Replacing The Ipod Shuffle’s Headphones

March 12, 2009 by Caleb Kraft 29 Comments

[blip.tv ?posts_id=1878228&dest=-1]

With the recent announcement that the only controls for the Ipod shuffle will be on the headphones, many were let down. [James] has come to the rescue, showing that you can just solder new ear buds on the end of the wires. Though this may not be the perfect solution, especially if your cable gets damaged, at least you can get a little better sound. This is a great example of something to show kids. It’s not too difficult and teaches them that if we’re not happy with something, we can hack it.

IPod Touch 2G Jailbreak Released

March 10, 2009 by Eliot 36 Comments

ipod

The iPod Touch 2G jailbreak was first shown in January. It had to be applied every time the iPod was booted. The iphone-dev team just released the 24kpwn LLB patch to allow for a persistent jailbreak. The team had been hanging on to this patch because there was the possibility the exploit could be used on future iPhone versions. Unfortunately, a group started selling the code, so the team was forced to release it for free. iPod owners are certainly happy though. There is a tutorial available for updating a factory reset iPod (backup link). The team will include the patch in future official tools.

UPDATE: [cptfalcon] pointed out a post that covers the technical details of the exploit.

[photo: Joits]

False Theremin

February 23, 2009 by Caleb Kraft 18 Comments

fth

[vilxes91] sent in this cool little false-theremin (translated). Its a pretty simple circuit, that can fit in really small places. It isn’t a true theremen because it uses the amount of light coming in around the lid for the modulation. To play it, you turn it on and open it up, the more open the lid, the higher the pitch. You can see a video of it in action after the break.

Continue reading “False Theremin” →

Parts: I2C Audio Volume Potentiometer (DS1807)

February 16, 2009 by Ian 7 Comments

ds1807ii

The DS1807 contains two logarithmic digital potentiometers (pots) for audio volume adjustment. Each pot has 64 volume levels plus a mute setting. The volume level of each pot is set over a two-wire I2C serial interface. We’ll show you how to connect and interface the DS1807 below.

Continue reading “Parts: I2C Audio Volume Potentiometer (DS1807)” →

SparkFun Releases RGB Button Controller

February 5, 2009 by Eliot 5 Comments

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SparkFun has been selling button pad parts for some time and we used them in our RGB door lock project. A excellent part, but you needed to implement your own interface to use the boards. SparkFun has just released two additional versions to make it easier on builders. The first is their Button Pad Controller USB. It has a 4×4 grid of buttons lit by RGB LEDs and a USB interface. This board can be expanded using the Button Pad Controller SPI. The SPI bus means it should be easy to add the button pad to embedded projects. This newest release puts you much closer to building your own RGB monome clone or other custom controller than ever before. The unit pictured above is their own project and they have no plans on selling anything like it.

WiFi Streaming Radio Update

February 3, 2009 by Nick Caiello 6 Comments

[flickr video=3238566442]

Since our last post about his WiFi Streaming Radio Project, [Jeff] has been hard at work to release part 8 of the project where he adds tuning control to the radio. Interestingly enough, the addition of the tuning control only requires a potentiometer and the completed AVR LCD board from part 7. After wiring the potentiometer to the analog to digital converter on the AVR and adding a few lines of code, the radio can now be tuned quickly and easily. In addition to thoroughly explaining the hardware changes, [Jeff] details the configuration changes required to the OpenWRT framework so that bidirectional communication between the router and AVR is possible, allowing the tuner to function properly. Be sure to check out the video above to see the tuner in action.

Generating G-code With Common Lisp

February 1, 2009 by Eliot 10 Comments

gcode

Ruin & Wesen are a two person shop creating specialized music gear. As part of their recent MIDI Command development, they got into case manufacturing. They purchased a mini CNC mill to cut the aluminum cases. Unhappy with the software options provide [Wesen] decided to write his own G-code generator. G-code is part of the numerical control used to command CNC machines. He implemented his interpreter using the language he’s most familiar with: Common Lisp (not surprising if you notice the website’s backend). The post covers the design philosophy used and some of the problems that came up. We look forward to future releases since the interpreter can generate milling code using processing.org sketches and cut PCBs directly from Eagle.

You may remember Ruin & Wesen from when they shared their Eagle layout videos.

[Thanks fbz]