Tiger Boy Advance Is A 90s Kid Dream Come True

January 7, 2022 by Tom Nardi 6 Comments

From the release of the DMG-01 in 1989 until the final Micro variant hit store shelves in 2005, the Nintendo Game Boy line represented the epitome of handheld gaming for hundreds of millions of players. But that’s not to say there weren’t a wide array of other handheld systems that aimed to chip away at the Japanese gaming giant’s monopoly. SEGA and Sony released high-tech systems that brought impressive technical innovations, while Tiger Electronics famously took the opposite approach with ultra-cheap handhelds that leveraged simplistic games based on popular children’s franchises.

[Chris Downing] had to make do with these budget Tiger games as a child, and now as an adult, he’s determined to made things right with the Tiger Boy Advance. As the name implies, this retro hybrid combines the look and feel of a branded Tiger game with the power and software compatibility of a legitimate Nintendo Game Boy Advance (GBA) circa 2001. It even sprinkles in some modern niceties, like USB-C charging and a backlit display. While most of its charm is probably lost on anyone who didn’t grow up within a fairly narrow range of years, the video below seems to prove that even modern kids can appreciate this one-of-a-kind creation.

From an electronics standpoint, the system is essentially just a gutted GBA crammed into a 3D printed approximation of an old Tiger game from around the mid 1990s. But what makes this project special is the nostalgia-fueled attention to detail that [Chris] brings to the table.

Take for example the custom manufactured faceplate that combines artwork from some of the era’s best known games. Getting the image printed on the back of the CNC-cut piece of clear acrylic proved to be quite a challenge, but the final result looks incredibly professional. Instead of using the GBA’s stock buttons and directional pad, [Chris] decided to 3D print replacements that mimic the look of the original Tiger controls. It all culminates in a device that perfectly recreates the unique look of the original Tiger games.

Some will argue that he’d have done better to equip the system with a Raspberry Pi Zero 2 and the latest build of RetroPie, and frankly, it’s easy to see the appeal of going that route. But [Chris] didn’t make this for us, he built it to encapsulate a very specific time from his own childhood. We’re just glad that the technology now available to the individual maker allowed him to turn this particular dream into reality.

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Tiny Switch Ornament Plays GIFs With An ESP32

December 19, 2021 by Dave Rowntree 4 Comments

It constantly amazes us what we hackers can build these days, (electronics shortages aside) we have access to an incredible array of parts, with specifications that only a few years ago would be bank-breaking and longer ago just fantasy. It’s nice to see people building one-offs just for fun, in spite of the current difficulties getting parts to actually be delivered. For example, check out this miniaturized Nintendo Switch created by [scottbez1] that plays animated GIFs from an SD card on tiny 1.14″ LCD display.

Obviously such a diminutive hack requires a custom PCB, which was a job for KiCAD. Armed with a 3D model of the LCD, the casing and PCB outline were drawn using Fusion 360. The PCB hosts a LilyGo ESP32 module for all the heavy lifting, with the WiFi adding some fun future capabilities not yet explored. The design is about as tight as it can get without pushing the limits of the PCB process too far, including a neat trick of sneaking passives inside the body of the SD card! That’s another space-saving idea we’ll be banking.

All-in-all a neat little hack, showing some good modelling and construction techniques and a good looking end result. Code for your reference may be found on the project GitHub, but as of writing the hardware design is not available.

Whilst this project shrinks the Switch, here’s one that goes the other way and super-sizes it, and if you have a switch lite but crave a little modern charging magic, then look no further than this Qi wireless charging hack.

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Borehole Camera Rig Makes Life Easier In Mining

October 9, 2021 by Lewin Day 11 Comments

Much of mining involves digging and drilling holes in the ground. Often, these holes need inspecting, but [Dean Harty] found that existing borehole inspection solutions weren’t up to snuff. Resolution was poor, and often live-view devices made recording footage a pain. Instead, he set about the development of the Sneaky Peaky, going through several revisions in the process.

The first revision was nothing more than a GoPro strapped to a small penny board, paired with a bright flashlight. The 4K resolution of the GoPro provided useful footage, and the assembly could be lowered into boreholes on a rope and retrieved easily. Rugged and water resistant, the gear worked well, and was remarkably cheap compared to more obscure mining industry hardware.

Later revisions ditched the skateboard, replacing it with a pipe-style housing instead. Key to the design was that the device could readily be destroyed and flushed out of a borehole with an air blast in the event it got stuck.

Eventually, mining outfit Metrologi got involved, having worked with [Dean] on several borehole backfill operations. A 3D-printed chassis was developed to hold an action camera and twin torches, held together with plastic zip ties. These are attached to the pull rope, and if the camera becomes jammed, a sharp pull will snap the ties and cause the device to fall apart. Steel cable ties are then used to create flexible guides to center the assembly in a variety of pipe diameters.

It’s a great example of people on the ground hacking together the tools they need, combined with iterative design to integrate improvements over time. We don’t talk about boreholes much around here, but they can be musical if properly employed, as it turns out. If you’ve got your own great mining hacks, however, do drop us a line!

Custom Soldering Fume Fan Doesn’t Skimp On Features

August 27, 2021 by Tom Nardi 8 Comments

Prolific maker [sjm4306] tells us the first iteration of his soldering fan was little more than some cardboard, electrical tape, and a hacked up USB cable. But as we all know, these little projects have a way of evolving over time. Fast forward to today, and his custom fan is a well-polished piece of kit that anyone with a soldering iron would be proud to have on their workbench.

Cardboard has given way to a 3D printed enclosure that holds the fan, electronics, a pair of 18650 cells, and a easily replaceable filter. Between the marbled filament, debossed logo, properly countersunk screw holes, and rounded corners, it’s really hard to overstate how good this case looks. We’ve shamefully produced enough boxy 3D printed enclosures to know that adding all those little details takes time, but the end result really speaks for itself.

Fan internals, with a look at the custom PCB.

The user interface running on the OLED is also an exceptionally nice touch. Sure the fan doesn’t need a graphical display, and [sjm4306] could have saved a lot of time and effort by using a turn-key speed controller, but the push-button configuration complete with graphical indications of fan speed and battery life really give the final product a highly professional feel.

In the video below, [sjm4306] reveals that while the finished product might look great, there were a few bumps in the road. Issues with clearance inside the case made him rethink how things would be wired and mounted, leading to a far more cramped arrangement than he’d anticipated. Part of the problem was that he designed the case first and tried to integrate the electronics later, rather than the other way around; a common pitfall you’d be wise to watch out for.

It’s been proven that, without some external input, solder smoke is going to go right in your face. Whether or not you need to do something this complex is naturally up for debate, but if you want to keep all that nasty stuff out of your lungs, you’d do well to outfit your workbench with some kind of fan.

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Modern Tape Echo Made Easy

August 21, 2021 by Bryan Cockfield 11 Comments

Modern popular music increasingly relies on more and more complicated and intricate equipment and algorithms to generate catchy tunes, but even decades ago this was still the case. The only difference between then and now was that most of the equipment in the past was analog instead of digital. For example, the humble tape echo was originally made by running a loop of magnetic tape over a recording head and then immediately playing it back. Old analog machines from that era are getting harder and harder to find, so [Adam Paul] decided to make his own.

At first, [Adam] planned to use standard cassette tapes in various configurations in order to achieve the desired effect, but this proved to be too cumbersome and he eventually switched his design to using the cassette internals in a custom tape deck. The final design includes a small loop of tape inside of the enclosure with a motor driving a spindle. The tape is passed over a record head, then a read head, and then an erase head in order to achieve the echo sound. All of this is done from inside of the device itself, with 1/4″ jacks provided so that the musician can plug in their instrument of choice just like a standard effects pedal would be configured.

The entire build is designed to be buildable and repairable using readily-available parts as well, which solves the problem of maintaining (or even finding) parts from dedicated tape echo machines from decades ago. We like the sound from the analog device, as well as the fact that it’s still an analog device in a world of otherwise digital substitutes. Much like this magnetic tape-based synthesizer we featured about a year ago.

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Handheld Hackintosh Runs Mac OS On LattePanda

June 30, 2021 by Tom Nardi 16 Comments

We’ve seen a huge influx of bespoke portable computers over the last couple of years thanks to availability of increasingly powerful single-board computers. The vast majority of these have been ARM powered using something like the Raspberry Pi 4, and naturally, run Linux. Only a handful have run on x86 hardware, usually because whoever built it wanted to be able to run Windows.

But this handheld x86 Hackintosh running the latest Mac OS on the LattePanda Alpha is truly something unique. Creator [iketsj] claims it to be a world’s first, and after a bit of searching, we’re inclined to agree. While others have installed Mac OS on the LattePanda to create Hackintosh laptops, this would indeed appear to be the first handheld computer to utilize this particular hardware and software blend.

Like other custom portables we’be seen, this one starts with a 3D printed enclosure. The overall design reminds us a bit of the YARH.IO we covered last year, and even borrows the trick of reusing the membrane and PCB of one of those miniature keyboard/pointer combos. Which in this case ends up being especially important, as in keeping with Apple’s own portable Mac OS machines, the screen on this handheld doesn’t support touch.

We especially like how the integrated Arduino on the LattePanda is being used in conjunction with some MOSFETs to control power to the handheld’s LCD, keyboard, and fans. While it sounds like the fans are currently running at full throttle, [iketsj] mentions he does intend on adding automatic speed control in the future. A dedicated “chassis controller” like this makes a lot of sense, and is something we imagine will only become more common as these portable builds become increasingly complex.

Now that we’ve seen a custom portable computer running Mac OS, are we due to see a whole new wave of cyberdecks sporting Cupertino’s software in the future? Maybe not. As [iketsj] points out at the end of this video, Apple’s switch from x86 to their own in-house silicon will almost certainly mean the death of the Hackintosh project within the next few years, bringing a fascinating era of computer hacking to a close.

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3D Printed Terminal Takes Computing Back In Time

May 13, 2021 by Tom Nardi 14 Comments

It’s hard to look at today as anything but the golden age of computing. Even entry level machines have quad-core processors and a terabyte or more of storage space, to say nothing of the incredible amount of tech packed into the modern smartphone. But even so, there’s something to be said for the elegant simplicity of early desktop computers.

Looking to recreate the feeling of those bygone days, [Pigeonaut] created the Callisto II. Its entirely 3D printed case snaps together without glue or screws, making it easy to assemble, and the parts have been sized so they’ll be printable even on smaller machines like the Prusa Mini. Inside you’ll find a 1024×768 Pimoroni HDMI 8″ IPS LCD, 60% mechanical keyboard, four-port USB 3 hub, Raspberry Pi 4, and a 22 watt USB power supply to run it all.

The internal components can be easily accessed with the hatch on the rear of the case, and there’s plenty of room inside to add new hardware should you want to toss in a hard drive or even swap out the Pi for a different single-board computer.

To really drive home the faux-retro concept of the Callisto II, [Pigeonaut] has created a website for the fictional computer company behind the machine, replete with all the trappings you’d expect from the early web. There’s even a web-based “operating system” you can use to show off your freshly printed Callisto II.

Incidentally the II suffix isn’t just part of the meme, there really was a Callisto before this one. We covered the earlier machine back in 2019, and while we’re a bit sad to see that the functional 3.5 inch floppy drive has been deleted, we can’t deny the overall aesthetics have been greatly improved in the latest version.

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