Want that 70″ LCD television in your living room to be an Android device? This little guy can make it happen. With an HDMI port on one end, and a USB plug on the other for power, just plug in FXI Technologies’ Cotton Candy dongle to create a 1080p Android television.

The price isn’t set for the device, but it’s expected to be available at less than $200. Considering what’s inside that’s pretty reasonable. There’s a dual-core 1.2 GHz ARM processor, 1 gig of RAM, 64 gigs of storage, Bluetooth, WiFi, and a microSD card slot. Wow!

So is it hackable? Absolutely. Well, kind of? The company doesn’t intend to bring Cotton Candy to the retail market. Instead, they will sell the device to developers who may do what they wish. From there, said developers have the option to license the technology for their own products. This begs the question, will the development kit come in under $200? Hard to say.

Check out the video after the break to hear an interview with the company’s CEO. It certainly sounds fascinating, and like the Chumby NeTV, we can’t wait to see what comes of this. Read the rest of this entry »

[Anthony Pray] had his car stereo stolen. When thinking about replacing it he realized the he and his wife never used it for anything other than an Auxiliary connection to play songs from their cellphones. So instead of buying a head unit he pulled an unused home audio amplifier out of a dark corner of his house and wired it to the car speakers. Problem solved, except that the under-dash installation meant the only volume control is on the phone playing the audio. He decided to build a wireless audio controller that would let him send commands to the phone without quite as much distraction from the road.

The device you see above is his creation. What a beauty. But seriously, it’s so random and hacked together how can you not love it? And, it works!

The frame is made from plastic coat hangers, and the wheel is an old RC control knob. There’s even a play/pause feature built from the clicking properties of a retractable ball-point pen. A Cypress PSoC board reads the knob and pen positions, then pushes commands via a Bluetooth module in order to control the phone. He recorded a testing video (after the break) which gives you a better look at the functionality of this setup. Read the rest of this entry »

[Ytai], the lead developer for the IOIO breakout board for the Android Open Accessory kit, figured out how to control just about anything from an Android phone wirelessly over Bluetooth.

When [Ytai] first announced the IOIO breakout board for Android devices, one of the commentors on his post said a standard Bluetooth dongle could stand in for the USB cable between the phone and the IOIO. Wireless control of home automation project and robots was just too good of an idea to let go, so [Ytai] dove into this new Bluetooth project.

After getting a cheap Bluetooth dongle from DealExtreme, [Ytai] found btstack, a lightweight Bluetooth stack that was perfect for an embedded environment. Dealing with the USB driver for a no-name Bluetooth adapter didn’t come as easily, but after a few long nights, [Ytai] emerged victorious.

He still has a few more problems to overcome. Namely, supporting environments where more than IOIO board is available. [Ytai] is thinking about adding support for WiFi dongles, something we’d love to see. Check out [Ytai]‘s demo of wireless control of a servo after the break.

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[Sean] happened to have an extra Android phone sitting around and wanted to see what type of home automation he could use it for. One simple hardware modification, and some apps from the Android Market let him monitor and control his garage door remotely.

The hardware modification is a hack we’ve already looked at. The BTmate uses a Bluetooth headset with an added transistor to short the connections on your garage door opener. The only issue is that you need to be within range for the Bluetooth to work. [Sean] adds a layer of abstraction by using two Android phones. One is permanently mounted in the garage and handles the Bluetooth connectivity, while the other uses VNC to tunnel in anywhere he has an Internet connection.

But why stop there? He knew that this one feature was overkill, and added a second which the phone was perfect for. Since it has its own camera, he used the tinyCam app to create a webcam server. This even allows him to turn the LED on and off for a better view in dim light conditions. See [Sean's] demonstration after the break.

Overkill? Maybe, but if you’ve got a phone with a broken LCD, this might be just the thing to give it a new purpose.

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It’s been a while since we checked in on [Travis Goodspeed]. His latest post makes RF sniffing with the Next HOPE badge more portable by ditching the need to display data on a computer. He’s built on the work he did at the beginning of the year, replacing the FTDI chip on the badge with a Bluetooth module. Now he can use his Nokia N900 as a GoodFET terminal to not only display the packets pulled from the air, but the control the badge as well.

Previously, the client running on the computer was communicating with the badge via a serial connection. To get it working on the N900 [Travis] transitioned from using py-serial over to using py-bluez. All of the code changes are available from the GoodFET repository.

He’s got a few other tricks planned for this concept. He put in a parts order to add Bluetooth to the Girltech IM-ME. The pretty pink pager has the same radio chip on board, so adding Bluetooth connectivity will allow it to be used in the same way. There are also plans in the works to add a couple other packet sniffing protocols to the bag of tricks, including ZigBee.

[James] is one of those guys on a quest to control everything with one device. His tool of choice is an Android phone, which can do quite a lot right out of the box. But he was never satisfied with its lack of IR remote control abilities. He fixed that feature-gap by building a Bluetooth to Infrared translator.

The hardware he used for the prototype is quite simple. A cheap serial Bluetooth modem from eBay lets him connect to his phone. An Arduino board listens for data from the modem and converts incoming commands to flashes on an IR LED. Voila, he can control the tube with his phone.

We love the potential of this hack. The Bluetooth module runs from 3.3V, and reading serial data and flashing an LED is extremely simple. You should be able to use a small uC, say an ATtiny13, and a 3.3V regulator to miniaturize the module. We could see this plugging into the USB port on the back of a TV for power, with a wire extension to put the LED into position. The only shortfall is the inability to turn the TV on remotely when drawing power this way.

Remote codes aren’t particularly large to store either. So this would be pretty easy to extend to full control of all IR-compatible home entertainment devices. You just need a tool to discover the remote control codes.

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[Oscar] shows us how to use a Processing sketch for Android to communicate with Bluetooth devices (translated). It turns out this is easier than you might think. Processing and Android are both closely related to Java, and you can just import the Android libraries that deal with Bluetooth within the Processing sketch. That makes it easy to enable the Bluetooth modem when the sketch is launched, and manages connecting with devices as well as sending and receiving data.

For this example [Oscar] is using an Arduino with a Bluetooth module as a test device. His sketch first shows what devices are available, then connects to the one you select from the list. The 11 lines of Arduino code transmit a value via the serial port, and listens back for a command to toggle the LED on pin 13. [Oscar] takes time in his tutorial to show us how each step of the Processing sketch is assembled, instead of only posting the finished code.

[Thanks Sara]

[Rich's] newest version of a Bluetooth connected Super Nintendo controller takes what was already good and makes it better. We looked at the original version back in May, which is built into a knockoff controller  – [Rich] mentions that he got a lot of flack for defacing retro equipment and wants to set the record straight. The most notable difference between the two controllers is that the batteries are now housed inside the case. He switched over to an 850 mAh Lithium Ion battery, which takes much less room than the four AA batteries did. There is an integrated charger which connects via a mini USB jack as seen in the image above. Bother versions of the controller can be used to play emulators without rooting your Android device.

Unfortunately you won’t get to look inside the case. What we can tell you is that the build no longer uses a BlueSMiRF board , opting for a less expensive Bluetooth solution. We also know that the build is still Arduino compatible, sporting an ATmega328 chip running the bootloader. The lack of detail is because [Rich] is working to market the controller with a limited-quantity preorder. Check out his video presentation of the new version after the break.

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