KR1 DIY guitar / synth makes its debut at Castle Frightenstein

We’ve seen a few Zoybar-based behemoths since we were hepped to the modular guitar platform way back in ’08, but few have caught our fancy like Kevin Rupp’s KR1. Featuring a Korg Kaossilator synth, both the Pocket Pod and a wireless transmitter from Line 6, and the beloved Sanyo Pedal Juice battery pack, this bad boy can do double duty as both your ax and your backing band. But enough of our jabber jaw — you want to see it in action, right? Check it out after the break.

[Thanks, TK]

Continue reading KR1 DIY guitar / synth makes its debut at Castle Frightenstein

KR1 DIY guitar / synth makes its debut at Castle Frightenstein originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 05 Apr 2011 11:25:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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DIY NES in an NES Game Cartridge

NES in NES Cartridge

We’ve all marveled at one point or another at how technology has changed even in the past few years. Mobile phones are smaller and more powerful; computers are thinner, lighter, and more powerful than ever. Even so, what about game consoles? They’re still fairly large, even though “slim” models generally come a few years after their release. If the original Nintendo Entertainment System were released today, how small could it be? 
One DIY enthusiast over at Instructables wanted to try their hand at making an NES as small as possible, and wound up fitting the entire console inside of an NES game cartridge. That’s right – they managed to get the entire console, including ports for controllers and an on-off switch inside of one of the cartridges you used to insert into the console to play. 
The modder, known over at Instructables as dany32412, found himself an old Famicom (the Japanese version of the NES) and took it apart. With some hard work, he managed to squeeze the whole thing into the cartridge, and standard NES controllers even work with the cartridge console. Instructions, as always, are at Instructables if you want to try it yourself.

Spotify Radio Puts Playlists On Physical Disks

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Jordi Parra’s Spotify Box is a wonderful reworking of the mix-tape and the radio, all in a hot little Dieter Rams-inspired box.

It works like this. The “radio” part has (or will have) a Wi-Fi connection and runs the Spotify music-streaming service using libspotify on embedded Linux. The radio comes with a clutch of tiny RFID disks. These can be tied to any Spotify track or playlist, so when you pop them into the little RFID-reading circle on the front of the box, music starts to play. Buttons on the faceplate let you skip tracks.

Apart from the wonderful look of the box, I like the concept a lot. You get the convenience and huge music library of Spotify, but the physicality and hand-crafted playlists come from the days of CDs, vinyl and cassette tapes.

That perforated front isn’t just a speaker grille, either. LEDs behind the holes light up in a kind of dot-matrix to make numbers, letter and icons to let your know what is happening inside. Here’s the video:

Spotify box from Jordi Parra on Vimeo.

Parra plans on continuing with his project, and has even been in contact with people from Spotify. Right now the box is little more than a peripheral that needs to be connected to a computer to play music, but those are just details. The idea itself is a good one. And add in some kind of AirPlay or Bluetooth audio capabilities and you have a super useful — not to mention hot-looking — wireless speaker for the home.

Spotify Radio [Jordi Parra / Zenona]

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Man steers R/C car with his hands, not to mention an HTML5-based web app (video)

With the right Arduino board, an R/C race car, a couple paperclips and the MacGyver spirit, we imagine most anyone can hack together a creative remote control these days… but how many can open-source an HTML5 web app that’ll do the deed from any tablet, phone or PC? Gaurav Manek crafted just such a thing, and he’ll demonstrate it for you on an Apple iPad in the video immediately above. What’s more, he’s also got a Kinect hack that uses Microsoft depth camera (with Code Laboratories’ NUI SDK) to control the very same with the wave of a well-placed hand — we’re already envisioning fisticuffs should he and a lab partner try for some head-to-head racing action. That said, you don’t need to wait for an illustrious creator to have all the fun. Why not download his source code at our links below and give it a go yourself?

Man steers R/C car with his hands, not to mention an HTML5-based web app (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 03 Apr 2011 14:21:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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DIY Tupperware Turret Offers Hours Of Enjoyment, Hiding From Angry Coworkers

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Getting tired of fellow office-workers bugging you at your desk? Chris over at PyroElectro put together the perfect solution for angry cubicle-dwellers like yourself. If you’ve got a spare airsoft gun, cake platter, TV remote and some electronics know-how, you can put together a remoted-controlled, fully-automatic airsoft turret. The device rotates and shoots pellets based on commands given to it from a distance using a standard remote control, all from the protection of a cake-tupperware shield. That said, the shield will only protect the turret; you pretty much have to deal with the people you shoot on your own.

PyroElectro has a step-by-step tutorial you can follow on their site with instructions on how to build this little weapon of minimal destruction. However, the project is rated at “medium-hard” difficulty and takes about 11 hours to complete, according to the site. Proceed at your own (and others’) risk.

[via Make, PyroElectro]

Gorgeous Bench Made From Discarded Metro Cards

metrocard bench.jpg

Anyone who has be on the New York City subway in the past several years knows that the underground transit system is perpetually littered with discarded Metrocards. Sometimes the things can be refilled, but many of the longterm cards are rendered useless the moment their time is up, and those disposal boxes that only exist as a place to get rid of the cards are seemingly perpetually overflowing.

New York artist Steve Shaheen opted to turn waste into art, soliciting people on Craigslist to help him collect disposed cards. In the end, they collected 5,000 Metrocards in less than a week. “There is something very personal about handling so many small belongings that were once riding around in peoples’ pockets,” Shaheen said of the cards. “There are untold personal stories in that inconspicuous, flimsy plastic.” 
The cards were placed over a steel frame to construct a flowing bench, which has since gone on to be displayed at NYC’s Sloan Fine Art museum.

Gadget Lab Notes: 8-Bit Camera App Snaps Game Boy Camera-Style Photos

The 8-Bit Pocket Camera App gives your photos a nostalgic, pixelated feel

8-Bit Pocket Camera App Wastes Your Smartphone’s Megapixels for Fun Photos
5-megapixel cameras, 8-megapixel cameras? Totally unnecessary—at least that’s what the makers of the 8-Bit Pocket Camera app want you to think. This $1 iOS app lets you take 200 x 200 tiffs reminiscent of the pictures (and quality) that the Game Boy Camera used to take back in the day (which were 128 x 112). The black and white pixilated pics you snap with this app can also be stylized, distorted, or enhanced with a border or different paper color, and will export as PNG files when emailed or posted online.

Recreate the Game Boy Camera with 8-Bit Pocket Camera App [Cult of Mac]

A Mouse That Doesn’t Click? My Ears Rejoice!
Click. Click click. Clickety clickclick click. For those who find themselves eternally irritated by the noise associated with every mouse button push, Nexus has a product for you: the Silent Mouse. It’s built with a patented switch that makes no sound when it’s clicked. The Silent Mouse is wireless, connecting to your notebook or PC via a nano receiver. It’s also got a button for selecting 1000 or 1600 DPI sensitivity, which is great for those who work on a large monitor.

Nexus Silent Mouse [Nexus via Slashgear]

Samsung Ships Notebooks With Keylogger Installed
The StarLogger keylogger program has been found preinstalled and active on two new Samsung laptops. The software logs every keystroke and takes screen caps, and can regularly email the data it collects without the user ever knowing this has been done. The affected laptops were purchased by Mohamed Hassan and detected when he installed security software. The first notebook that had the keylogger installed was eventually returned due to a driver issue; its replacement had the same keylogger program installed.

Samsung Installs Keylogger on its Laptop Computers [Network World via Geek.com]

Touchscreen Interface Simulates a Stretchy, Flexible Surface
Rather than just pinching to zoom and swiping to slide your position further along a screen, researchers at Osaka University have developed a touchscreen display that appears to flex, as if it were made of elastic material. So when you drag your finger to change what part of a map you’re viewing, for instance, the screen visually resists that movement, squishing and stretching the map’s proportions to keep your original position in perspective until you release your finger, almost like the map is printed on a sheet of rubber.

New Flex Touchscreen Interface Demonstrated Using Google Maps [Diginfo.tv via Crunchgear]



The PiCycle Electric Bike is Frowning at You
The PiCycle e-bike uses a 48V brushless DC motor to help power you up steep hills, across vast distances, or just on your daily commute. It can take you up to 20 miles without a single pedal on your part and reach speeds up to 30mph. Other featuers include an internal hub transmission, a beltdrive system, shifting on-the-fly, a suspension seat post, and hydraulic brakes. Its perfectly arched frame looks like a rainbow, or a frownie face.

PiCycle LTD Electric Bike [PiCycle via Uncrate]

Creative Coffee Table Is a Four-Person Pong Game
There’s no need for a coffee table in today’s world to be simply made of wood and just sit there. The coffee table is the perfect piece of furniture to transform into something interactive, like a four person game of pong played on a 30 x 30 matrix of red LEDs. Players use one of four knobs placed along each side to slide their bat left and right. The game can support up to 5 balls for more complicated play.

Super Pong Coffee Table [Instructables via Technabob]


Super Pong Table serves up four-way retro play, whole lot of awesome (video)

Sure it’s just sliding sticks and bouncing balls, but anyone who grew up playing Atari can tell you that Pong rules. Unfortunately, its earliest incarnation only supported enough 2D fun for two, which is why our eyes just about popped out of our heads when we saw this. The folks over at Instructables are showing off another awesome retro gaming project that makes everyone’s favorite game a party pleaser — it’s also a pretty good fix for an old coffee table. The Super Pong Table allows for up to four players and fives balls per game, and enlists 900 LEDs and four Atari paddle controllers to make the thing work. Each player controls his or her own stick and gains or loses a point depending on whether they hit or miss a ball — the first player to reach 20 points gets their very own “YOU WIN” light up display. Looks like we just found something to do with our weekend. You can check out a video of the table in action after the break or follow the source link for instructions on making your own.

Continue reading Super Pong Table serves up four-way retro play, whole lot of awesome (video)

Super Pong Table serves up four-way retro play, whole lot of awesome (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 29 Mar 2011 20:58:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Students build self-balancing TIPI robot, plan new world order (video)

Remember this guy, the QB robot that was priced at a whopping 15 grand? Seemingly, the webcam wheeler inspired a team of young minds at the University of Waterloo, who’ve unleashed the DIY in themselves to build one of their own. TIPI, or Telepresence Interface by Pendulum Inversion, was designed to give humans the feeling that they’re not actually talking to a six-foot tall cyclops cyborg with an LCD face and webcam eye, but rather, evoke the emotions drawn when speaking the old, conventional, face-to-face way. Thanks to this team of mechatronics engineers, the low-cost TIPI uses an accelerometer, gyro and pendulum to balance by itself and can be remotely controlled while communicating via its Beagle Board and Polulu Orangutan SVP brain. Head past the break to see the robot struttin’ its stuff — oh, and get ready to rave. You’ll see what we mean.

Continue reading Students build self-balancing TIPI robot, plan new world order (video)

Students build self-balancing TIPI robot, plan new world order (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 28 Mar 2011 17:32:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Homeless Man Builds Car From Scrap

carro620.jpgAs any regular Car Talk listener will tell you, old Fiats aren’t exactly known for being the most durable cars in the world. A homeless man in Brazil took advantage of the discarded shells of these junkers and threw together a brand new car, built entirely from scrap. Starting with a 125cc motorcycle engine, Orismar de Souza was able to put together a working vehicle, capable of hitting 50mph on the highway and featuring such luxuries as a reverse gear and an actual car starter to replace the kickstarter of the 125cc engine. It also sports an in-dash stereo.

After panhandling in the streets for months to raise the $270 he needed for the car’s metal plating, de Souza built the body panels by hand, borrowing a chisel and hammer as tools for the job. Most of the other parts used in making the car came from old discarded Fiats. His previous experience with metalworking led him to be confident in his automotive creation, but that didn’t stop others from telling him that his project was just a joke. The looks on their faces after the car hit 50 must have been priceless.

The finished machine was able to help de Souza land both a home and a job, a fitting end to this inspiring DIY story. And I have a feeling his car is even more reliable than the ones he built it from. At least if it breaks down, no one will tell him he can’t fix it.

[via Hack-A-Day, Jalopnik]