Day: November 15, 2006

Design Challenge Mini-extra

November 15, 2006 by 14 Comments

Check out our new contest – design a business card PC board.

[Windell] sent in his tv-b-gone retro mod. [I want one that changes all the TVs to the SciFi channel.] He points out the ultra tv-b-gone as well.

[pillowcase] sent in his iTunes shower button – skip songs mid shampoo.

We heard about making a portable high power laser from a DVD burner laser yesterday, but the bandwidth was exceeded before we got there. It’s back up, for now.

[Mitch] let us know that a few days ago+ we appeared on TV in a lock bumping ad on Channel 6 WOWT News in Nebraska. Anyone else seen this?

Don’t forget that this site is driven by tips, so keep us in mind when you whip out the soldering iron.

Hackaday Design Challenge – Yes, A Contest!

November 15, 2006 by 76 Comments


So, you guys want to show off your skills? We’re giving you the chance. [If you don’t like it, blame Limor – she came up with the original idea]

The Challenge:
Design our next give-away: a business card sized PC Board. We’re not telling you what to make the circuit do, just make it something handy for hacking. Me, I think a PIC programmer/proto board would be handy.

The board must have:

  • The Hackaday logo
  • business card dimensions (90mm x 55mm)
  • reasonably easy to construct
  • A useful circuit (programmer, interface, whatever.)
  • Assembly instructions
  • Parts list

Through hole components are a good idea (Of course, if you can do it with SMD cheaper, and keep it easy to build… Surprise us) Maybe we could surface mount the CPU before we give them away, or we might put together parts kits, but it depends on the winning design(s).

You can put whatever circuit you like on it. PIC
programmer, JTAG interface, flux capacitor… but it has to work!

We want to have a board house make these up for us, so we’ll need the design in a format we can work with. We suggest EAGLE. It’s free and runs on just about everything. (But it limits you to two layers – which should be plenty)


Some hints to help you get the winning design:
Bonus for extra functionality
Clever incorporation of our logo
Completeness – include solder mask, drill info, everything we need to make the board.

The Prizes:
Fabienne is putting up her black 2gb iPod nano engraved with “hackaday.com” “one fresh hack each day” – It’s been used a bit, and opened up a few times so it’s got some scratches, but hasn’t been modded… yet.

We’ll send you some of the boards of course. I’ve got more good stuff in the works, and I’ll announce more prizes as we get them confirmed.

Submissions: When you’ve got your design ready, Put it online and let us know about it on the tip line. (Or send in a tip and we’ll tell you where to email it if you don’t have anywhere to host it.)

The Deadline: December 25th. Plenty of time to get your design cranked out. Everyone needs a winter break, but We’ll try to have a winner chosen within a week or two of the deadline.