Nostalgic 30-in-ONE Electronics Badge For DEF CON 30

DC Zia 30-in-ONE Badge for DEF CON 30

[hamster] and the DC Zia crew offered up a throwback 30-in-ONE Learn Electronics indie badge for DEF CON 30. The badge is inspired by the Radio Shack “100-in-1” style project kits that so many of us cut our teeth on back in the 70s and 80s.

DC Zia is a hacker group loosely associated with New Mexico who have been working together to make an indie badge for DEF CON each year.  If you aren’t familiar with the badgelife community of hardware hackers and programmers who make electronic indie conference badges, check out our BadgeLife Documentary.

The 30-in-ONE badge is provided in the form of a kit, so the learning and fun begins with assembling the badge. From there, an included booklet guides the badge holder through building and experimenting with 30 different circuits.

The included components include resistors, capacitors, LEDs, transistors, switches, transformer, speaker, OLED display, battery box, and a bundle of jumper wires for making any desired circuit connections.  The documented circuits have compelling titles such as the Electric Cat, Light Theremin, Grandfather Clock, and Frequency Counter.

Flashback to what DC Zia, and other groups, were up to five years prior in our expose on The Hardware Badges of DEF CON 25.

12 thoughts on “Nostalgic 30-in-ONE Electronics Badge For DEF CON 30

    1. Speaking of things that do Xmanythings in one… I just bought a multifunction six in one pen, and it will absolutely blow your mind, because the amazing thing about it, vs every other multifunction pen in the world ever, is that the pen actually works!!!

  1. Has anyone ever come across a company that makes those springs from the old kits and sells them in large quantities? I think those would be fun to make kits with.

    I have found places that sell packs of like 5 for $5 or something like that. That would be great if I had an old kit I wanted to refurbish that was just missing a few. It would get too expensive too fast though for making anything new.

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