Frank — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 06:37:34 +0000

Fear not hackintosh faithful; according to Gizmodo, the hacker who is the driving force behind netbook hackintosh builds says that the kernel will be fixed for the Atom processors. “It’ll just take a few weeks.”

If you might have slipped with your netbook and upgraded to 10.6.2, you can still downgrade your kernel to get you back up and running again.

[Via Gizmodo]

Hackintosh Atom Fix In The Works originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/11/12. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

In Case You Missed It: Week 44 Round Up

Frank — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 04:22:01 +0000

Another week another bunch of stuff that we posted. In case you missed any of it we have everything from Videogame Alarm Clocks to Secret Knock Door Openers. Enjoy.

Gadgets

A Cell Phone For Grama
USB Boobie Warmers
Fuel Cell Charger
Batteries For The Web 2.0 Generation

Gaming

Videogame Alarm Clocks

Hacking and Security

DIY: Star Trek Bluetooth Communicator
Turn A Dead 360 Into A PC
DIY: Auto Tracking Sentry Gun
DIY: Arduino AppleTV Remote
Secret Knock Door Lock
DIY: Digital Mixtape
Build A Real Working Tricorder, Sort Of
Build An Annoying Beeping Thing

Mac

MacHeist Nano Bundle: $154 In Apps 4 Free
Hacker Hacks Jailbroken iPhone
10.6.2 Kills Off Atom CPU Support
iPhone Safari Bug Could Cost You Cash

Tech News

Google Voice Invites
Woops: 10.6.2 Doesn’t Kill Atom Support

In Case You Missed It: Week 44 Round Up originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/11/09. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

© tech.nocr.at 2009 | Permalink | Comments | Read more in Tech News | Explore more in: 10.6.2, 360, ac, alarm, alarm clock, apple, appletv, apps, arduino, arm, atom, batteries, beep, bluetooth, bug, bundle, case, cash, cat, cell phone, charger, clock, communicator, cpu, dead, diy, door, ds, ea, fuel cell, game, Gaming, google, google voice, gun, hack, hacking, hacks, id, invite, iphone, jailbroken, knock, loa, lock, Mac, macheist, mixtape, nano, open, os, pc, pen, phone, remote, roundup, safari, secret, security, sentry, star trek, tap, tape, tech.nocr.at, tor, tracking, trek, tricorder, ui, usb, video, web 2.0, weekly | Add to del.icio.us | Stumble it | Reddit

DIY: Star Trek Bluetooth Communicator

Frank — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 05:15:24 +0000

How could a week go by without us talking about some sort of Star Trek reference or gadget? Now if you really want to ~~be singled out as a dork~~ show your love for Star Trek why not build yourself this bluetooth Star Trek communicator? I’m not talking about those wussy TNG communicators, I’m talking about the old school plastic molded with mesh screen original series communicators. (Check out the video after the break).

Makezine has a great detailed write up on build your very own super geeky handset.

I thought it would be fun to have a Star Trek: The Original Series Bluetooth communicator for a cellphone. I worked with Dave Clausen to hack one together from a toy Star Trek communicator, a Bluetooth module, and a microcontroller.

If you pair this us with a phone that does voice dialing then you could easily walk around town with you phone nowhere to be seen. Imagine all of the ~~beatings~~ looks you will get as you walk down the street talking into this iconic device.

[Link to Make a Star Trek Bluetooth Communicator]

DIY: Star Trek Bluetooth Communicator originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/11/07. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Turn A Dead 360 Into A PC

Frank — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 04:45:55 +0000

Got a dead 360 laying around that you can’t fix? Turn that sexy piece of hardware into a fully functional PC. The guys over at Hack N Mod have posted a detailed mod which converts a 360 console into a fully functional PC. Best of all, no red ring of death on this one. Check out the video after the break.

The main challenge with an Xbox to PC mod is fitting everything inside the cramped space of an Xbox 360. The CPU and the power supply have different sizes and line up differently. Innovation is the name of the game as electric0ant shows through careful planning and his project illustrations. Check out a few below. The complete step by step is given on his project page.

Now if only someone could cram a fully functional quad core into an altoids tin, that would be awesome.

[Link to Resurrect a Dead XBox 360 into a PC]

Turn A Dead 360 Into A PC originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/11/07. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Woops: 10.6.2 Doesn’t Kill Atom Support

Frank — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 04:13:26 +0000

Woops, looks like 10.6.2 won’t kill support for the Atom chip after all. All you netbook hackintosh users can now breath a sigh of relief. We reported a few days ago that the latest developer build of Leopard had support for the Atom chipset removed. None of the Apple hardware uses the Atom chip so it looked like it was a direct attack at killing off the hackintosh community. Well, we were wrong.

It looks like Apple has added support for the Atom chip back in. Not sure why they did this in the first place. It could have been a mistake, could just be a temporary measure, but it can change again at any time. Apple is notorious for going to extreme measures to it’s OS off of non Apple hardware. Only time will tell. In the meantime, enjoy the latest developer build on your netbook.

Woops: 10.6.2 Doesn’t Kill Atom Support originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/11/06. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Secret Knock Door Lock

Frank — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 05:09:36 +0000

Forget about all of those fancy RFID and Biometric door lock systems, build yourself a high-tech secret door knock lock.

By using an Arduino and a few other parts that were laying around, Steve Hoefer built a device that unlocks the door when it detects a certain knock pattern on the door. It works by listening and counting the time between knocks, and you can re-program the unit by simply holding down a button. Check out the video after the break of the Secret Knock Door Lock in action.

I wouldn’t depend on this to keep my place safe. It would be real easy for someone to hang out around the corner and listen to the knock and then they would know how to get in. The guys over at Hackszine have the right idea; incorporate a system where as you can use a series of one time knocks or incorporate a timestamp.

[Link to Secret Knock Door Lock]

Secret Knock Door Lock originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/11/05. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Hacker Hacks Jailbroken iPhone

Frank — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 04:55:51 +0000

We all know the dangers of running a jailbroken iPhone. No tech support, the wrath of your carrier, and simple exploits as demonstrated by Dutch hacker. With a little bit of port scanning to find jailbroken iPhones with SSH running he sent users a message that read “Your iPhone’s been hacked because it’s really insecure! Please visit doiop.com/iHacked and secure your iPhone right now! Right now, I can access all your files.”

The URL directs people to Paypal and requests €5 in exchange for instructions that explains how to remove the hack. How did the Dutch hacker get in? All jailbroken iPhones have a default root password, if you forget to change it your left wide open to this kind of attack.

This is more of an annoying attack than anything else. With root access to the phone a lot more could have been done. Remember, if you jailbreak your phone, for the love of God, change the root password.

Hacker Hacks Jailbroken iPhone originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/11/05. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

10.6.2 Kills Off Atom CPU Support

Frank — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 04:00:00 +0000

Looks like Apple is taking another step to put a nail in the coffin of the hackintosh community. Looks like the developer build of Mac OS 10.6.2 lacks support for Intel’s Atom processor which every netbook around uses and is very popular in the hackintosh community.

If this is a conscious move on Apple’s part and they let the build go live we might be looking at another cat an mouse game between Apple and the legions of hackers in the hackintosh world.

For the longest time Apple hasn’t really anything heavy at stopping people from installing their OS on non Apple hardware. With a move like this, which really doesn’t streamline the OS and looks like a blatant attack on the hackintosh world, I wonder how long it will take set community to find a work around. You can never keep the power of the people down (I just had to throw that one in there).

10.6.2 Kills Off Atom CPU Support originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/11/04. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

In Case You Missed It: Week 43 Round Up

Frank — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 13:35:51 +0000

In case you missed anything last week; we have everything from Metallica on your iPhone right through to a $1200 Mouse. Enjoy

Gadgets

Remote Controlled Tissue Box
Electronic Guitar Shirt
Sucker Alert: $1200 Mouse
Sucker Alert: Wattgate 381 “Audio Grade” Socket

Gaming

Nokia Kills The N-Gage – Are You Shocked?
Nintendo DSi Get’s Bigger
Quickdev16: SNES Developers Cart
Soccer Hero

Hacking and Security

Use Your iPhone To Control Your Car
Mr. Wake – The Uncatchable Alarm Clock
Crush Your Cans With Electricity
3D Video With One Camera
DIY: Tesla “Spooky Spirit” Radio
Phaser Boasts 300mW Laser
iPhone App To Crack Combination Locks

Mac

Tap Tap Revenge Metallica For The iPhone

Tech News

XBMC on ARM
Install 59 Apps Quickly And Easily
Water Drops At 2000 FPS

In Case You Missed It: Week 43 Round Up originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/11/01. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

© tech.nocr.at 2009 | Permalink | Comments | Read more in Tech News | Explore more in: 3d, ac, alarm, alarm clock, apps, arm, audio, camera, car, cart, case, cat, clock, comb, control, diy, ds, dsi, ea, gag, Gaming, guitar, hack, hacking, id, iphone, ir, kde, laser, led, loa, lock, Mac, metal, metallica, mouse, n-gage, nes, nintendo, nintendo ds, nintendo dsi, nokia, os, phaser, phone, radio, rc, remote, remote control, rip, roundup, security, shirt, snes, soccer, sucker, tap, tap tap revenge, tech.nocr.at, tesla, tissue, tron, ui, video, water, weekly, xbmc | Add to del.icio.us | Stumble it | Reddit

3D Video With One Camera

Frank — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 05:57:54 +0000

3D video has really started to make a strong comeback. I remember being a kid when the paper glasses with red and blue lenses were all the rage. Technology has changed a lot since then. The cost of creating 3D videos is so expensive that it prohibits the aspiring film maker from considering the option, but if you happen to have a CNC machine that you can access your on your way to brining that dream to life.

Gabriel, the crafty hacker, is using a SketchUp to plot the camera paths, a plugin to export those paths and automatically adjust them for perspective and a CNC machine to preform all of the movement. You take a pass at something for the left eye then the CNC machine takes a second pass at a different perspective for the right eye.

Simple eh, well it does have it’s drawbacks like the inability to shoot anything that’s moving. Although this isn’t the perfect setup, it does show you how creative some people can be. Maybe this would be perfect for stop motion 3D. Check out the two videos after the break. The first is the actually 3D video and the second shows a behind the scene on how the whole rig works.

[Link to 3D with CNC]

3D Video With One Camera originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/10/28. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Phaser Boasts 300mW Laser

Frank — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 04:15:23 +0000

Since you can’t walk into to your favorite weapons store and pick up a phaser just yet, hacker Luke decided to build his own. He picked up a toy phaser from Amazon for about $20 ripped out the internals only choosing to reuse the trigger, top switch and battery pack.

The phaser contains two laser diodes which were pulled from a 6x BD-R burner. I sure hope that the burner was broken since purchasing a unit just for the sake of pulling the diodes out to put in a toy gun is very expensive. The two diodes are mounted on a swiveling carriage which can be turned 180 degrees to switch between the diodes. A boost driver is used to bump up the 3v that the batteries provide to 7v to drive the diodes.

Although you won’t be killing Kingons with this unit it does make one cool looking toy. Remember, don’t go firing it in peoples eyes, that will hurt. Check out the video after the break.

Phaser Boasts 300mW Laser originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/10/26. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

In Case You Missed It: Week 42 Round Up

Frank — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 05:49:12 +0000

In case you missed anything this past week, we have everything from cooling with mineral oil to video editing on your iPhone. Enjoy.

Gadgets

Asus Keyboard PC

Gaming

Cool Your Xbox With Mineral Oil
PS3 Smashing Into A TV At 80 KMH
Open Source DS Bluetooth Adapter
Black Wii For The Brits
Rock Band For iPhone Now Available

Hacking and Security

Remote Control That’s Impossible To Lose
DIY: Build A Solar Power Station
PS3 Laptop
Hard Drive Lock Pick

Mac

Dead: ZFS For The Mac
Rebel EFI: A Thorn In Apples Side
ReelDirector: Video Editing For Your iPhone

Tech News

Project Eagle Claw: Taking Out The Scammers
Skype And Chrome Go Portable
Microsoft’s App Lab
Windows 7: Will You Upgrade?
B&N Nook Officially Released
Super Fast Robot Hands

In Case You Missed It: Week 42 Round Up originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/10/25. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

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iPhone App To Crack Combination Locks

Frank — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 05:05:52 +0000

Earlier this month we talked about how easy it was to hack a Master Lock (you know, one of those locks we all got in high school) by using some basic math. Well, someone has decided to write an iPhone app that will help you in your endeavor to remember the combination to your old gym or high school lock.

LockGenie is an app that helps you store and recover forgotten or lost combination lock passwords. It doesn’t actually hack the lock for you, but does all of the math for you and presents you with 100 possible combinations that will work on your lock. Now I know that 100 combinations sounds like a lot, but it’s far better than the millions of possible passwords a standard Master Lock has.

You can pick it up in the iTunes app store for $1.99. I know that sounds steep for a single purpose app, but if you have one or two combo locks laying around and you can’t remember their passwords it’s cheaper than replacing them.

[Link to LockGenie]

iPhone App To Crack Combination Locks originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/10/25. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Remote Control That’s Impossible To Lose

Frank — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 06:43:25 +0000

This is gonna be one of the easiest hacks you’ll ever do, at least from an electrical standpoint.

Most electronics like digital camera and cell phones have a loop attached to them so that you can slip a lanyard on to it which in turn makes it easier to find or harder to lose. This guy came up with a similar idea, albeit a tad too extreme in my opinion, but still an excellent way to ensure that his remote control never gets lost. Actually, by looking at the picture, he is now ensuring that his remote control will never move again, period.

If your not a blacksmith or if you don’t happen to have a massive I-beam laying around, this hack will probably cost you a lot more than a replacement remote control would cost.

[Link to Dad's Lost The Remote]

Remote Control That’s Impossible To Lose originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/10/24. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Rebel EFI: A Thorn In Apples Side

Frank — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 04:51:27 +0000

You guys remember Psystar, don’t you? Psystar was the company that openly sold hackintosh systems, complete with a beige box PC and OS X pre installed. Well looks like they have dealt another painful blow to the kids in Cupertino.

Rebel EFI is Psystar’s latest attempt at sending Steve Jobs off of the deep end. For $49.99 the company claims that their Rebel EFI software “allows for the easy installation of multiple operating systems” including OS X on plain old PC hardware. The software can also detect hardware on your system that is compatible with OS X.

There are always risks involved with running hackintosh systems. Apple can decide to roll out an update to OS X at anytime that will break this functionality and let’s not even get into the legal issues surrounding running an Apple OS on non Apple hardware.

If you want to see it for yourself you can grab a trial copy of the software off of their site that will run with a two hour time limit.

[link to Rebel EFI]

Rebel EFI: A Thorn In Apples Side originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/10/23. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

DIY: Build A Solar Power Station

Frank — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 04:36:06 +0000

Why lug around a generator when you could go green and build yourself a portable solar power station? Okay okay okay, so you’re not gonna the the juice out of this thing that you would out of say a 1500 watt gas generator, but if what you require is less than 400 watts of power then this is perfect for you.

The portable power unit has a solar panel that charges a 12 volt deep cycle battery which then in turn feeds a 400 watt inverter. This will also save you money in the long run. Besides the initial investment in the hardware there is no operating cost to use it. The only thing you require is sunlight, which last time I check is still a-plenty. Especially during the day.

[Link to Portable Power Station]

DIY: Build A Solar Power Station originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/10/22. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Open Source DS Bluetooth Adapter

Frank — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 02:58:31 +0000

Gordan Savicic and Gottfried Haider of DSbrut have just released their open source bluetooth adapter for the Nintendo DS. The adapter will allow the DS to interface to other bluetooth devices like GPS units and keyboards. This should really open up the homebrew scene.

Almost two years in the making, we’re happy to finally release our DS Bluetooth adapter. The tiny Slot-1 cartridge allows you to hook up the Nintendo DS wirelessly with other devices such as GPS-receivers, robots and so forth. Today we’re making all materials of the project openly available, including the schematics and a GPL-licensed software library for the Nintendo DS, because we believe in open hardware design and want to encourage collaboration in the hardware hacking community.
In our design, we use a tiny ATmega168 microcontroller to make the Nintendo DS speak to the RN-41 Bluetooth SMD module by Roving Networks. Using this piece of hardware the Nintendo DS can scan its neighbourhood and establish connections to other Bluetooth devices (supporting SPP). The module can also be remotely connected to, allowing for a range of interesting applications. We also developed a software library for the Nintendo DS, making it easy to use this new Bluetooth interface.

[Link to Open Source Bluetooth DS Adapter]

Open Source DS Bluetooth Adapter originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/10/20. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

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Jailbreak Resistant iPhone

Frank — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 05:15:12 +0000

Reports are flying around the internets that Apple is now shipping iPhones with a new bootrom that is resistant to the 24kpwn exploit that was used by the iPhone Dev-Team to jailbreak the iPhone. To be really honest with you I’m surprised it took Apple this long.

MuscleNerd, who is a Dev-Team member, has confirmed that the latest bootrom, iBoot-359.3.2 makes jailbreaking the iPhone impossible for the time being. People thought that the original iPhone would never be jailbroken when it was released too.

There has always been a cat and mouse game between manufactures and hackers. Take Nagravision, the company who creates the client access cards for the parent company of Dish Networks, Echostar. Hackers and Nagravision has been playing this game for years. A new encryption is release and shortly (some times not so shortly) there-after the encryption is broken. I’m sure it will only take some time and some crafty hacker will find another exploit that can be used to jailbreak the iPhone.

Jailbreak Resistant iPhone originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/10/17. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

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DIY: Front Door Opener

Frank — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 04:39:41 +0000

Ever wish you could open your front door the same way you open your car door? With a small key fob? This crafty (maybe even lazy) college student did just that.

We are talking some serious ass hardware hacking required to pull this off, but it’s one fun project to build, maybe not the nicest looking, but cool never-the-less. As you can see from the video it works well. I just wonder how safe this is. I use to have a car with a key fob that opened a neighbors garage. It was funny as hell. I’d lock my car and his door would open, i’d unlock it and his door would close.

[Link to Add a key fob to your door]

DIY: Front Door Opener originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/10/16. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Nuclear Battery In Your Pocket

Frank — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 05:30:16 +0000

Yep, you heard me correctly, a nuclear battery. Researchers at the University of Missouri have created super tiny nuclear power sources that can be used as batteries. Dead gadgets and XBox 360 controllers will soon be a thing of the past.

The secret to these tiny power plants is the use of new liquid semiconductors instead of solid ones. Don’t think you can run out and pick a set up at Radio Shack just yet. The current focus is on powering nano electromechanical systems not your digital camera. Which in my opinion might be a good idea. We have all heard of cell phone and laptop batteries exploding, imagine if something goes wrong with one of these. You’ll have a lot more to worry about than burn wounds.

Nuclear Battery In Your Pocket originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/10/08. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

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Hack A Master Lock

Frank — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 04:35:36 +0000

We all remember those Masterlock pad locks we had in high school. Some of us even remember trying to figure out how to get the combination for them. Some people would try everything from listening carefully to clicks right to pulling hard on it while spinning the tumbler hoping to feel a click.

Now mathematically we know that their are 64,000 possible combinations but what I didn’t know is by using this simple formula above (go ahead and click on it to take a closer look) you can drop that number to 100 or less. I agree it’s not the stuff that most professional lock picks have but it sure beats trying all 64,000 possibilities.

Hack A Master Lock originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/10/08. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

PSP Go Gets Patrially Owned

Frank — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 20:33:34 +0000

What’s the thing been out for? 4 or 5 days? and it already has been partially owned. This has to be a record somewhere.

It looks like your typical save game exploit, but it also seems that it doesn’t allow enough access to the hardware yet to install something like custom firmware. If the great team of modders working on the PSP go keep this up we should have some custom firmware roll out in the next few weeks, hopefully.

Check out the video of the exploit in action below.

PSP Go Gets Patrially Owned originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/10/05. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Solar Oven From Office Supplies

Frank — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 05:04:45 +0000

Why would you use that simple and easy to use device called a microwave to heat up your lunch when you can build you very own solar oven using some basic office supplies? Well if your the MacGyver of the office this simple and easy how to is right up your alley.

I’m sure using this to heat up yesterdays left-overs will easily take up your entire lunch break but it is a simple and easy hack and probably a hell of a lot better for you than using a microwave.

Link to Office Warrior Solar Oven

Solar Oven From Office Supplies originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/10/03. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

EEE 4G External Antenna Mod

Frank — Mon, 18 May 2009 03:52:51 +0000

I love to use Back Track as my all around security testing OS (If your not sure what Back Track is check out my little write up about it the other day). I also love to use Back Track on my EEE pc. It’s small, light, and has decent wifi range. Thanks to Larry Pesce that will soon change. He modded his Asus EEE 4G Surf with an external RP-TNC antenna connector. This will definitely increase the range when your out scoping open wifi’s.

Full details on the surgical procedure can be found here

EEE 4G External Antenna Mod originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/05/17. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Pedal Powered USB

Frank — Thu, 14 May 2009 12:23:25 +0000

Most people who own gadgets that are USB powered have a billion different charging cables. A USB cable to use with your computer, a few wall warts to change your stuff at home or at the office, a car USB charger, hell, some of us even have battery powered altoid tins to charge our iPod’s and Cell Phone’s. What about the poor folk who ride their bikes everywhere they go? Do we have something for you.

Now you can build this not so easy and somewhat complicated device that will charge your gadgets as you pedal around town. Originally created by a group of guys using a grant from MIT. The device, which was originally planned to charge your mp3 player as you run ended up evolving into a bicycle based charger.

If you want to attempt this yourself, you’ll need about $275 and some advanced knowledge of electronics. Although this project isn’t for the faint of heart, if you ride a bike all the time you can charge everything you have on you. Plus, it’s super green and allows you to do your part to help mother nature.

Pedal Powered USB originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/05/14. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

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Industrial Strength Firewall, Poor Mans Budget

Frank — Tue, 12 May 2009 05:44:27 +0000

What in this world could protect your computer(s) or network better than a firewall? If you said not connecting your machine to the Internet your right, but most of us can’t live for more than a few minutes without being online. Hell, it gives me the shakes.

Now, here at the Frank residences we have multiple machines. A family machine, a MythTV box, various gaming consoles, a bunch of laptops, and a bunch of servers that preform various tasks. We also have multiple static IP’s to help out with the work load. It’s a lot of traffic coming and going, and although a basic Linksys or Dlink might do just fine, I was looking for something more flexible, something more powerful. I have gone through many open source firewall/router packages in the past and they all have their pro’s and con’s, but one the I have stumbled on and love is pfSense.

This project started in 2004 as a fork of the m0n0wall project, but focused towards full PC installations rather than the embedded hardware focus of m0n0wall. pfSense also offers an embedded image for Compact Flash based installations, however it is not the primary focus. It has a powerful packaging system that allows you to add additional functionality like a squid proxy server or Radius server to it’s already long list of features.

Right out of the box you get some neat features that you might only see in a massive commercial product.

Outbound Load Balancing – If you have multiple Internet connections you can use the built in load balancing feature to bridge them together into one fat pipe.
VPN – Built in OpenVPN, PPTP and IPsec servers for when you fell like calling home.
Redundancy – Setup 2 multiple firewalls. In case one pfSense server dies, the other one will pick up the slack.
Real Time Graphing – See exactly what’s going on with your traffic.

If you have a spare PC laying around and want the solid protection that a industrial grade firewall can offer then give pfSense a try. You really don’t need to be a BSD wizard to install it either. Download the iso, burn it to a cd, load the cd and choose install. All of the configuration and settings are changed via’s it’s intuitive web page.

Give it a whirl, you won’t be disappointed.

Industrial Strength Firewall, Poor Mans Budget originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2009/05/12. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

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Duplicate Keys From An Image

Frank — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 03:48:10 +0000

Think your keys are safe on your desk? Think again. Computer programmers at UC San Diego have created some software that can pose a serious threat. Dubbed “Sneakey”, it can analyze an image (not even a good one) of a key from almost any angle and create an exact replica. In the picture above, the team successfully reproduced a key using an image that was shot with a telephoto lens from 200 feet away.

“You only need to click a few control points in the image of the key and the ‘Sneakey’ program does the rest,” programmer Benjamin Laxton told a UCSD reporter, “It normalizes the key’s size and position so that each pixel then corresponds to a known distance. From this information the height of each of the key cuts can easily be computed and likewise the bitting code can be extracted.”

What can you do to protect yourself? Apparently not much. Keep your keys in your pocket at all times and you should be safe.

Duplicate Keys From An Image originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2008/11/06. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

SNES Controller Mod For The PSP

Frank — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 21:48:15 +0000

A crafty hacker received a request to adapt a SNES controller to a PSP. The requester has limited use of one hand which made the PSP controls to difficult for her to use, but she had no problem playing with an SNES controller.

Born from that request is this clean mod. A port in the back of the PSP allows for the SNES controller to function. The neat thing is that the SNES cable and connector on the back also act as a “stand” for the PSP so you could comfortably sit back and enjoy your favorite PSP game.

[Link to SNES PSP Controller Mod]

Sometimes the PSP’s controller just, well, sucks.

SNES Controller Mod For The PSP originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2008/10/29. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

iPhone 3G Baseband Almost Cracked

Frank — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 02:16:32 +0000

In true iPhone-Dev Team fashion, the iPhone 3G baseband has almost been cracked. What does this mean to the average user? Carrier independence. Cracking the baseband allows for hacked code to run at the telecomm level. This is exactly how the iPhone-Dev team brought freedom to the first-gen iPhone last year.

Sadly you still have to sign up for an AT&T contact on site before you can get your hands on the 2nd-gen iPhone, but with the ability of “ulocking” available, it shouldn’t be too long before we see used iPhones making their way onto Ebay.

[Link to iPhone-Dev Team]

iPhone 3G Baseband Almost Cracked originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2008/10/27. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Is Your Printer Spying On You?

Frank — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 01:21:26 +0000

Seems that all of those forensic based TV shows were right all along, police can track the make, model, and serial number of a printer just by looking at a piece of paper that came from that printer. Scary stuff. Good to know that the guys at the EFF are actually trying to do something about this.

You can help the project by sending in prints from your printer. The larger their collection, the larger the possibility of them cracking the code. You can visit the EFF’s printer dot project here

Is Your Printer Spying On You? originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2008/10/23. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Wirelessly Eavesdropping On Keyboards

Frank — Tue, 21 Oct 2008 04:02:19 +0000

Seems that every time you press a key on your keyboard a small burst of electromagnetic radiation is let out. So what you say? What if I told you that the radiation can be captured and decoded. Yes, some crafty hacker can sit near quietly and capture your key strokes without every touching or installing software on your machine.

11 different keyboards were tested and they were are vulnerable to at least one of the four different methods of attack. Tests have also shown that the data can be captured through walls and up to 65 feet away. It’s scary to think that someone could be be in the apartment beside you and logging everything you do without any type of attack. Think of it as a hack right out of the box.

They don’t list what keyboard are affect as they are finishing their paper on it, but as soon as get more info we will pass it on.

Wirelessly Eavesdropping On Keyboards originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2008/10/21. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

LED Hard Drive Clock

Frank — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 04:03:09 +0000

There have been many “Clocks” built out of old hard drives, but this one has to take the cake. Ian Smith this super cool clock from an old hard drive he had laying around. By using some tri-colour LEDs, a PIC microcontroller, and some simple vision techniques he has built something that not only functions as a clock but as a pie chart by the looks of it.

The platter has a slit cut through it so that as the disk spins the illumination of the LEDs shine through. Due to the speed (5400 RPM or about 90 revs a second) the eyes are tricked into seeing a colour. So by turning the LEDs off and on at just the right time you can make this thing display a clock, pie chart, or any other circular art you can think of.

[Link to LED Hard Drive Clock]

LED Hard Drive Clock originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2008/10/20. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

RockBand For Those Over 40

Frank — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 02:51:39 +0000

Over 40 and wonder what the whole RockBand or Guitar Hero crazy is all about? Want to jump in but don’t know how to? Maybe you would be better off with Dan’s mish-mash of sound and electronics. This guitar has been stripped of all it’s internals and has a CPU and all sorts of cool audio circuitry stuffed inside. The Fender Bender is more machine than guitar.

You can even play the instrument with a custom made pick guard built from an old motherboard and some resistors.

[Link to Fender Bender]

RockBand For Those Over 40 originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2008/10/19. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

Laser Music Sequencer

Frank — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 04:04:46 +0000

If you have ever been to a club you can usually be assured to see some kind of light show (unless the clubs you frequent are in some back alley). Most of those light shows incorporate lasers to add to the experience. Now you can create your own laser show that will act to the music, albeit a small show, but great for your room.

Funky Alex has come up with a cool dual speaker laser X/Y mirror display that will bounce a laser around to the beat of the music. I’m sure if you had some bigger speakers and a longer throw you could probably have this display on an entire wall.

The vibrations from the 2 base speakers (with 1 mirror an each speaker) makes the laserbeam move with the music and the frequencies (audio).

You can find entire instructions on building your own including links to some software for your Mac to help you draw some cool effect on Instructables

Laser Music Sequencer originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2008/10/18. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.

PSP 5.0 Firmware Hacked

Frank — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 03:33:07 +0000

Is there anything that hacker Dark_AleX can’t do? I mean just a mere 2 days after Sony releasing version 5.0 of it’s firmware for the PSP he has gone and thwarted the security measures. This will allow people to update their PSP without the fear of losing and homebrew functionality.

5.0 brings some useful features to the table like the Playstation store that will bring direct download movies, and games.

PSP 5.0 Firmware Hacked originally appeared on tech.nocr.at on 2008/10/17. Reproduction of content not allowed without consent.