Clock Hides Time Until You’re In Close Proximity

April 15, 2010 by Mike Szczys 10 Comments

[Alan] is branching out beyond the Arduino with this clock. He’s still using the same code but built this board around an ATmega328 and the components he needed, saving his Arduino board for further development. The concept uses a character display housed in an old iPod Touch case. The build relies on an infrared sensor to actuate the LCD backlight. The closer your hand is the brighter the light.

The Maxim DS3232 RTC chip keeps time in this application. We’ve seen this little marvel used before, popular because it uses temperature compensation to maintain accuracy. If you’re interested in this part, check out the library file that [Alan] wrote for it.

Third-person Vehicle

April 6, 2010 by Jakob Griffith 27 Comments

Here is something we didn’t expect (NSFW). The machinima crew behind RedVsBlue, Rooster Teeth, actually did a hack!

The idea is simple enough, how could you experience driving a vehicle like in a video game – aka, third-person. With some steel bar, Canon 5D camera, and a 15inch monitor inside of a blacked out cab, they accomplished just that.

What surprised us the most, is the great difficulty and difference there is between the video game vehicle and the real life one. But all of us here at HAD know why; they need to replace the steering wheel with a joystick. While they’re at it they can make it wireless and remote-controlled. Finally a HUD would be easy enough to program (might we suggest processing). Oh dear lord, is the world ready for this!?

1-Wire LAN With An LCD

March 23, 2010 by Jakob Griffith 14 Comments

[Viktor], one of our favorite avid hackers, has been playing around with 1-wire systems all this month. What started out as a MicroLAN Fonera has turned into an iButton interface, to a 1-wire powered hub, and finally a 1-wire character driven LCD. Anyone looking at 1-wire systems or OWFS could surely benefit from his testing.

However, if you still haven’t gotten your fill of 1-wire goodness, let us remind you of the 1-wire HVAC and IPv6 to 1-wire protocol translator.

[Thanks Juan]

Spectrum Analyzer Wedged Into A Cellphone

February 12, 2010 by Mike Szczys 21 Comments

[Miguel A. Vallejo] wanted a portable spectrum analyzer for the 2.4GHz ISM band. No problem, there’s modules for that are easy to interface with a microcontroller and LCD screen. But carrying around a black project box doesn’t exactly scream ‘cool’ so he fit his spectrum analyzer inside of a cell phone. This made a lot of things easier for him; he already had a few old phones, he was able to use both the original battery and the original LCD screen, and a lot of the mounting work is already done for you. The only challenge was to fit his custom circuitry inside. By hacking off part of the CYWM6935 module and cutting some protoboard in the same shape as the original PCB he managed to get everything into this tiny portable package. Now he’s looking for a way to incorporate a charger, and an on/off switch.

If you don’t have an old cell phone sitting around you can try building a spectrum analyzer that uses a character display. But we’d suggest hitting up your friends for their old cellphones. The screens are used in all kinds of fun projects.

IM-ME Screen Reverse Engineered

February 1, 2010 by Mike Szczys 3 Comments

[Dave] figured out the command set for the IM-ME terminal. It took a bit of sleuthing to get this pink plastic peripheral to give up these secrets. He used an oscilloscope to sniff out the SPI connections, then used a hacked IM-ME to capture the traffic from a factory-fresh unit. He managed to extrapolate how write data was being sent but he still couldn’t figure out how commands were differentiated from that data. With the info at hand he searched around the interwebs to find that the screen uses an ST7565S controller. Now he’s got custom firmware to make the LCD display do his bidding and we’re wondering what’s next?

LCD Backlight Repair

January 22, 2010 by Mike Szczys 13 Comments

Another broken LCD TV came [Steve DiRaddo’s] way. This one had a broken backlight that he wanted to fix. He scrapped his LCD light table in order use the inverter. The two televisions were not the same size, nor made by the main manufacturer, but backlights all operate under the same principles. Using an inverter from a bit larger model meant it would have enough power to illuminate the lamps but he knew there’d be a problem with connectors and pinouts. After a bit of testing and creative wiring he got the system back up and running.

He’s got some extra parts left over from each TV including a bunch of CCFL lamps. Sound like it’s time to add some ground effects to his bike.

Home Made Small Form Factor LED Projector

January 15, 2010 by Caleb Kraft 26 Comments

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mQ8Kq2wLrf0]

[Newtonn2] dropped a tip in our inbox this morning that made us quite happy. This is a step by step build of a small form factor LED based projector. While the size may not get some of you too excited at first, those of us who have built projectors before know that home made ones are usually quite large. This one is roughly the size of the small office projectors you would see in a large retailer. He’s using a 30 watt LEd for the light and we didn’t notice a lumen measurement anywhere, but it looks bright enough to be watchable. Pictures usually turn out dark, so in person, the projection probably looks more bright and crisp. Now he just needs to find a high definition LCD that size.