This week, Editor-in-Chief Elliot Williams and Kristina Panos met up in a new disposable location to give the lowdown on this week’s best hacks. First up in the news — the Home Sweet Home Automation contest is still going strong. You’ve still got plenty of time, so get on over to Hackaday.IO and start your entry today. In the news, the UK is asking how powerful an electric bike should be (more than 250 Watts, certainly), and legal pressure from Nintendo has shut down two emulators.

Kristina’s cigar box kalimba…

…with hand-wound pickup!

Then it’s on to What’s That Sound. Kristina failed again, although she was pretty confident about her answer. Can you get it? Can you figure it out? Can you guess what’s making that sound this week? If you can, and your number comes up, you get a special Hackaday Podcast t-shirt.

But then it’s on to the hacks, beginning with a Wi-Fi toothbrush hack from [Aaron Christophel]. This can only mean the beginning of some epic toothbrush firmware, right? From there, we marvel at moving cat food, the ultimate bulk material, and the idea of spoofing a whole cloud of drones. Finally, we examine one of Jenny’s Daily Drivers in the form of Damn Small Linux (the other DSL), and reminisce about dial-up (speaking of DSL).

Check out the links below if you want to follow along, and as always, tell us what you think about this episode in the comments!

Download and savor at your leisure.

Episode 261 Show Notes:

News:

• Our Home Automation Contest Starts Now!
• How Powerful Should An Electric Bike Be? The UK Is Asking
• Yuzu And Citra Emulators Shut Down After Legal Pressure From Nintendo

What’s that Sound?

• Fill out this form with your best guess, and you might win!

Interesting Hacks of the Week:

• Hacking An Actual WiFi Toothbrush With An ESP32-C3
• Piano Feeder Gets Pets Playing For Their Supper
  • Handling Bulk Material: Why Does My Cat Food Get Stuck?
• Can’t Disable DJI Drone ID? Spoof It With An ESP!
  • Loudmouth DJI Drones Tell Everyone Where You Are
• Thumbs Up To This Pico MIDI Kalimba
• Making A Crystodyne Radio With Zinc Oxide And Cat’s Whiskers
  • Spark, Bang, Buzz and Other Good Stuff.
• A “Full” Keyboard For $5*

Quick Hacks:

• Elliot’s Picks:
  • The $16 PCB Robot
  • A Simple Hack For Running Low-Power Gear From A USB Battery Pack
  • Reverse Engineering The Behringer Ultranet Protocol
• Kristina’s Picks:
  • RGB LED Disco Ball Reacts To Sound And Color
  • Optical Guitar Pickup Works With Nylon Strings
  • Luggable Cyberdeck Can Still Be A Luggable PC

Can’t-Miss Articles:

• • Jenny’s Daily Drivers: Damn Small Linux 2024
  • Dial-Up Is Still, Just Barely, A Thing