Intelligent flashlight will literally show you the way

intelligent-flashlight

Flashlights are so 20th Century. Be it the incandescent type that popped up very early on, or LED models with came around in the 90's, there's not much excitement to the devices. But [Sriranjan Rasakatla] is doing his best to change that. This is his WAY-GO Torch, an intelligent flashlight (a Smart Light?) that will not just light your path, but overlay useful data on it. At the front of the … [Read more...]

$3 adds sweet tunes to your project

Adding-MP3-to-your-project-for-300

It's a fun time to design your own MP3 player, lovingly adding in features to a meticulously crafted user interface. But sometimes you just want a quick and cheap way to add music to a project. [Jeff Ledger] will show you how to do just that using some knock-off hardware from overseas. Instead of a proper breakout board -- which can cost a bundle -- he used a generic MP3 player acquired for $3 … [Read more...]

Just in case you didn’t know how awesome laser cutters really are

laser-cut-gears

[Alex] got his hands on an Epiloge laser cutter the easy way -- the company he works for bought one. We're sure he's not trying to rub it in, but he really does make the tool look and sound cool in the post he wrote purely to show off the new toy hardware. This model is a CO2 laser and it's capable of etching and cutting a variety of materials. It does so with a 1200 DPI resolution at 0.005 … [Read more...]

Electronics that tell you to wash the dishes

SAMSUNG

Nothing stinks up the house like a sink full of dirty dish. Well, a full trash can will do it to a greater extent, but that's a project for another day. In what must be an overreaction to a perpetually full sink of dishes at his London Hackerspace, [Tom] built a web-connected dirty dish detector. He calls it the Great OpenCV Wash-Up Detector. The system features a series of different signals to … [Read more...]

Wii Nunchuck on an 80s computer

MSX

For a computer that debuted in the early 80s the MSX was a very respectable machine. Of course  these were the days that superimposing graphics over a video was an amazing feat, but  [Danjovic] and [Igor] are still having fun with their boxen. They designed a software interface for the Wii Nunchuck (translation) on their trusty MSX computer. The plug coming out the back of a standard … [Read more...]

The TIM-8 is the smallest 8-bit relay computer ever

relay

Who wouldn't want to build a computer out of relays? We do, but we've got too many projects on our plate already. It looks like [rory] has his priorities in order because his build is one of the most amazing we've ever seen. We've seen [Harry Porter]'s amazing relay computer and we're familiar with [Konrad Zuse]'s WWII era endeavours. Relay computers aren't exactly uncommon, but [rory] … [Read more...]

Hackaday Links: January 16, 2012

xbox

Finally the 13-year-old on Battlefield 3 will get their comeuppance [Shawn] sent in his fully adjustable auto-fire mod for an XBox360 controller. It's pretty simple - just an ATtiny85 soldered to a button with a pot to adjust the rate and switch to turn it on and off. It could have been done with a 555, but this is good enough. Now one for the PS3 bronies [Capt-Nemo] loves and … [Read more...]