Month: March 2022

Remoticon 2021 // Jay Bowles Dips Into The Plasmaverse

March 3, 2022 by No comments

Every hacker out there is familiar with the zaps and sizzles of the Tesla coil, or the crash and thunder of lighting strikes on our hallowed Earth. These phenomena all involve the physics of plasma, a subject near and dear to Jay Bowles’s heart. Thus, he graced Remoticon 2021 with a enlightening talk taking us on a Dip Into the Plasmaverse.

Jay’s passion for the topic is obvious, having fallen in love with high voltage physics as a teenager. He appreciated how tangible the science was, whether it’s the glow of neon lighting or the heating magic of the common microwave. His talk covers the experiments and science that he’s studied over the past 17 years and in the course of running his Plasma Channel YouTube channel. Continue reading “Remoticon 2021 // Jay Bowles Dips Into The Plasmaverse” →

Modules described in the article (two copies of the challenge shown, so, two lines of modules)

Spaceship Repair CTF Covers Hardware Hacker Essentials

March 3, 2022 by 15 Comments

At even vaguely infosec-related conferences, CTFs are a staple. For KernelCon 2021, [Tyler Rosonke] resolved to create a challenge breaking the traditions, entertaining and teaching people in a different way, while satisfying the constraints of that year’s remote participation plans. His imagination went wild in all the right places, and a beautifully executed multi-step hardware challenge was built – only in two copies!

Story behind the challenge? Your broken spaceship has to be repaired so that you can escape the planet you’re stuck on. The idea was to get a skilled, seasoned hacker solving challenges for our learning and amusement – and that turned out to be none other than [Joe “Kingpin” Grand]!

The modules themselves are what caught our attention. Designed to cover a wide array of hardware hacker skills, they cover soldering, signal sniffing, logic gates, EEPROM dumping and more – and you have to apply all of these successfully for liftoff. If you thought “there’s gotta be a 555 involved”, you weren’t wrong, either, there’s a module where you have to reconfigure a circuit with one!

KernelCon is a volunteer-driven infosec conference in Omaha, and its 2022 installment starts in a month – we can’t wait to see what it brings! Anyone doing hardware CTFs will have something to learn from their stories, it seems. The hacking session, from start to finish, was recorded for our viewing pleasure; linked below as an hour and a half video, it should be a great background for your own evening of reverse-engineering for leisure!

This isn’t the first time we’ve covered [Tyler]’s handiwork, either. In 2020, he programmed a batch of KernelCon badges while employing clothespins as ISP clips. Security conferences have most certainly learned just how much fun you can have with hardware, and if you ever need a case study for that, our review of 2019 CypherCon won’t leave you hanging.

Continue reading “Spaceship Repair CTF Covers Hardware Hacker Essentials” →

Ion Thrusters: Not Just For TIE Fighters Anymore

March 3, 2022 by 42 Comments

Spacecraft rocket engines come in a variety of forms and use a variety of fuels, but most rely on chemical reactions to blast propellants out of a nozzle, with the reaction force driving the spacecraft in the opposite direction. These rockets offer high thrust, but they are relatively fuel inefficient and thus, if you want a large change in velocity, you need to carry a lot of heavy fuel. Getting that fuel into orbit is costly, too!

Ion thrusters, in their various forms, offer an alternative solution – miniscule thrust, but high fuel efficiency. This tiny push won’t get you off the ground on Earth. However, when applied over a great deal of time in the vacuum of space, it can lead to a huge change in velocity, or delta V.

This manner of operation means that an ion thruster and a small mass of fuel can theoretically create a much larger delta-V than chemical rockets, perfect for long-range space missions to Mars and other applications, too. Let’s take a look at how ion thrusters work, and some of their interesting applications in the world of spacecraft!

Continue reading “Ion Thrusters: Not Just For TIE Fighters Anymore” →

The Antonov An-225 Seems To Have Been Destroyed After All

March 3, 2022 by 49 Comments

Something that probably unites most Hackaday readers is a love of machines, particularly unique or interesting ones. In the world of aircraft for example, we’ve run several stories about those which push the edges of the size envelope, be they the Hughes Hercules troop carrier, the Scaled Composites Stratolifter space launcher, or the Antonov An-225 Mriya cargo plane. This last machine has been in the news for all the wrong reasons over the last few days, with reports emerging that it may have been destroyed in the fighting around its base at Hostomel near Kyiv. There has been some uncertainty around this news as it has alternately been claimed to have been destroyed or to have miraculously survived, but now a set of photographs have emerged showing what appears to be the An-225 burning in its damaged hangar.

The An-225 is a unique aircraft not only in the sense that there is no other model quite like it, but also because it was manufactured for the special purpose of being the transport carrier of the Soviet Union’s Buran space shuttle, and thus only one airframe was completed. Its characteristic twin tail served to avoid the turbulence that would have resulted from a Buran mounted on top of its enormous fuselage, and the six engine configuration required to move such a behemoth was in part the clue to identifying it in the photograph. Those readers who were lucky enough to see it take off or land in person will attest to its impressive physical presence, while the rest of us remain sad to have missed that chance.

It seems crass to talk about the destruction of an aircraft when compared to the scale of the unfolding tragedy in Ukraine, but we think perhaps our British and French readers who grew up with Concorde in the sky will understand the power of such a machine as a source of pride. We hope that the Antonov company will return to the design of huge cargo aircraft in peacetime, and Ukranians can again have pride in a monster aircraft that the rest of us will drive for miles just to watch taking off or landing.

The issue of which aircraft is the world’s largest can be a complex one, as we’ve explored in the past.

Header image: Vasiliy Koba, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Mortal Kombat Stand Up Arcade machines

Mortal Kombat ROM Hack Kontinues Arcade Legacy

March 3, 2022 by 8 Comments

September 13th 1993, colloquially known as Mortal Monday, became a dividing line in the battle for 16-bit supremacy. The mega popular arcade game Mortal Kombat was ported to Super Nintendo and Sega Genesis consoles, and every fanboy and fangirl had an opinion on which version truly brought the hits.

Nintendo’s version opted to remove the blood and gore in an attempt to preserve the company’s family-friendly image, while Sega’s offering merely locked the game’s more violent content behind a cheat code that so many fans learned by heart: ABACABB. Nintendo’s decision to censor Mortal Kombat on their console pushed public opinion in favor of the Sega Genesis version being superior, though it was clear that corners were cut in order to squeeze it onto a cartridge. Recently a group of developers led by [Paulo] sought to restore the Genesis version to its full potential with a ROM hack they’re calling Mortal Kombat Arcade Edition.

Mortal Kombat Arcade Edition is the sort of ROM hack where every facet of the game has been retouched. All sorts of sound effects and animations that were omitted in the 1993 translation to the Genesis have now been restored in higher quality. Every fighter’s look was remastered to more closely match the arcade presentation complete with move timing tweaks. Secret characters like Reptile, Noob Saibot, and Ermac are all playable, plus all the character bios from the arcade game’s attract mode make an appearance. An SRAM save feature was implemented in order to save high scores, and for an additional dose of authenticity there’s even a “DIP switch” configuration screen where you can set it to free play.

This ROM hack comes as an IPS patch that can be applied to a legitimate dump of the user’s Sega Genesis or Mega Drive cartridge. The site hosting the Mortal Kombat Arcade Edition patch features an online IPS patching tool called Rom Patcher JS that makes the patching process more convenient for those attached to their browser. The patched ROM can then be enjoyed in the user’s favorite emulator of choice, though running it on original hardware via a ROM cart is also possible (even encouraged). Considering the limitations of the Sega Genesis’ color palette the revamped look of Mortal Kombat Arcade Edition is all the more impressive. It just goes to show you that Genesis still does!

Not ready to FINISH HIM? Check out this countertop arcade build featuring some Mortal Kombat II art, or marvel at the incredible effort that went into creating the Knights of the Round ROM hack known as Warlock’s Tower.

Continue reading “Mortal Kombat ROM Hack Kontinues Arcade Legacy” →

The Return Of SCSI

March 2, 2022 by 68 Comments

There was a time when high-performance disk drives used SCSI — the Small Computer System Interface — and everything else was kid stuff. Now, advanced forms of SCSI are still around but there are other high-performing disk interfaces, too. But some old gear really loves their classic SCSI ports, and [Adrian] decided to try hooking some of them up to some modern computers. You can see how he did in the video below.

The key to the attempt is a USB to SCSI adapter which was unusual but not unheard of, and [Adrian] came across one from 1999. Of course, you have to wonder if a modern computer will support the device or will be able to load the drivers from the old CD.

Continue reading “The Return Of SCSI” →

3D Printed Shoes Make Bigfoot Tracks

March 2, 2022 by 18 Comments

[Stephan Henrich] is probably going to set off a wave of bigfoot sightings if his new shoe, the Cryptide sneaker takes off. The shoe is completely 3D printed in flexible TPE using a laser sintering printer from Sintratec. The shoe takes a name from cryptozoology and, in fact, would leave a puzzling footprint due to its articulated toes and scaly-looking sole.

Judging from the look of the sole, it should be pretty cushy and we presume if you were 3D printing these, you’d scan or precisely measure the intended foot for a perfect fit. You can see a video about the shoe below.

Continue reading “3D Printed Shoes Make Bigfoot Tracks” →