August 2021 - Page 5 of 5 - CrackedConsole

Hacking an old Nintendo Zapper into a wireless remote

August 5, 2021 by CrackedConsole

Those of us who have experienced the Nintendo Zapper while playing games such as Duck Hunt will probably have fond memories of it. However, with the rapid disappearance of CRT TVs and the aging of the physical mechanisms, YouTuber DuctTape Mechanic wanted to give an old Zapper a new lease on life. His modification integrated a small RF transmitting module into the top of the device, allowing it to be switched on by the trigger’s microswitch. With everything in place inside the Zapper, he moved onto the receiver.

Neeraj Rane’s Custom ePaper Photo Frame Turns a PCB Frame Into an Interactive Map

August 4, 2021 by CrackedConsole

This ePaper photo frame’s PCB isn’t just for show: Exposed copper map pins let you pull up images by location with a tap.

Electrical engineer Neeraj Rane has built an ePaper photo frame with a difference: an exposed circuit board displays map pins that doubles as touch-sensitive buttons to bring up images associated with each place.

Nicolai Valenti Developed a Budget-Friendly Metal 3D Printer

August 4, 2021 by CrackedConsole

This 3D printer allows makers to create metal parts without breaking the bank.

Nicolai Valenti created an affordable PLA metal 3D printer that allows makers to prototype metal parts. The machine relies on SS316L, copper, aluminum, and titanium powders, heated via a Nichia laser array beaming 405 nm light to produce metal parts. Overall, this is Valenti’s fourth and final metal 3D printer prototype, and it utilizes three NEMA 17 stepper motors with GT2 belts.

This Freeform Sculpture Lets You Know When the Coffee’s Too Hot

August 3, 2021 by CrackedConsole

While I rarely drink hot coffee, there seems to be a sweet spot between scalding and lukewarm, where it doesn’t burn but emits a sufficient amount of heat when imbibed. You could take a guess at this temperature by the steam coming off of the surface of the liquid, and how long it’s been sitting. For a more direct way to sense this vital stat, YouTuber Make Fun Stuff has come up with a non-contact beverage temperature monitor.

The device holds an IR sensor on top of the cup, using a crane-like linkage structure that’s soldered out of 2mm brass rods. In addition to providing mechanical support, these rods transfer electrical signals to the sensor, as what turned out to be a beautiful angular circuit sculpture. Bent wire was also tried here in multiple configurations, but this acted more like a spring than the rigid platform that was needed.

Was Lord Kelvin wrong? 3D-printed shape casts doubt on his 150-year-old theory

August 3, 2021 by CrackedConsole

A 150-year-old theory about an otherworldly shape proposed by Lord Kelvin, one of history’s greatest physicists, has finally been put to the test — and his conjecture is now in doubt.

In 1871, William Thomson, more commonly known as Lord Kelvin — a famed British physicist who made key contributions to electromagnetic theory, thermodynamics, navigation and the absolute temperature system that bears his name — proposed a theory about a strange hypothetical shape, which he called an isotropic helicoid.

3D Printed Material Might Replace Kevlar

August 2, 2021 by CrackedConsole

Prior to 1970, bulletproof vests were pretty iffy, with a history extending as far as the 1500s when there were attempts to make metal armor that was bulletproof. By the 20th century there was ballistic nylon, but it took kevlar to produce garments with real protection against projectile impact. Now a 3D printed nanomaterial might replace kevlar.

A group of scientists have published a paper that interconnected tetrakaidecahedrons made up of carbon struts that are arranged via two-photon lithography.

A Minecraft player is building the entire Zelda: Breath of the Wild map

August 2, 2021 by CrackedConsole

Minecraft and The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild are two great tastes, but do they taste great together? One Minecraft player is making an argument for ‘yes’ with a massive project to rebuild the entire map from Nintendo’s modern classic as a playable Minecraft survival map. It’s still in progress, but the results are already impressive.

PactoTech’s Impressive Arcade Cabinet Has No Fewer Than Six Arduino Boards Inside

August 1, 2021 by CrackedConsole

Designed for emulating a range of arcade and console games — and playing PC games natively — this hefty build impresses.

Pseudonymous maker “PactoTech” has shown off an impressive four-player arcade cabinet build that uses not one but a total of six Arduino boards for handling various features.

Designed for emulating a range of classic arcade and console games, PactoTech’s build Super Smash Bros. Ultimate-themed arcade cabinet features four player control via arcade sticks and illuminated colour-coded buttons, a single trackball, and more traditional gamepad controllers — plus a wireless keyboard and mouse, handily accessible on a storage shelf above the main controls and below the screen.

Ike T. Sanglay Jr. Puts Apple’s macOS Big Sur on a Custom Handheld, Powered by a LattePanda Alpha

August 1, 2021 by CrackedConsole

This handheld hackintosh uses an off-the-shelf SBC, some software tricks, and a 3D-printed chassis with Arduino-driven cooling system.

Maker Ike T. Sanglay Jr. has shown off what he believes to be the world’s first handheld computer capable of running Apple’s macOS 11 “Big Sur” operating system — courtesy of a LattePanda Alpha single-board computer in a 3D-printed housing.

“As for how I installed macOS,” Sanglay explains in his video walk-through of the project, “I just followed the OpenCore Dortania guide. The LattePanda Alpha has an Intel [Core] m3-8100Y CPU and 8 gigabytes of RAM.”