ICQ Will Shut Down On June 26 This Year

May 26, 2024 by 29 Comments

In many ways, ICQ has always been a bit of a curiosity. It was one of the first major instant messenger clients of the 1990s. It saw broad uptake alongside the likes of AOL Instant Messenger and MSN Messenger. Yet, it outlasted both of them despite not being attached to an industrial juggernaut like AOL or Microsoft. After 27 years, however, it seems that the last petal will drop, with the shutdown of ICQ announced on the ICQ website for June 26, 2024.

Originally launched by an Israeli company, Mirabilis, in June of 1996, it took the Internet by storm, leading to AOL buying Mirabilis in June of 1998. Under the wing of AOL, ICQ kept growing its user base until it was sold to Digital Sky Technologies (now VK, which operates Mail.ru) in 2010. Around this time, the likes of Facebook and Google, with their own messaging solutions, came onto the scene, leaving ICQ to flounder. Ultimately, ICQ found a new home in the Russian market as a mobile messaging system until its imminent shutdown. Users are urged to move to the VK Messenger instead.

The demise of ICQ obviously led to a blast of nostalgia on sites like Hacker News, even though it has lost relevance in the West for many years. We’re sad to see this chapter end and will mourn the demise of our UINs (RIP, 61007952) along with our fellow compatriots in the usual IRC channels.

This is what happens when you depend on the grid. Going off the grid doesn’t have to look homemade, either.

How Do You Fill The 1N34 Void?

May 26, 2024 by 31 Comments

The germanium point contact diode, and almost every semiconductor device using germanium, is now obsolete. There was a time when almost every television or radio would have contained one or two of them, but the world has moved on from both analogue broadcasting and discrete analogue electronics in its lower-frequency RF circuitry. [TSBrownie] is taking a look at alternatives to the venerable 1N34A point-contact diode in one of the few places a point-contact diode makes sense, the crystal radio.

In the video below the break, he settles on a slightly more plentiful Eastern European D9K as a substitute after trying a silicon rectifier (awful) and a Schottky diode (great in theory, not so good in practice). We’ve trodden this path in the past and settled on a DC bias to reduce the extra forward voltage needed for a 1N4148 silicon diode to conduct because, like him, we found a Schottky disappointing.

The 1N34 is an interesting component, and we profiled its inventor a few years ago. Meanwhile, it’s worth remembering that sometimes, we just have to let old parts go.

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Weird Old Stereo Accessories

May 26, 2024 by 25 Comments

Some people trick out their cars. Some, their computers. There are even people who max out their audio systems, although back in 1979, there was more of that going on, probably, than today where you discresionary income is split so many ways. Case in point: [Alan Cross] remembers how excited he was to get the Radio Shack catalog that year. He was working at a grocery store, saved his money, and — over time — picked up a haul ranging from an equalizer to a strobe light.

Who didn’t need a power meter or a “light organ?” These gadgets seem cheap until you realize it was 1979 and [Alan] was a student working at a grocery store. He points out that the $20 power meter is about the same as $80 today.

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2024 Business Card Challenge: Adding Some Refinement To Breadboard Power Supplies

May 26, 2024 by 6 Comments

For small electronics projects, prototyping a design on a breadboard is a must to iron out kinks in the design and ensure everything works properly before a final version is created. The power supply for the breadboard is often overlooked, with newcomers to electronics sometimes using a 9V battery and regulator or a cheap USB supply to get a quick 5V source. We might eventually move on to hacking together an ATX power supply, or the more affluent among us might spring for a variable, regulated bench supply, but this power supply built specifically for breadboards might thread the needle for this use case much better than other options.

The unique supply is hosted on a small PCB with two breakout rails that connect directly to the positive and negative pins on a standard-sized breadboard. The power supply has two outputs, each of which can output up to 24V DC and both are adjustable by potentiometers. To maintain high efficiency and lower component sizes, a switch-mode design is used to provide variable DC voltage. A three-digit, seven-segment display at the top of the board keeps track of whichever output the user selects, and the supply itself can be powered by a number of inputs, including USB-C or lithium batteries.

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Homebrew Computer From The Ground Up

May 26, 2024 by 12 Comments

Building a retro computer of some sort is a rite of passage for many of us, with some building replicas or restorations of old Commodores, Ataris, and other machines from decades past. Others go even further back, to the time of the Intel 8008 or earlier, and a dedicated few will build something completely novel. This project from [3DSage] falls squarely in the latter category, with his completely DIY computer built component by component from scratch, including the machine code needed to run it.

[3DSage] starts with the backbone of every computer: the clock. He first demonstrates how a pair of NOT gates with a set of capacitors can be used as a rudimentary clock pulse, then builds a more refined version with a 555 timer and potentiometer for adjustable rates. Then, it’s on to creating a binary counter, which is a fundamental part of the memory system for this small computer, and finally, allows this circuitry to behave like a normal computer. Using a set of switches to store values in memory and stepping through them with the clock, the computer can be programmed to do plenty of tasks just like a modern microcontroller.

[3DSage] built this project a few years ago and has used it for real-world applications such as controlling servos, LED arrays, playing music, and other tasks. Although he has to program it using his own machine code by hand, it’s a usable computer in many ways. If you want to eschew modernity and build a retro computer in the style of the 1960s, though, this piece goes through what it would have been like to build a similar system in the era when these computers were more common. If you have a switch fetish, you might like to see how real computers worked back then, too.

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The Secret Behind The Motion Of Microsoft’s Bendy Mouse

May 25, 2024 by 7 Comments

The Surface Arc is a designed-for-travel mouse that carries flat, but curves into shape for use. It even turns on when it’s bent and shuts itself off when it’s flat. The device isn’t particularly new, but [Mr Teardown] was a bit surprised at the lack of details about what’s inside so tears it down in a video to reveal just how the mechanism works.

The mechanism somewhat resembles a beaver’s tail, and locks into place thanks to a magnetic connector at the base that holds the device’s shape.

The snap-action of the bending is accomplished with the help of a magnetic connection near the bottom end of the mouse’s “tail”, locking it into place when flexed. Interestingly, the on and off functionality does not involve magnets at all. Power control is accomplished by a little tab that physically actuates a microswitch.

There are a few interesting design bits that we weren’t expecting. For example, there is no mechanical scroll wheel. The mouse delivers similar functionality with touch sensors and a haptic feedback motor to simulate the feel and operation of a mechanical scroll wheel.

[Mr Teardown] finds the design elegant and effective, but we can’t help but notice it also seems perhaps not as optimized as it could be. There are over 70 components in all, including 23 screws (eight different kinds!), and it took [Mr Teardown] the better part of 45 minutes to re-assemble it. You can watch the entire teardown in the video embedded just under the page break; it’s a neat piece of hardware for sure.

If you’re in the mood for another mouse teardown, we have a treat for you: an ancient optical mouse from the 80s that required a special surface to work.

[via Core77]

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One Man’s Trash Is… A Rare $60,000 Historical Computer

May 25, 2024 by 10 Comments

According to Smithsonian Magazine, a salvage company in London was cleaning out a property and found an odd-looking computer device. No one knew what it was, and they couldn’t find anything with a quick online search. The devices in question were two ultra-rare Q1 computers dating from the early 1970s.

While these machines looked formidable, they contained Intel 8008 CPUs but did have built-in screens, keyboards, and printers. The two machines had a few minutes of fame at Kingston University London and are now for sale. They will probably bring about $60,000 each. Not bad for salvage junk.

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