GadgetAddiction.com » DIY Gadgets

Going Green: DIY-style

Steve — Mon, 11 May 2009 13:30:45 +0000

Here in true ‘green’ form is a collection
of the latest home made hacks to getting the most out of your gadgets.

DIY Solar iPhone Charger

This
one’s not for the faint at heart when it comes to soldering but a DIY
guide for a MightyMintyBoost has been posted by Instructables user
Honus. Although the tutorial may tax your skills the result is a nifty
solar charger forged from various technical components and one Altoids
tin.

Guide via Source

Lifehacker’s Top 10 Battery Hacks

Everyone wants to get the most out of their
batteries. Not only does it cut costs, but extending the life of your batteries
helps the environment and can significantly decrease your frustration level.
Here are a few interesting pointers from the list:

Ditch the DVDs. Spinning a video on disk
is about as wasteful as spinning your tires when you consider the energy
savings of running the video straight off your hard drive or a USB drive. So
next time you plane on watching Snakes on a Plane on a plane, consider ripping
it first
Keep gadgets away from your hot,
power-sucking legs by clipping devices to your belt. The additional heat given
off by your body can impact on the longevity of your cell phone’s lithium ion
battery life (though you’re not leaching enough energy to launch bolts from
your hands like Ernest, it’s worth thinking about a belt clip)

Check out the complete list for other
battery saving tips

Build your own 125 MPG Hybrid car in your
garage!

Step 1: Become a Ford technical expert in
fuel economy

Step 2: Marvel that such a position
actually exists

Step 3: Take all those hyper-efficient
designs of yours that Ford wouldn’t employ and put ‘em to good use in a
garage-project.

The HyperRocket was designed by John, a
Ford employee, who in his spare time built this 124 MPG wunderkind bullet car.
The design calls for three wheels, a 250cc four stroke engine, and a patient
spouse that’s also trained in first aid.

Not a DIY-er? The whole shebang can be
yours for a paltry $15, 600, which is the opening bid on eBay

Source

SOBEaR

Finally a huggable bear that’s designed for
“anyone who does not know their own limits, or has problems controlling
themselves.” Yes, the future is now. Well, now is then so the future was just a
moment ago. Either way we finally have plush toys that dispense alcohol and know when you’ve had too much
(Disney’s had Winnie dishing drinks for years but his judgements never been
that great). SOBEaR is equipped with a built-in breathalizer and will cut you
off if you blow over after blowing into his face. How’s this green, you ask? It
saves the animal rights activists’ fuel from protesting the now abandoned
facility where real live panda’s were being trained to mix martinis.

Source

A Twittering Kill-a-Watt

Steve — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 13:30:19 +0000

For many consumers it’s difficult to truly
gauge the impact some gadgets are having on your energy consumption except as
the bottom line on your hydro bill. When you factor in HDTVs, PCs, consoles,
maybe a heating unit in the winter time, A/C in the summer, it can become a veritable
labyrinth in terms of trying to track down the culprit behind your latest whopper of a utilities bill. Enter
the Kill-a-Watt. Plug it into a wall socket, jack-in a shady appliance, and
watch the digits soar.

The Kill-a-Watt tracks energy usage by the kilowatt-hour
and you can track your consumption by the day, week, month, or the entire year.
This is an excellent way to put things into perspective, allowing users to
track their own habits, perhaps turning heads by showing just how much it’s
costing to leave the television or computer running when you’re not in the
room. Furthermore you can maximize the unit by plugging in your standard power bar. Ever wonder what your entire PC rig is costing you on a daily basis? And at a cool $23 on Amazon it’s almost a sure bet that this little gizmo
is money in the bank. Still not satisfied?

Well, what’s more a couple of handy do-it-yourselfers
have turned the whole setup into a twittering green machine, posting your power
consumption/savings to Twitter. Phil Torrone and Limor Fried crafted the
redubbed Tweet-a-Watt using an Xbee wireless module that they’ve implanted into
the main body of a Kill-a-Watt. The device then reports wirelessly to a nearby
computer. Once the day’s consumption for that outlet has been calculated the
numbers are published to a Twitter account of your choice. The current setup
even supports multiple units reporting in one day. Schematics and a how-to are en route in hopes that others will join in on the DIY fun. In
addition, they’ve submitted their concept to the Core77 & Greener Gadgets
design competition.

What Torrone and Fried are hoping for is a
community to form around these Tweet-a-Watt reports, with the aspiration of engendering a
culture of healthy competition and conservation. At last a way to go green and brag about it online!

Source

The DYMO, a Device You May Never Need.

AceFisch — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 15:00:48 +0000

As far as compact discs go, they are close to obsolete thanks to the widespread availability of smaller, more durable MP3 payers- at the forefront of which is the iPod. But even in the post-CD age some music lovers find the need for discs is still there, which may be one reason for the creation of the DYMO DiscPainter.

A compact device, the DYMO DiscPainter may or may not be for you. The main function of this printer is applying a professional gloss to any CD or DVD you may need. What’s intriguing is the way in which the Painter spins the disc while painting it. Instead of the traditional method of printing onto either a sticky CD backing or with a traditional inkjet the DYMO carefully measures the disc in order to paint it in a number of spins, at which time the ink is put onto the disc by an immobile inkhead. Dymo has labeled this RadialPrint Tehnology.

Unlike inkjet printers in which the inkhead moves back and forth while sending the paper through, the DYMO has only one immobile inkhead, which uses the disc’s spin to cover the entire surface. What more remarkable is that it indeed does cover the entire surface, from the very center to the very outside of the disc, no space is lost, so the image is complete.
So who could possibly use a piece of equipment like this? It’s certainly an entertaining thing to watch, and can paint one disc in up to 30 seconds- or three minuets depending on your speed. It comes with its own image building software to create the unique disc covers you want as well as making sure they’re compatible with the rounded shape of the disc.

Apart from its own software the DYMO is compatible with Adobe Print Shop, Illustrator, InDesign, SureThing and QuarkXPress as well. It’s also ready for either a PC or Mac computer- no qualms there.
It’s actually a useful device for the up-and-coming independent artist looking for a more professional look when selling demos and albums, or professionals who look to hand out demos or presentations. Small business owners could also find use with this intriguing device in order to add professionalism and creativity to their company.

Spykee Robot Perfect for Your Robot Army

thepete — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 15:00:57 +0000

Are you building a robot army to take over the world and finding it frustrating that there just aren’t enough types of robots to choose from? Well, if this is you (and who isn’t it these days?), your selection got a little wider with the Spykee spy robot from Meccano (watch out for their official website–it’s a resource-hungry Flash-based monster). When Meccano calls this a spy robot, they’re not kidding.

Once built (he comes as a kit), Spykee has a built in camera and microphone and can stream both audio and video over WiFi. Since he can move around on his tractor treads this makes him a mobile sentry robot, not unlike WowWee’s Rovio. However, Spykee has a few things that makes him a bit more impressive than the three-wheeler from WowWee. The first thing you notice is that Spykee is vaguely humanoid. He’s got those aforementioned treads to get around on rather than wheels but he’s got arms and a head that turns, making him much more human-like than Rovio.

Beyond the shallow, surface differences, Spykee also manages to bring some impressive features inside his chassis, as well as out.

He’s got Voice Over IP (VOIP) phone capabilities which allows you to use him to communicate with anyone in the room while you are anywhere in the world with an Internet connection. He can stream music from your computer through his speakers allowing you to have a portable music player you don’t even have to carry with you.

As a spy robot, he’s capable of sensing motion, recording video and audio, and, as mentioned above, streaming both, too. Another improvement over Rovio is that Spykee can sense when his battery is running low and will return to his charging station automatically. Since he’s got WiFi onboard, you can control Spykee from any computer (PC or Mac) on your local network or even from over the Internet.

Of course, you shouldn’t be expecting HD or even standard definition video–Spykee shoots 320×240 15 frames per second. He’s joystick compliant, which is nice and his software is open source, which means he’s a great hobby ‘bot, if, in fact, you are not planning on taking over the world with a robot uprising under your control.

Spykee runs for £200 and is apparently only available in the UK. Learn more at Gizoo.co.uk‘s product page for Spykee or head over to the unofficial Spykee site at Spykee.org.

The MechRC Expandable Robot, Ideal for Use Against the Robot Uprising

thepete — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 15:00:16 +0000

Every day it seems like more and more robots are popping up. Industrial robots, toy robots and more–a simple Google News search for “robots” will net you more reading than you have time for. One thing is for certain, it’s just a matter of time before one of those little guys decides he needs the same rights as the rest of us and then… the robot uprising will begin!

How should you deal with the robot uprising? Plan ahead by picking up your own robot, now before the uprising comes. If you raise him to respect you and your authority, you can be (reasonably) certain that he will protect you from any other robot insurgents. A good candidate for your personal robot force, would be the

12 Dollar Computer for the Third World

thepete — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 15:00:06 +0000

Odds are, you’ve probably heard of the so-called $100 laptop from OLPC, but a $12 computer? That’s just not possible, is it?Nicholas Negroponte, founder of the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) non-profit, back in 2005, began an attempt to make a laptop that would cost them just $100 to make and Third World governments just $100 to buy. Sadly, after two years of amazing hardware and software development, OLPC was able to produce the XO Laptop which cost them just under $200 to construct. Since they’re a non-profit, OLPC began selling their XO to NGOs and Third World governments for that same $200 a pop. After all, $200 is still a good price, right?Well, the idea behind OLPC was to put computers in the hands of kids in developing nations. However, many critics felt that even $100 would be too much to charge people in many Third World countries. Now, a group of designers attending MIT’s International Development Design Summit are designing a computer that they hope will cost just $12 to build.Will these uber-inexpensive computers surf the web or play your favorite YouTube videos? Probably not. The theory is that some rudimentary Internet use will be possible, but so far it’s not clear how much.What this group of designers hopes to do is hack the crap out of a cheap, probably unlicensed gaming system, upgrading it with new software and, from the sound of it, not too many new parts.After all, the beauty of the “Victor-70″ (also known as the “Victor-60” and the “Victor-90” and probably other numbers) is that it is, essentially, a knock-off of the Famicom game system from Japan. If you’re not familiar with the Famicom, it was the original version of the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) before its casing was redesigned and sent over to America. As a result, any game cartridge that worked on the old Famicom system works on the Victor-70, including one that ran a version of the programming language “Basic.” This opens up a lot of possibilities for repurposing.The other advantage of the Victor is that it plugs into a TV set and doesn’t have a dedicated monitor or display like the OLPC XO does. That, alone, will allow the price to drop dramatically. There are also other “educational” game cartridges available for it that are already available. This, in theory, would make the untouched device already a nice little box for kids, especially for the price–in India, they go for around $10. One assumes a mark-up, so if bought wholesale, it becomes obvious that a $12 computer just might be possible.Get a bit more information at the official site for the project: PlayPower.org or the official wiki for the project or, uh, another official wiki for the project.Will these ever come to the First World? Who knows? ComputerWorld.com was able to track down an online source for the Victor-70, but the link was dead as of this writing.Sources: BostonHerald.com and Computer World.com

Bug Labs’ Swiss Army Knife of Gadgets

thepete — Sun, 13 Apr 2008 15:00:30 +0000

If you’ve ever wished you could tweak that handheld gadget of yours just a bit, or even a lot, to make it better meet your needs, Bug Labs has a gadget you might want to check out. Well, it’s less of a “gadget” and more a gestalt of gadget-like objects. OK, you may be wondering just what the heck that even means, but when you see how the Bug platform works, you’ll understand.

See, the idea is that you have a base gadget–similar to a mini-motherboard. Like a mobo, you plug other components into it and then use software that makes those components do what you want. The Bug Base allows other modules to attach onto it. You then add your own (or other folks’) Java apps to make those modules do what you need them to do. The Bug has been compared to Lego for gadgets and really does give a new meaning to the phrase “plug and play.”

But what modules are available and what modules are on their way?

Currently, the only available modules are a screen ($99), motion detector ($49), 2 megapixel camera ($69), and a GPS ($79). Not that you can’t do a lot with just those. However, despite the claim by Bug Labs that they’ve already sold out of their initial supply, the price seems like it would be quite a deterrent against buying all of the modules and the prices mentioned above are the what early-adopters pay. Bug Labs will raise prices at some point, making the price tag for the complete collection of modules and the Bug Base seem like something James Bond might scoff at. Combined, they’ll run you around $690.

What’s even more bizarre are the claims on the Bug Labs product web page as to what modules are coming soon. Two of the four modules mentioned are perfectly reasonable. These are the touch-sensitive, color LCD screen and the qwerty keyboard. However, the addition of the audio module featuring a speaker and input/output jacks seems odd since those features are rather basic–like things that should come with the Bug Base. Perhaps the speaker can come in a module, but a handheld device without a headphone jack? AM radios in the 1950s had headphone jacks.

The other odd claim for a module-on-the-way is that of a Teleporter. Seriously, as of this writing, a claim of a “Teleporter” module is in the “Available Q2, 2008″ column on the Bug Labs product page. This is most likely a leftover from a ridiculous attempt at an April Fool’s joke. All in all, it seems like the Bug will be quite an interesting gadget, assuming it survives the early-adoption stage.

Dock Your Hard Drive

thepete — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 15:00:59 +0000

If you’re like most computer-based gearheads, it’s more than a little likely that you have an extra hard drive or two just laying around taking up space and collecting dust. You might even be contemplating building a low-end homemade rig just to serve as a new home for those still functioning but probably smaller-capacitied (not really a word) drives. Or, perhaps you recently upgraded from a tower PC to a laptop and have yet to transfer all that data off of your old machine. Which ever is your issue, computer accessory company, Brando, has the perfect device to add to your computer setup: it’s a dock for your old SATA hard disk drives.
Think of the dock you stick your iPod in to charge its battery or transfer media. Essentially, the Brando HDD dock is exactly like that, only bigger, for obvious reasons. It can take your full-size 3.5 inch internal hard drive or even your laptop-size 2.5 inch drive and connect it to any computer with a USB port on it. Pick up one of these and you’ve just put all of your old SATA drives back to work.
This hard drive dock comes in two flavors. One is just a dock that takes both 2.5 inch and 3.5 inch SATA HDDs. The other does the same and manages to squeeze in four USB ports to make up for the one it’s using up in your computer. Not a bad trade-off.
The non-USB-ported drive dock will run you $45US and the 4-port-USB-hubbed version will run you $9 more–but watch out. Brando is a Hong Kong-based company and, as a result, shipping can be on the costly side for such a fairly small-sized device. To get either drive dock to your home in the US, you’ll need to drop $24 or $28, respectively. Apparently, those 4 ports cost a dollar per port extra to ship. Be glad they didn’t shove in a Firewire port just for spite!
Sadly, there is no mention on either of the drive dock’s product pages regarding IDE drive support.