3.5mm stereo connectors for headphones and microphones are almost mandatory for audio projects. X1 (left) is a simple plug with connections for the audio channels (pin 2,3), and ground (pin 1). X2 (right) has pass-through contacts (pin 2,3) that divert audio to an internal speaker when headphones aren’t connected.
Here’s a breakdown of the audio connectors illustrated above. Continue reading “Parts: 3.5mm Stereo Audio Jacks”
[stuart] wanted a more intuitive way to control his rover platform than the software solution he had been using. He settled on using a Playstation controller with an AVR to operate the rover wirelessly. He found a couple references for talking to the controller using SPI on a PIC and adapted that for his ATMega88. The code is available on his site. He removed the rumble motors from the controller and stuffed the chip plus the transmitter package inside. The Linx TX/RX pair are mounted to pluggable boards so he can use them on other projects. A video of the tank in motion is after the jump. Continue reading “Playstation Tank Controller”
[mdavis19] found himself in the middle of nowhere, with no electricity, needing a strong vacuum. That happens to us all right? His solution was to hack together a gas powered monster vacuum. He found a shop vac at a yard sale and promptly discarded the motor and filter. Some minor modifications to a leaf blower and a plywood mount finished the job. He now has absolute sucking power as long as he has fuel. He describes how this is going to be used for gold prospecting, though it would probably work just as well on pet hair. If you’re going to use one around the house though, you may want to find a way to mount a filter in it, and wear ear plugs.
[Andlier] sent us this cool little project. He has built a wireless accelerometer controlled RGB LED lighting system. Based on what a mouth full that is, it sounds complicated right? The end result looks fairly intuitive. Simply pick up the controller and tilt your hand to change the color of the light.
The controller consists of an Atmel AVR168 microcontroller. He doesn’t specify what transceiver he is using, but if you look in the comments, he notes that he added an antenna to it to extend the range. The part that controls the LED is based off of an Atmel AVR169 microcontroller hooked to some shiftbright LED modules.
Continue reading “Wireless Accelerometer Controlled RGB LED”
[Gabe Graham] sent us this step by step process of building a dock for his Zune and hacking is steering wheel controls to work with it. Like many of us, he was not happy with the performance of those little radio transmitters that hook to your mp3 player. He remedied the situation by mounting a dock for his Zune onto the console and patching into his stereo. The sound quality was great, but controlling it was a pain.
He had one button left on his steering wheel that was not needed for anything. He created a custom controller for the Zune that would issue different commands based on how long he held the button on the steering wheel. If the button was held for less than half a second, it would skip tracks, any longer and it would pause. Though he could possibly clean up the look of the LED sticking out of the console, the over all effect is quite well done.
Movea has just released a version of Gyration’s wireless remote control for Windows Media Center computers. Other than the wireless mouse controls that the remote offers, one nice feature of the remote is the ability to control Windows Media Player (WMP) while your display is off.
The remote interacts with WMP, by downloading data to be displayed using it’s built in LCD screen. From here you can view songs by album or artist and even access your playlist. Prices for the remote range from $179.99 to $229.99 with an included keyboard.
After a little searching we found that Gyration had made a similar version of the remote for Dell that was packaged with the Dell XPS M2010 Based on this and a thread by [BENZONATE] on AVS Forum we put together our own remote using the following parts: Continue reading “How To: Build Your Own Gyration Media Center Remote”
[Andrey Mikhalchuk] Has posted some great instructions on how to build an inexpensive router based robot. Starting with a Linksys WRT54GL, he takes us through the process of disassembling and modifying it to directly control servos. He has put together a custom version of OpenWRT Linux that you can download from his site. After testing to make sure everything is functional, he goes through a quick and dirty chassis build. As you can see from the picture above, there are lot of household items thrown in there such as rubber bands and zip ties. After adding a camera mounted on two servos for x y movement, he fine tunes it and lets it go.
This project looks fairly simple, cheap, and fun. It may look familiar as it is very similar to our Wifi Robot post from August.
[thanks Matt]
