Author: Jenny List

3313 Articles

The USB Killer Now Has Commercial Competition

September 13, 2016 by 96 Comments

With a proliferation of USB Flash disk drives has come a very straightforward attack vector for a miscreant intent on spreading malware onto an organisation’s computer network. Simply drop a few infected drives in the parking lot, and wait for an unsuspecting staff member to pick one up and plug it into their computer. The drives are so familiar that to a non-tech-savvy user they appear harmless, there is no conscious decision over whether to trust them or not.

A diabolical variant on the exploit was [Dark Purple]’s USB Killer. Outwardly similar to a USB Flash drive, it contains an inverter that generates several hundred volts from the USB’s 5 volts, and repeatedly discharges it into the data lines of whatever it is plugged into. Computers whose designers have not incorporated some form of protection do not last long when subjected to its shocking ministrations.

Now the original has a commercial competitor, in the form of Hong Kong-based usbkill.com. It’s a bit cheaper than the original, but that it has appeared at all suggests that there is an expanding market for this type of device and that you may be more likely to encounter one in the future. They are also selling a test shield, an isolated USB port add-on that allows the device to be powered up without damaging its host.

From the hardware engineer’s point of view these devices present a special challenge. We are used to protecting USB ports from high voltage electrostatic discharges with TVS diode arrays, but those events have an extremely high impedance and the components are not designed to continuously handle low-impedance high voltages. It’s likely that these USB killers will result in greater sales of protection thermistors and more substantially specified Zener diodes in the world of USB interface designers.

We covered the original USB Killer prototype when it appeared, then its second version, and finally its crowdfunding campaign. This will probably not be the last we’ve heard of these devices and they will inevitably become cheaper, so take care what you pick up in that parking lot.

[via Extremetech]

A Motorcycle Lift From A Trailer Jack

September 11, 2016 by 21 Comments

If you have ever worked on a motorcycle on a regular basis with a limited workshop, you’ll know the challenge of taking off one or other of the wheels. You’ll probably have plenty of tales of bikes balanced precariously on blocks or suspended from the ceiling on a web of cargo straps, and if you are really unlucky you’ll have the Dented Tank Of Shame from the whole edifice tumbling down.

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Very Simple PC Frequency Counter Works Up To 100MHz

September 9, 2016 by 32 Comments

We all use 74 logic in our projects as general purpose logic interfacing glue. These chips have become as ubiquitous as a general-purpose op-amp, or even as passive components. In most cases we’re not demanding much of them, and power requirements aside an original 74 chip from the dawn of the series could probably do the same job that we’re putting a more modern variant to work on.

It is easy therefore to forget that 74 logic is a field that has seen continuous improvement and innovation reflecting the developments elsewhere in electronics, and the most modern 74 versions hide some impressively high specifications.

A good example comes via a project from [Scott, AJ4VD], a very simple frequency counter that uses a single 74 series chip at its business end, and counts to over 100MHz. The chip in question is a 74LV8154 dual 16-bit counter which he is using as a prescaler to deliver a rate more acceptable to an ATMega328 microcontroller that does the counting. As he points out, the accuracy of a frequency counter is only as good as its gate timing, and he ensures as accurate a seconds-worth of pulses as he can with a 1PPS signal derived from an inexpensive GPS receiver. The 328 makes its counting available to a host computer via a serial port, and can be easily read through a terminal. He’s built it dead-bug style on a piece of unetched PCB, on which the simplicity of the circuit is evident.

There was a time when a project like this one would have required multiple integrated circuits including a probably quite expensive purpose-built prescaler. Cheap glue logic has now advanced to a stage at which it can be done instead at commodity prices, and we like that.

We’ve featured a few 74-series counters before, including this old-school one and this one also using a 74LV8154.

31415926 (That’s Roughly Π Times 10 Million Raspberries)

September 8, 2016 by 57 Comments

The Raspberry Pi Foundation founder Eben Upton has announced that their ten millionth eponymous single-board computer has been sold since their launch back in February 2012. It’s an impressive achievement, especially so since their original sales expectations were for a modest ten thousand. For those of us who watched the RS and Farnell websites crumble under the strain of so many would-be purchasers on that leap day morning four and a half years ago their rapidly exceeding that forecast came as no surprise, but still, it’s worth a moment’s consideration. They passed the Sinclair ZX Spectrum’s British record of 5m computers sold back in February 2015, leaving behind the Pi’s BBC Micro spiritual ancestor on 1.5m sold long before that.

Critics of the Pi will point out that its various versions have rarely been the most powerful small single board computer on the market, or even at times the cheapest. They will also point to the closed-source nature of the Broadcom binary blob that underpins Pi operating systems, and even the sometimes unpredictable nature of the Pi Foundation with respect to its community, product availability and launches. But given that the Pi Foundation’s focus is not on our side of the community but on using the boards as a tool to introduce young people to computing, it’s fair to say that they’ve done a pretty good job of ensuring that a youngster can now get their hands on a useful and easily programmable computer much more easily than at any time in the past.

Would we be in the same position of being able to buy a capable Linux computer for near-pocket-money prices had the Raspberry Pi not been released? Probably so, in fact certainly so. The hardware required to deliver these products has inevitably fallen into a more affordable price bracket, and we would certainly have plenty of boards at our fingertips. They would probably have Allwinner or maybe Mediatek processors rather than the Pi’s Broadcom part, but they would be very likely to deliver equivalent performance at a similar cost. Where the Raspberry Pi’s continued success has come from then has not necessarily been from its hardware but from its community and software. The reliability and ease of use delivered by the Raspbian Linux distribution that Just Works for the parent putting a Pi in front of their child, and the wealth of expert information on the Raspberry Pi forums to get them through any Pi-related troubles are what has given the Pi these sales figures. The boards themselves are almost incidental, almost any hardware paired with that level of background information would likely have met with similar success. Comparing the Pi software experience with for example one of their most capable competitors, it’s obvious that the software is what makes the difference.

It’s likely that Raspberry Pi sales will continue to climb, and in years to come we’ll no doubt be reporting on fresh milestones on ever more powerful revisions of their product. But it’s also likely that their competition will up their software game and their position in the hearts and minds of single board computer users might be usurped by a better offering. If this increased competition in the single board computer market delivers better boards with more for the hardware developer community, then we’re all for it.

Review: The RC2014 Z80 Computer

September 8, 2016 by 58 Comments

As hackers and makers we are surrounded by accessible computing in an astonishing diversity. From tiny microcontrollers to multi-processor powerhouses, they have become the universal tool of our art. If you consider their architecture though you come to a surprising realisation. It is rare these days to interface directly to a microprocessor bus. Microcontrollers and systems-on-chip have all the functions that were once separate peripherals integrated into their packages, and though larger machines such as your laptop or server have their processor bus exposed you will never touch them as they head into your motherboard’s chipset.

A few decades ago this was definitely not the case. A typical 8-bit microprocessor of the 1970s had an 8-bit data bus, a 16-bit address bus, and a couple of request lines to indicate whether it wanted to talk to memory or an I/O port. Every peripheral you connected to it had to have some logic to decode its address and select it when you wanted to use it, and all shared the processor’s bus. This was how those of us whose first computers were the 8-bit machines of the late 1970s and early 1980s learned the craft of computer hardware, and in a world of Arduino and Raspberry Pi this now seems a lost art.

The subject of today’s review then provides a rare opportunity for the curious hardware hacker to get to grips with a traditional microprocessor bus. The RC2014 is a modular 8-bit computer in which daughter cards containing RAM, ROM, serial interface, clock, and Z80 processor are ranged on a backplane board, allowing complete understanding of and access to the workings of each part of the system. It comes with a ROM BASIC, and interfaces to a host computer through a serial port. There is also an ever-expanding range of further peripheral cards, including ones for digital I/O, LED matrixes, blinkenlights, a Raspberry Pi Zero for use as a VDU, and a small keyboard.

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Nintendo Wields DMCA Ax On Fan Games

September 7, 2016 by 61 Comments

In a move that may sadden many but should surprise nobody, Nintendo of America has issued a DMCA takedown notice for 562 fan-created games created in homage to Nintendo originals and hosted on the popular Game Jolt site. Games affected include Mario, Zelda, and Pokémon based creations among others, and Game Jolt have responded, as they are required to, by locking the pages of the games in question. They state that they believe their users and developers should have the right to know what content has been removed from their site and why the action has been taken, so they have begun posting any notices they receive in their GitHub repository.

It is likely that this action won’t be appreciated within our community, however it’s important to note that while there are numerous examples of DMCA abuse this is not one of them. Nintendo are completely within their rights over the matter, if you use any of the copyrighted Nintendo properties outside the safe harbor of fair use then you will put yourself legitimately in their sights.

Something that is difficult to escape though is a feeling that DMCA takedowns on fan-created games are rather a low-hanging fruit. An easy way for corporate legal executives to be seen to be doing something by their bosses, though against a relatively defenseless target and without really tackling the problem.

To illustrate this, take a walk through a shopping mall, motorway service station, or street market almost anywhere in the world, and it’s very likely that you will pass significant numbers of counterfeit toys and games copying major franchises including those of Nintendo. A lot of these dollar store and vending machine specials are so hilariously awful that their fakeness must be obvious to even the most out-of-touch purchaser, but their ready availability speaks volumes. Unlike the fan-created games which are free, people are buying these toys in huge numbers with money that never reaches Nintendo, and also unlike the fan-created games there’s not a Nintendo lawyer in sight. Corporate end-of-year bonuses are delivered on the numbers of violations dealt with, and those come easiest by piling up the simple cases rather than chasing the difficult ones that are costing the company real sales.

We’ve covered many DMCA stories over the years, and some of them have been pretty shocking. Questions over its use in the Volkswagen emissions scandal, or keeping John Deere tractor servicing in the hands of dealers. Let’s hope that the EFF and Bunnie Huang’s efforts pay off and dismantle section 1201, one of the most nonsensical parts of the law.

Via Engadget. Dendy Junior unauthorised Nintendo Famicom clone image, By Nzeemin (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0], via Wikimedia Commons.

Bicycle Seismograph Measures The Streets

September 6, 2016 by 25 Comments

Riding the streets of the Netherlands on a bicycle is a silky-smooth experience compared to doing the same on those of Germany. So says [Kati Hyyppä], who made the move with her trusty Dutch bike. The experience led her to record the uneven cobblestones and broken asphalt of the German roads on a home-made seismograph, a paper chart recorder driven by the bike’s motion and recorded upon by a pen free to vibrate as it passed over any bumps.

The resulting instrument is a wooden frame with a ballpoint pen mounted in a sliding holder weighted with some washers and kept under some tension with elastic bands. The paper roll is driven from the motion of the bike by the drive from a mechanical speedometer feeding a set of FischerTechnik gears, and the whole unit is suspended from the crossbar.

You can see it in action in the video below the break, and if you would like to build one yourself she has put the project up on Instructables as well as posting the description linked above.

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