Programmable Computer Built From A Humble ATtiny84

March 5, 2013 by Mike Szczys 19 Comments

attiny84-computer

Here’s a way to play around with simple computing concepts without going too crazy with the hardware side of things. [John Eisenmann] calls it the DUO tiny. It’s a programmable computer based around the ATtiny84. He wrote the operating system himself, building in a set of commands that make it quite functional, but allow the user to manipulate or even write the programs using the four button interface. Editing and running programs (which include some games) is demonstrated in the clip after the break.

The three major components used in the system are the ATtiny84, and EEPROM chip with 64 KB capacity to hold the programs, and the 102×64 pixel LCD screen seen above. The project began on a breadboard, but as he brought each part into being it transitioned to a strip-board prototype and finally this fab-house version.

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Virtual Archery Game Makes Practicing Convenient, Safe, And Inexpensive

March 2, 2013 by Ryan Fitzpatrick 13 Comments

Inspired by playing The Legend of Zelda video game series, Cornell University students [Mohamed Abdellatif] and [Michael Ross] created a Virtual Archery game as their ECE 4760 Final Project. The game consists of a bow equipped with virtual arrows and a target placed about 20 ft away. The player has three rounds to get as high of a score as possible. A small display monitor shows the instructions, and an image of where the shot actually hit on the target.

Pressing a button on the front of the bow readies a virtual arrow. A stretch sensor communicates with a microcontroller to determine when the bow string has been drawn and released. When the bow is drawn, a line of LEDs lights up to simulate a notched arrow. The player aims, and factors in for gravity. An accelerometer calculates the orientation of the bow when fired. The calculated shot is then shown on the display monitor along with your score.

This immediately makes me think of Laser Tag, and feels like a product that could easily be mass marketed. I’m surprised it hasn’t been already. Good work guys.

[via Hackedgadgets]

Check out the video demonstration after the break:

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[CNLohr]’s Microscope Slide Linux AVR Minecraft… Thing

February 18, 2013 by Brian Benchoff 19 Comments

We’ve been following [CNLohr]’s process of creating an AVR-powered microscope slide running Linux and interfacing redstone circuits in Minecraft to real world electronic for a while now, but we’re really at a loss for words on how it works. Well, now there’s a video explaining everything you want to know about this amazingly complicated and overwrought thing.

The device is powered by an AVR microcontroller and Ethernet controller running [Fabrice Bellard]’s JSLinux in a browser. [CNLohr] added a few bits to JSLinux allowing him map the x86 IO ports emulated inside JSLinux to the AVR’s IO ports. This allows him to query the status – both analog and digital – using just a browser. Very cool, but [CNLohr] can also run his Minecraft server optimized for 8-bit devices on this microscope slide server to create a bridge between real electronics and redstone circuits.

To sum up what’s going on here, [Bellard] created an x86 emulator in JavaScript, and put Linux on it. [CNLohr] is serving this from a microcontroller attached to a circuit built on a microscope slide so he can blink an LED from within Minecraft. It’s the most beautifully over engineered and useless thing we’ve ever seen, basically.

In the video after the break, you can see [CNLohr]’s overly convoluted walk through of what’s going on with this microscope slide server. As a little bonus, you can also catch a glimpse of Hackaday at 00:20 in [CNLohr]’s most visited / new tab thingy in Firefox. We’re honored, really.

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Giant Resistor-shaped Ohmmeter

February 12, 2013 by Mike Szczys 34 Comments

resistance-measuring-resistor

The fun of having a giant resistor-shaped Ohmmeter is that it reads back the resistance by displaying the color code. If you’re not too hot with decoding those bands there’s a helper band to the right which will display the value numerically.

All of the electronics are housed in the opaque part of the resistor, making for a nice low-profile base. The bent leads are hollow and allow [Sebastian] and his friend to run power and measurement leads through to the power connector on the back and the pair of banana jacks near the front. Each translucent ring houses an RGB LED, except for the one on the right which has four 7-segment display modules embedded in it. An ATmega168 takes the measurements using its Analog to Digital Converter (ADC) to read the value from a voltage divider. You can see a quick demo of the Ohmmeter in the video after the jump.

This would be a fun thing to pair with that giant breadboard.

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Digging Deeper Into The Apollo Saturn V LVDC

February 11, 2013 by Mike Szczys 11 Comments

LVDC-NAND-proto

[Fran] went all-out with her reverse engineering of the Apollo Saturn V LVDC board. Regular readers will remember that she was showing of the relic early this year when she took the board to her Dentist’s office to X-ray the circuit design. Since then she’s been hard at work trying to figure out how the thing functions using that look inside the board and components. When we say ‘hard at work’ we really mean it. Not only did she explore many different theories that resulted in dead ends, she also built her own version of the circuits to make sure they performed as she theorized. Above you can see her version of the NAND/AND gates used on the hardware.

We find her explanation of how the logic devices were originally fabricated to be very interesting. They started with a ceramic substrate and used additive processes to form the traces and add the gates. We’ve embedded her video explanation after the jump.

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Gas Sensor Suite Built With Gadgeteer Modules

January 31, 2013 by Mike Szczys 16 Comments

gadgeteer-gas-sensor-suite

[Blake] just finished a gas sensor suite built from Gadgeteer parts. The three sensors are the cylindrical towers along the left hand side of the assembly. The one at the top (with the orange ring) is an alcohol sensor. The middle one senses ammonia and the lower sensor measures air quality. Also rolled into the mix are temperature and humidity sensors.

You can collect a lot of data with this type of setup. To keep it organized [Blake] used the ThingSpeak interface. Using the NIC in the upper right he uploads the measurements for real-time graphing. The setup is explained in detail in the video after the break, including a test with some cleaning ammonia.

We haven’t tried out the Gadgeteer system for ourselves yet. But you’ve got to admit that the ribbon cable connector system the family of parts uses really helps to keep a rather complicated setup like this one nice and tidy.

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The Keypad Contest

January 31, 2013 by Eric Evenchick 11 Comments

What can you do with ten buttons and ten lights? A lot.

[Andrew] and [Nathan] found a collection of Hale Research keypads being thrown out, and decided to host the Keypad Contest. The goal of the contest was to create something nifty using the ten buttons and ten lights on the keypad, and an ATtiny2313 that replaced the original 8051-compatible microcontroller in the device.

[Andrew] wanted to try making PCBs with his home-built CNC machine, so he milled out USBtinyISP programmers for the ATtiny2313. Then he gave out eleven development kits to a group, and explained how to develop on the hardware.

After a month of hacking, seven people completed projects. The winner was an internet radio controller, which had the keypad sending serial data to a TP-Link WR703N router. The router used a USB sound card and OpenWRT firmware to stream music. The runner up was a timing game called “Capture”.

The contest write up has details on all seven projects. [Andrew] and [Nathan] were successful in getting software engineers to try hardware with this contest, resulting in some neat hacks. After the break, check out a video demo of the internet radio controller.

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