Hasta La Gadget!

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.

Permalink Hack A Day  |  Gaurav Manek  | Email this | Comments

If your foremost dream is to jack into a dystopian cyberpunk reality where hackers play with human brains (and you also happen to love Japanese anime), you’d best book your flight to Tokyo right now — a Shibuya department store has set up a basic cyberspace simulator straight out of Ghost in the Shell. That’s the film Ghost in the Shell: S.A.C. Solid State Society, to be precise, which just got a stereoscopic 3D re-release in Japan this week, and in its honor creative services company Kayac set about constructing a high-quality Kinect hack. Microsoft’s depth camera tracks the lean of your body, while the honeyed virtual reality is projected onto a pair of nearby walls, and it’s your objective to slap the Tachikoma tank silly without falling over yourself. Get a peek at what it’s like to play with in the video above.

Kinect dives into anime cyberspace, dares you to catch cute robot tanks (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 30 Mar 2011 20:51:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink CrunchGear  |  BMCL (Vimeo)  | Email this | Comments

Our man Ben Heck has done it again — this time, he’s taken modding to a new, retro level. Atari requested that Heck create a modded system as a promo for its new games, so our man teamed up with element14 and did what he does best. The master of mods has gutted an Xbox 360 and shoved it into a one-of-a-kind Atari 2600-esque case that he calls ‘Xbox 360 1977 Edition.’ The system’s got switches from old Atari systems had that control disc-ejection and controller synchronization. Just like the classic Ataris, Heck’s portable gaming laptop’s got wood panels and a black finish — and it’s huge. The best part of this mod? Well, playing Street Fighter on Xbox 360 hidden inside of what would be a modern version of a classic like Atari is pretty cool, in our opinion. As cool a classic like the Virtual Boy though? We’ll leave that for you to decide. Oh, and be sure to hit the source link to watch the mod get formed in 23 glorious minutes.

Ben Heck crafts Atari-styled Xbox-360, takes us back to the ’70s originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 22 Mar 2011 16:22:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The latest generation of gaming gadgets do some nifty tricks, and one of the niftiest they might perform is assisting the realm of medicine. Microsoft’s Kinect sounded like a candidate for surgery, and this month real-life surgeons have actually put it to use — Sunnybrook Hospital in Toronto, Canada rigged the Xbox 360 depth camera to its medical imaging computer. Now, doctors don’t have to scrub out to manipulate an MRI scan, or even appoint a peon to the task — rather, they simply raise their bloodied glove, and dive into the digital imagery with a wave of a dextrous hand.

Meanwhile, the American Optometric Association has expanded upon its initial praise of Nintendo’s 3DS, saying the autostereoscopic 3D handheld “could be a godsend for identifying kids under 6 who need vision therapy.” Though Nintendo’s warning labels had originally incited a bit of fear among parents, the organization says that kids who can’t experience the 3DS to its full potential may have amblyopia (or other vision disorders) that can be more easily treated the earlier it’s caught, though one doctor interviewed by the Associated Press contends that kids with amblyopia may not know what they’re missing to begin with — so don’t necessarily expect a panacea, folks.

Kinect keeps surgeons on task, Nintendo 3DS might assist optometrists with diagnoses originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 21 Mar 2011 07:34:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink Joystiq  |  AP, The Canadian Press  | Email this | Comments

You knew this was coming — it was only a matter of time — and here it is, Apple’s latest creation sans the iOS 4.3 chains. The development community credits @comex with installing Cydia on this white iPad 2, and he’s apparently already hard at work on a public jailbreak. According to his Twitter feed, the hack required a brand new exploit, as previous bugs were squashed in iOS 4.3. We’ll keep you posted on when the hack’s ready for you to use, too.

[Thanks, Henrique and Vassilis]

iPad 2 jailbroken, no ETA on public release originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 13 Mar 2011 20:45:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |  @chpwn (Twitter), @comex (Twitter)  | Email this | Comments