Version 1.8 of the 80386 ISA SBC in its assembled glory. (Credit: Alexandru Groza)

Building Your Own 80386DX ISA Single Board Microcomputer

March 30, 2022 by Maya Posch 36 Comments

Having grown up with 386-level systems during the early 90s like so many of us, [Alexandru Groza] experienced an intense longing to experience the nostalgia of these computer systems from an interesting angle: by building his own 80386DX-based single board computer. Courtesy of the 16-bit ISA form factor, the entire system fits into a 16-bit ISA backplane which then provides power and expansion slots for further functionality beyond what is integrated on the SBMC card.

Having started the project in 2019, it is now in the home stretch towards completion. Featuring an 80386DX and 80387DX FPU alongside 128 kB of cache and a grand total of 32 MB of RAM, an OPTi chipset was used to connect with the rest of the system alongside the standard 8042-class PS/2 keyboard and mouse controller. A large part of the fun of assembling such a system is that while the parts themselves are easy enough to obtain, finding datasheets is hard to impossible for some components.

Undeterred, some reverse-engineering of signaling on functional mainboards was sufficient to fill in the missing details. Helpfully, [Alexandru] provides the full schematics and BOM of the resulting board and takes us along with bootstrapping the system after obtaining the PCBs and components. After an initial facepalm moment due to an incorrectly inserted (and subsequently very dead) CPU and boot issues, ultimately [Alexandru] gave up on the v1.6 revision of the board

Fortunately the v1.8 revision with a logic analyzer led to a number of discoveries that has led to the system mostly working, minus what appears to be DMA-related issues. Even so, it is a remarkable achievement that demonstrates the complexity of these old systems.

Finally, The Venerable Vectrex Gets A Mini Makeover

March 29, 2022 by Robin Kearey 16 Comments

It appears that every great console is bound to get a miniature remake: we’ve had the PlayStation Classic, the Mini NES and SNES, and even a miniature Sega Genesis/Mega Drive. But one great console that was sorely missing from that list, at least according to [Brendan], was the Vectrex. So he went ahead and built a fully-functioning miniature Vectrex Console.

If the name “Vectrex” doesn’t ring a bell in your mind, you’re not alone: a commercial failure, it was quickly forgotten by most following the 1983 video game crash. But it has retained a cult status among enthusiasts due to its unique design featuring a monochrome vector monitor, onto which you can place transparent overlays to obtain a sort-of color display. Its games can now all be emulated using software like RetroPie, which is what [Brendan] chose to run on a Raspberry Pi Model 2 that he had lying around.

As for the display, he settled on a Pi-compatible 3.5″ TFT device. Hooking it up to the Pi was easy enough, but getting the image rendered in its proper portrait orientation was quite a headache, requiring endless fiddling with drivers and configuration files.

Once he got this working, [Brendan] set to work designing a miniature copy of the Vectrex’s original case. It took a few iterations and several 10-hour runs on his 3D printer before he ended up with a sturdy case that securely held the Pi and its display in place. A few more hours of printing later he also had a handheld controller, which he based on an Arduino Pro Mega. The Arduino reads out four regular pushbuttons and a joystick, and communicates with the Pi through a coiled USB cable.

The end result, as you can see in the video embedded below, is the cutest little Vectrex we’ve ever seen. It’s really the opposite of this big-screen Vectrex project. We’ve also seen a Vectrex projector, and even one with a real color monitor hacked in. Continue reading “Finally, The Venerable Vectrex Gets A Mini Makeover” →

A Timex Datalink smartwatch next to an Arduino

Arduino Keeps Your Classic Timex Datalink In Sync

March 26, 2022 by Robin Kearey 18 Comments

The Timex Datalink was arguably the first usable smartwatch, and was worn by NASA astronauts as well as geek icons like Bill Gates. It could store alarms, reminders and phone numbers, and of course tell the time across a few dozen time zones. One of the Datalink’s main innovations was its ability to download information from your PC — either through flashing images on a CRT monitor or through a special adapter plugged into a serial port.

With CRTs thin on the ground and original serial adapters fetching ludicrous prices online, classic Datalink users today may find it hard to keep their watches in sync with their Outlook calendars. Fortunately for them, [famiclone] came up with a solution: a DIY Datalink adapter based on an Arduino. It works the same way as Timex’s serial adapter, in that it receives data through the computer’s serial port and transmits it to the watch by flashing a red LED.

Updating your watch does require the use of the original Datalink PC software, which only runs on classic operating systems like Windows 95 or 98, so you’ll need to keep a copy of such an OS running. Luckily, it has no problem with virtual machines or USB COM ports, so at least you don’t need to keep vintage PC hardware around. Then again, whipping out a 1995 Pentium laptop to update your Timex watch would make for the ultimate geek party piece.

Love classic geeky watches? Check out this featured article we did on them a few years ago. If you’re interested in using computer monitors to transmit data optically, we’ve covered a few projects that do just that.

Polar Planimeter Quantifies Area By Plotting Perimeter

March 25, 2022 by Ryan Flowers 12 Comments

These days it’s hard to be carry the label “maker” or “hacker” without also being proficient in some kind of CAD- even if the C is for Cardboard. But before there was CAD there was Drafting and its associated arts, and one couldn’t just select a shape and see its area in the square unit of your choice. So how could an old school draftsman figure out the area of complex shapes? [Chris Staecker] introduces us to the polar planimeter, a measuring tool created specifically for the purpose and explained in full in the video below the break.

The polar planimeter being discussed is a higher end unit from the 1960’s. Interestingly, the first polar planimeters were invented in the early 19th century even before the math that describes their function was completed. A lever is placed in a fixed position on one end and into the planimeter on the other. The planimeter itself has another arm with a reticle on it. The unit is zero’d out with a button, and the outline of the shape in question is traced in a clockwise fashion with the reticle.

What makes the polar planimeter capable of measuring in multiple dimensions is the fixed arm. The fixed arm pivots around, allowing the planimeter to track angle changes which affects the output. So, the planimeter isn’t just measuring the length of the perimeter, but the size of the perimeter. The final measurement is output in square inches.

Overall it’s a really slick tool we didn’t know existed, and it’s fascinating to see how such problems were solved before everything could be done with a mouse click or two. Be sure to check out this 100+ year old reference set to round out your knowledge of past knowledge. Thanks to [Zane] for the great tip!

Continue reading “Polar Planimeter Quantifies Area By Plotting Perimeter” →

Brick And Motor Table Saw Delivers Paper Cuts On Demand

March 23, 2022 by Ryan Flowers 11 Comments

Twenty Two Motors. Fifty gears. Eighty Two Hundred RPM. Hundreds of individual pieces, and one sheet of glossy paper cut into a disk. This isn’t a nightmare driven Rube Goldberg machine. Instead, it’s a Lego monstrosity created by [GazR] of [GazR’s Extreme Brick Machines!], and all of these parts are flying in formation for one Lego slicing purpose. In the video below the break, you can see what very well may be the worlds most powerful Lego and Paper table saw.

Starting out with a build that had a mere fourteen motors in a platform that looked quite a lot more like a table saw, [GazR] learned that having only fourteen motors turning a Lego based blade was not a good combination. In the next iteration, the same number of motors were used, but the gearing was increased to bring RPM up, and a Lego toy saw blade took care of cutting duties.

Seeing that higher speeds with thinner blades was a winning trend, [GazR] stepped it up to the aforementioned 8200 RPM twenty-two motored paper whirling Lego Death Machine. Yes, [GazR] cut Lego, carrots, carpet, and paper- all with circular sheet of paper.

Do Lego mechanisms turn your gears? You might enjoy this Legopunk Orrery from the Hackaday archives, too. Thanks to [Keith] for the great tip. Be sure to submit your own tips via the Hackaday Tips Line, or the #Submit-A-Tip channel in the Hackaday Discord server.

Continue reading “Brick And Motor Table Saw Delivers Paper Cuts On Demand” →

Old School Mechanical Pong Still Amazes

March 23, 2022 by Elliot Williams 13 Comments

[Tom], of the YouTube channel ThingsTomLike, found a very sweet little mechanical Pong clone at a thrift store. It came in broken, but in only fifteen minutes of your time, [Tom] manages a complete teardown and repair. (Video, embedded below.)

The game works by balancing a lightbulb on the end of a pivot arm that projects a “ball” onto a screen, while players move their paddles up and down to hit the spring that surrounds the light assembly. The ball arm gets periodically kicked by a DC motor and cam assembly, which makes it careen wildly back and forth across the screen.

It’s a marvel of simple, no-IC engineering. Ironically, it might have been cheaper than making it out of silicon at the time, but viewed from today’s economy, just the human labor in adjusting that counterweight so that the “ball” floats would blow the budget.

Why a screen and lightbulb? Because it’s emulating Pong, a video game, the new kid on the block. But even 45 years later, we think it has got a charm all of its own that the cold digital logic of Pong lacks, even if the gameplay suffers.

Continue reading “Old School Mechanical Pong Still Amazes” →

Great Computer Hacks Make Hackers Hacker Computers

March 18, 2022 by Ryan Flowers 14 Comments

In the year 1995, computers were, well… boring. The future wasn’t here yet, and computers were drab, chunky beige boxes. Sure, there were some cool-ish computers being sold, but the landscape was still relatively barren. But as you’ll see in the video below the break, it doesn’t have to be that way, and the [Hackers Curator] shows us the way by recreating Johnny Lee Miller’s computer from the 1995 movie Hackers.

Hackers wasn’t popular when it came out, but over the years it has gained quite a following. It portrayed computers and the people who loved them in completely new ways, representing a culture that has never existed. Even so, it inspired so many young hacker types. Among those inspired is the crew over at [Hackers Curator] and they have taken it upon themselves to, uh… curate… the props, costumes, and stories surrounding the movie.

Recreating Dade’s iconic camo “luggable” computer came with quite a lot of difficulty. It turns out that the original movie props were working custom computers that used hacked together customized cases and Mac Powerbook 180c internals. Dade’s (aka Zer0 Cool and Crash Override) was mashup of the a Compaq Portable 486c and the aforementioned Mac. [HackersCurator] have lovingly recreated this prop from two broken computers, but chose to run the internals with a Raspberry Pi.

The techniques used in the creation of this beastly cyberdeck are ones that can be used in building so many other projects, even if you’re not a Hackers hacker. Customizing the plastics and placing a trackball in the most awkward of spots was expertly done, and we’ll be referring to it in the future for guidance when doing similar projects.

Are movie replica hacks your thing? You’re in luck! It turns out that this isn’t [Hackers Curator]’s first build. In 2019 they tackled Lord Nikon’s laptop, and of course, we covered that one too!

Continue reading “Great Computer Hacks Make Hackers Hacker Computers” →