[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VF2dI7RiMVQ]
[Csaba Bleuer] has built this really nice POV LED sphere. Looking at the hand drawn schematic, it appears that he’s using an Atmega8 as the core. The resolution is pretty decent, and even shows fairly well on camera despite the refresh issues. Although much cleaner, it looks like a similar implementation to this one that we covered back in october of last year. He’s still got some polishing to do to match “the orb” though.
Ah, the heady aroma of damp engineers! It’s raining in Silicon Valley, where the 2010 Embedded Systems Conference is getting off the ground at San Jose’s McEnery Convention Center.
ESC is primarily an industry event. In the past there’s been some lighter fare such as Parallax, Inc. representing the hobbyist market and giant robot giraffes walking the expo. With the economy now turned sour, the show floor lately is just a bit smaller and the focus more businesslike. Still, nestled between components intended to sell by the millions and oscilloscopes costing more than some cars, one can still find a few nifty technology products well within the budget of most Hack a Day readers, along with a few good classic hacks and tech demos…
Sometimes, sitting in a windowless office can drive you crazy. Adding a little bit of life and color can really help. [Gripen40k] did this by building a biosphere. He didn’t have any windows though, so he made an LED light on a PIC based timer. What is interesting is what he did with a thermistor. The Cree LED bulb that he salvaged was going to be submerged in the water, so he had to do some workarounds to keep from over heating the biosphere. Read the project log for more details.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sO2-tqoyGik]
Take a few moments and watch this 3 axis rotating LED light display fire up. The final effect of being an RGB glowing ball is nice, but we’re fascinated with the structure. There are tons of great detailed pictures of the assembly on the forum thread to feast your eyes on. Just getting power to the LEDs was a feat, he passes their power through 6 slip contacts. Parts were pulled from an old VCR and some old fans.
[via HackedGadgets]
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jsg24MGNpRc&feature=player_embedded%5D
WaitingForFriday’s [Simon Inns] is quite possibly the USB interface and PIC master. This week he let us know about his VU-meter repurposed as a computer performance monitor using a PIC18F2550 and his open source USB Generic HID communication class. With PWM the meter’s needles and RGB LED can be accurately set and even dampened for CPU usage, network usage, HDD utilization, and even memory usage. Oddly enough, in his software we didn’t find the ability to use the device as a VU-meter – go figure.
Shortly after finishing his Makiwara punching bag, [Abieneman] wired and programmed an Arduino to an accelerometer to find out just how much acceleration (and with some math, force) is behind his punches. The project is simple and would be quick to reproduce for your own measuring and experiments: all that he used included an Arduino, accelerometer (with A/D converter), LED displays (and shift register). We were a little disappointed to learn of how much static the accelerometer produced, so measuring things such as impulse, energy, and pretty much anything not kinematic is nullified. But it makes us wonder, how much static would be in say, a Wii Remote punching bag?
Medea Vodka comes with a bottle that includes a blue scrolling LED Marquee. OK, great? It’s an interesting marketing ploy but kind of a waste don’t you think? Friends, it’s up to us to repurpose this hardware. It can’t be that difficult to hack into the programmable display and make it do your bidding. Our friend Google tells us that you can get your hands on this 750 milliliter bottle for about $40. That’s around $25 more than a passable grade of Vodka sells for, a mere pittance for the challenge of cracking open the hardware for fun and profit. Don’t forget to document your work and tip us off once you’ve accomplished something. See Medea’s programming instructional video after the break. Oh yeah, remember to hack first and drink later… cheap soldering irons get hot!
Continue reading “What Kind Of LED Matrix Does Your Vodka Come With?”
