Portable PI Powered Music Player

January 9, 2022 by Matthew Carlson 13 Comments

There was a brief time in the early 2000s when we carried cellphones, wallets, keys, and a bespoke digital media player loaded with a small selection of our music libraries. Devices like iPods, Zunes, Sandisk Sansa, and iRiver. Then as cell phones gained more storage and processing power, the two devices became one, and audio players slipped to obscurity as sports accessories. Perhaps in that vein, [BalderDragonSlayer] made his own Raspberry Pi-powered media player.

The device was cobbled together using a Raspberry Pi Zero, an Adafruit OLED bonnet, a LiPo charger, and a cheap USB DAC. The interface software is written in python, which has all your usual player controls, using the directional joystick and two pushbuttons on the bonnet. DietPi is a slimmed-down Linux that offers an impressively fast boot time, which is why it was picked for this project. The case was a simple project case with some holes dremeled into the face for the screen and buttons.

It is a wonderful little project that seems wonderful for walks in the park. This isn’t the first Pi-powered media player we’ve seen before. But we’re hoping we see more in the future.

Automated Mushroom Cultivation Yields Delicious Fried Goodies

January 9, 2022 by Donald Papp 30 Comments

[Kyle Gabriel] knows mushrooms, and his years of experience really shine through in his thorough documentation of an automated mushroom cultivation environment, created with off-the-shelf sensors and hardware as much as possible. The results speak for themselves, with some delicious fried oyster mushrooms to show for it!

Fried oyster mushrooms, grown from scratch.

The most influential conditions for mushroom cultivation are temperature, humidity, and CO2 concentration, and to automate handling the environmental conditions [Kyle] created Mycodo, an open-source system that leverages inexpensive hardware and parts while also having the ability to take regular photos to keep an eye on things.

Calling [Kyle]’s documentation “comprehensive” doesn’t do it justice, and he addresses everything from setting up a positive pressure air filtration system for a work area, to how to get usable cultures from foraged mushrooms, all the way through growth and harvesting. He even includes a delicious-looking recipe for fried mushrooms. It just doesn’t get more comprehensive than that.

We’ve seen [Kyle]’s earlier work before, and it’s fantastic to see the continued refinement. Check out a tour of the whole thing in the video embedded below (or skip to 16:11 if you want to make yourself hungry.)

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Pi Powered 1:35 Scale Panther Tank

January 9, 2022 by Tom Nardi 6 Comments

Tank aficionado [Daniel Zalega] has enjoyed playing around with armored fighting vehicles in the digital realm for years, but only recently realized he had the technology and skills necessary to take his passion into the physical world. Albeit on a slightly reduced scale. So he bought a 1:35 plastic model kit for the German WWII Panther tank from Tamiya, and started working on a way to make it move.

Luckily for [Daniel], the assembled model is essentially hollow. That gave him plenty of room to install the geared drive motors, batteries, motor controllers, voltage regulators, a servo for the turret, and the Raspberry Pi Zero that controls the whole show. Those with an aversion to hot glue would do well not to look too closely at the construction here, but it gets the job done. Besides, it’s not like this little Panther is going to see any front line combat.

Another element of the model kit that made it well-suited to motorization is the fact that it had real rubber treads. That meant [Daniel] just had to pop some holes in the side of the tank, and figure out how to mount the drive sprockets to his gear motors. Unfortunately it looks like the wheels are static on this model, meaning the tread has to be dragged over them. That’s certainly robbing the tank of some power and speed, but in the video after the break, you can see its movement is still fairly realistic.

To control the tank, he points his phone’s browser to a simple page running on the Raspberry Pi. By simply dragging a finger on the screen, you can operate the tank’s two independent treads and rotate the turret. [Daniel] said his original plan was more elaborate, with the web page displaying a live video feed from an onboard camera as well as the readings from various sensors. But at least for now, things are kept as straightforward as possible.

This certainly isn’t the first souped-up toy tank we’ve seen here at Hackaday. From gorgeous steam powered machines to this Tiger tank with a laser-assisted aiming system, these small tracked platforms have long been a favorite of hardware hackers.
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Adding An Audio Jack To Classic Headphones Is A Nifty Upgrade

January 8, 2022 by Lewin Day 15 Comments

One of the most common ways to junk a pair of headphones is to damage the cord. Obviously, the lead can be repaired, but it involves busting out the soldering iron and can be tedious when dealing with the tiny little coated wires.

It does involve soldering, but ideally, you only have to do it once.

[mauriziomiscio.mm] has a way of dealing with the problem in a once-and-done fashion, by installing a female audio jack into his vintage headphones. The benefit is that if the cable is damaged, it can simply be unplugged and replaced with a new one, and is commonly seen on headphones from companies like KRK.

The hack is simple when applied to a classic pair of AKG K141 headphones. The little plastic casing on one earpiece is popped off, and replaced with a 3D-printed version that stoutly holds a female TRS jack in place. This can then be soldered up to the wiring inside the headphones.

With everything assembled, the headphones can now use an easily-replaceable cable, and one needn’t worry about having to bust out the soldering iron if the lead is damaged in future. It’s a particularly useful hack for those who use their headphones on the road, always throwing them into backpacks between gigs.

If that’s not hardcore enough, consider attaching a headphone jack to an old 8-track player for the most ridiculous Walkman you can imagine. If you’ve been working on your own portable audio hacks, be sure to drop us a line!

Hidden Shaft And Gears Make This Hollow Clock Go

January 8, 2022 by Donald Papp 20 Comments

[shiura]’s Hollow Clock 3 is a fantastic 3D printed take on a clock movement that uses a hidden mechanism to pull off its unusual operation. The Hollow Clock has no face, just an open space with an hour and minute hand that move as expected. Only the longer minute hand has any apparent connection to the rest of the clock body, with the rest appearing to hang in the air.

This is how it works: the longer minute hand is connected to the white ring, and it is in fact this ring that rotates, taking the attached minute hand with it. But how does the hour hand remain stationary while the rest turns? A concealed shaft and gear assembly takes care of that. For every full rotation of the minute hand (actually the white ring), the hour hand is only permitted a relative advancement of 1/12th of a rotation. It’s a clever system, and you can see the insides in the photo here.

Unlike clock projects that showcase their inner workings, the Hollow Clock works hard to conceal them. If you decide to make your own, [shiura] warns to expect to do a bit of tweaking to fine-tune the amount of friction between moving parts so that operation is smooth, and provides useful guidelines for doing so. Take a few minutes to watch the clock in action in the video, embedded below.

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Modernizing The Game Boy Advance

January 8, 2022 by Al Williams 9 Comments

[Zekfoo] decided to honor the Game Boy Advance’s 20th birthday by redesigning it at the circuit level to give it a more modern twist. To quote the project readme:

I really want to like the Game Boy Advance. Growing up with a GBA SP, I was spoiled by its clicky buttons, rechargeable battery, and illuminated screen. When I finally got my hands on an original GBA, I couldn’t be more disappointed by the stark difference in feel and function. While today’s retro modding scene has produced many improvements for the GBA (referred to from now on as its codename AGB), the console still has many quirks that simple modding hasn’t been able to fix, but that can be addressed in a circuit redesign.

The four-layer board looks great and there a number of modernized features.

For example, this new version is rechargeable. The unit has proper switches, which most people will prefer over the mushy membrane switches. There’s also a screen light and an improved power supply that helps produce cleaner audio, among other things.

We were disappointed that the repository only has images and audio files — if you want to duplicate the build you are on your own. He’s also done a clone of the Game Boy Color, but — alas — no design files there either. Still, a couple of good-looking projects.

We always enjoy seeing old products given a facelift. If you think you just need an emulator, they sometimes don’t exactly mimic real hardware.

DE10-Lite-Ful FPGA Dev Board Hack Plays The 1981 Classic Defender

January 8, 2022 by Ryan Flowers 6 Comments

We’re not sure what the assignment was, but the results of [Garret Carter]’s homework for his Digital System Design class at Tennessee Tech couldn’t help but capture our attention. Below the break you can see what [Garrett] describes as a “simplified stylized version” of the 1981 arcade hit “Defender”.

With the goal of keeping the price low but keeping performance as high as possible, [Garrett] set forth to program the DE10-Lite FPGA development board in VHDL. The results are convincing, and while not perfect, came in under budget.

The DE10-Lite board gave [Garrett] the opportunity to get even more creative, using the dev board’s onboard switches, buttons, 7-segment LED’s and accelerometer to full effect. In this case, the dev board is not only the game, but also the controller and status display. A very neat hack indeed!

If you want to make your own, you can get the full project details at [Garrett]’s Github page. And [Garrett], we don’t know what marks your professor will give, but we give you an A+, would definitely play again.

While FPGA development boards aren’t necessarily inexpensive, our own Jenny List shows where you might be able to find a used but workable FPGA board for a fraction of the cost, If you know where to look.

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