Hackaday Podcast

Hackaday editors Mike Szczys and Elliot Williams recount the past week in hardware hacking. There's a new Tamagochi hack that runs the original ROM on plain old microcontrollers like the STM32. Did you know you can blast the Bayer filter off a camera sensor using a powerful laser and the sensor will still work? We didn't. There was a lot of debate this week about a commercial jet design alteration that would remove windows -- but it's for the good cause of making the plane more efficient. We marvel at what it takes to pump blood with an artificial heart, and go down the troubleshooting rabbit hole after the magic smoke was let out of a radio.

You know you want to read the show notes!

Hackaday editors Elliot Williams and Mike Szczys get charged up on the best hacks the week had to offer. The 3D printer design gods were good to us, delivering an upside-down FDM printer and a hack that can automatically swap out heated beds for continuous printing. We look at a drone design that builds vertical wings into the frame of a quadcopter -- now when it tips on its side it's a fixed-wing aircraft! We chew the artificially-intelligent fat about GitHub CoPilot's ability (or inability?) to generate working code, and talk about the firm future awaiting solid state batteries.

You know you want to read the show notes!

Hackaday editors Mike Szczys and Elliot Williams have found a critical mass of projects this week that wouldn't be possible without 3D printers. There's an absolutely astounding model roller coaster that is true to the mechanisms and physics of the original (and beholden to hours of sanding and painting). Adding sheet material to the printing process is a novel way to build durable hinges and foldable mechanisms. Elliot picks out not one, but two quadruped robot projects that leverage 3D-printed parts in interesting ways. And for the electronics geeks there's a server rack stuffed with Raspberry Pi, and analog electronic wizardry to improve the resolution of the WS2811 LED controller. We wrap it all up with discussions of flying boats, and adding Bluetooth audio to old car head units.

You know you want to read the show notes!

Hackaday editors Elliot Williams and Mike Szczys bubble sort the best hardware hacks so you don't miss 'em. This week we're smitten by the perfection of a telephone tape loop message announcer. We enjoyed seeing Blender's ray tracing to design mirrors, and a webcam and computer monitor to stand in for triple-projector-based fractal fun. There's a bit of injection molding, some Nintendo Switch disassembling, and the Internet on a calculator. We close the show with a pair of Space stories, including the happy news this week that Wally Funk finally made it there!

You know you want to read the show notes!

Hackaday editors Mike Szczys and Elliot Williams help you get caught up on a week of wonder hacks. We don't remember seeing a floppy drive headline the demoscene, but sure enough, there's a C64 demo that performs after the computer is disconnected. What causes bench tools to have unreliable measurements? Sometimes a poor crystal choice lets AC ruin the party. We dive into the ongoing saga of the Audacity open source project's change of ownership, and talk about generator exciter circuits -- specifically their role in starting grid-scale generators from shutdown.

You know you want to read the show notes!

Hackaday editors Elliot Williams and Mike Szczys dive into a week of exceptional hacks. Tip-top of the list has to be the precision measuring instrument that uses a cable spooling mechanism. There's news that the Starlink base station firmware has been dumped and includes interesting things like geofencing for the developer modes. We saw a garage robot that will plug in your electric vehicle if you're the forgetful sort. And we close up by talking about heavier-than-air helium airships and China's Mars rover.

You know you want to read the show notes!

Hackaday editors Mike Szczys and Elliot Williams look through the most interesting hacks of the week. We spent ample time in adulation of the automatons built by François Junod; wizard-level watchmaking wrapped in endless levels of artistic detail. A couple projects stuffed into old cellphones turned Elliot's head. We got to see what happens if you spin a gear's teeth on two axes to make a universal spherical gear. And we conclude the episode with a look at how Windows 11 may send a lot of good hardware to recycle center, and at how toothpaste tubes sometimes miss the recycling center completely.

Dig the show notes, you hep cats.

Hackaday editors Elliot Williams and Mike Szczys marvel at the dangerous projects on display this week, including glass etching with hydrofluoric acid and pumping 200,000 A into a 5,000 A fuse. A new board that turns the Raspberry Pi into an SDR shows off the power of the secondary memory interface (SMI) present in those Broadcom chips. We also discuss the potential for graphene in hard drives, and finish up with a teardown of a very early electronic metronome.

You know you want to read the show notes!

Hackaday Editor in Chief Mike Szczys is taking a bit of vacation this week, so Managing Editor Elliot Williams is joined by Staff Writer Dan Maloney to talk about all the cool hacks and great articles that turned up this week. Things were busy, so there was plenty to choose from, but how would we not pick one that centers around strapping a jet engine to your back to rollerskate without all that pesky exercise? And what about a light bulb that plays Doom - with a little help, of course. We'll check out decals you can make yourself and why the custom keyboard crowd might want to learn that skill, learn about the other "first computer", and learn how a little radiation might be just what it takes to save an endangered species.

You know you want to read the show notes!

Hackaday editors Elliot Williams and Mike Szczys marvel at the awesome hacks from the past week. We had way too much fun debated whether a wind-powered car can travel faster than the wind, and whether or not you can call that sailing. Low-temperature desoldering was demystified (it's the bismuth!) while a camera gimbal solves the problem of hand tremor during soldering. Ford just wants to become your PowerWall. And the results are in from NASA's mission to spin mice up in a centrifuge on the ISS.

You know you want to read the show notes!