Windows Drivers For PS3 Controllers

January 11, 2009 by Nick Caiello 38 Comments

Recently, a Japanese coder on the DCEmu Forums released Windows drivers for DualShock 3 controllers. While the drivers only support using the controllers over USB and not bluetooth, they do include force feedback and Sixaxis support. Included with the drivers is a configuration tool, and though it appears to be in Japanese there is some explanation of how to use it included in the forum post. We have not tested these personally, but you can try out the drivers for yourself by downloading them from the forum here.

[photo: William Hook]

UIRemote: Universal Remote Application For IPhone

January 7, 2009 by Nick Caiello 18 Comments

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E-SlcjmqeYw]

When several students from the University of Toronto became tired of having multiple remotes lying around, they decided to do something about it. Their solution to this problem came in the form of UIRemote, a universal remote application for the iPhone. The application allows the iPhone to control anything that is normally controlled by an infrared remote, thanks to the use of a custom infrared adapter that plugs into the phone’s headphone port. It’s a technique similar to our iPod remote control from 2004. While the UIRemote application and adapter are still in beta, the students expect to release both things simultaneously sometime within the next two months.

[via Engadget]

Passive Multidimensional Input

December 29, 2008 by Nick Caiello 15 Comments

[vimeo 2433260]

Any musician who has ever used a computer to create music will tell you that while this technology is more than capable of producing great music, it is always a much more intimate experience to create by physically playing an instrument. In an effort to bridge this gap, [Randall Jones] has built a passive multidimensional interface that uses multitouch input to create an intimate experience that rivals that of a traditional musical instrument. While this concept may seem very complicated, the interface is made of only copper strips, rubber, and wood. At $50, this interface was designed to be inexpensive and appears to be very easy to use. As seen in the video, this interface can be used as anything from a drum to a multitouch synthesizer.

[via Make]

Inside Nokia’s Hardware Damage Labs

December 3, 2008 by Nick Caiello 11 Comments

[vimeo 2310654]

Like everybody, we sometimes get a little frustrated with our cellphones. Probably one of the most annoying things is when we drop our phones once and they stop working. At Nokia’s hardware damage labs in San Diego, they physically test their phones for extreme uses. They test things like flip tension, water resistance, and even UV resistance. Recently, the folks over at MobileCrunch were given a tour of these labs and were nice enough to post an in-depth article about what they saw. In addition to the impact testing video above, there are many more videos posted that demonstrate the tests they perform.

Firefox Addon Makes Pirating Music Easier

December 3, 2008 by Nick Caiello 36 Comments

[vimeo 2380513]

The Amazon MP3 Store may have the lowest prices on DRM free music, but for some people 79 cents for a song is just too much, especially when [john] and the folks at pirates-of-the-amazon.com can help you get that song for free. Pirates of the Amazon is a slick Firefox addon that inserts a “download 4 free” button next to the “add to cart” button in the Amazon MP3 Store. After clicking on the button, the addon refers users to a thepiratebay.org search page with bittorrent download links for the song or album. While there is no question that this makes getting your music easier, by using this addon you do run the risk of violating copyright laws, depending on which country you live in.

There isn’t much here that hasn’t been thrown into Greasemonkey scripts in the past and we wonder if they’re marketing this to anyone at all. People who absolutely love using Amazon but hate buying stuff perhaps? They cite a couple interesting projects in their about section: Amazon Noir robotically abused the “Search Inside” feature to reconstruct entire books. OU Library searches your local library to see if it has the Amazon book you’re looking for.

DIY Cardboard IPhone Dock

November 27, 2008 by Nick Caiello 13 Comments

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sXCA8SM9nS4]

While the iPhone 3G included several new features that its predecessor lacked, one thing it did not include was a dock. Instead of shelling out $30 to buy Apple’s iPhone 3G dock, [Roland] and the folks at Geeky-Gadgets.com decided to design their own cardboard iPhone dock. While this doesn’t include any fancy features like dock connectors or audio line-outs, it looks like a quick and budget friendly way to give your iPhone 3G a place to charge and sync.

Flickering LED Circuit

October 30, 2008 by Nick Caiello 16 Comments

Here’s a simple project for your Halloween celebration. The other day while looking through our box of Halloween decorations, we noticed that the incandescent lamp in one of the jack-o’-lanterns was burnt out. Instead of simply replacing the outdated bulb, we decided to build a small dark detecting circuit with 2 yellow LEDs based on this Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories design. After successfully building the circuit, we took the project one step further by incorporating an Atmel ATtiny13 microcontroller. The code switches the LEDs on and off randomly for a flickering effect and is based on this instructable. Below is the schematic we created in EAGLE and a parts list.

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