Gadget Hacks News
News: Teens Pulled Over in Their Almost Street Legal (And Totally Cool) DIY Wooden Car
Getting pulled over sucks, even when you're in a normal car. Just imagine how these teenagers felt when they were pulled over for driving their wooden car without a license! They also got a citation for not having a speedometer or side indicator lights, but if that's all that's keeping their DIY vehicle from being street legal, I'm already impressed. Photo by WTF.nl/Zaanstreek-Waterland Police
News: This Real-Life Star Wars Hover Bike Could Be the Future of Personal Transportation
Admit it—at some point or another, you've wished that you had your own personal hovercraft. Don't worry, we've all been there. Well, a company called Aerofex wants to make a hovercraft that's way more than your standard leaf-blower-powered one, taking a queue from the swoop and speeder bikes from the Star Wars franchise, building their own sort of repulsorlift. This hover bike may not be quite as fast as the ones from Star Wars, but if the company has its way, it could be on sale by the end o...
News: Want a Drink? The Arduino 'Inebriator' Will Pour You 15 Different Cocktails
Who needs to go to bartending school when you've got the Inebriator to mix your favorite drinks for you? Want a cosmopolitan? No problem. Press a button. Want a tequila sunrise? Sure thing. Press a button. As long as you've got a good supply of liquor and mixers, the Inebriator is at your command. So, what exactly is this Inebriator thing? Well, it's a robotic bartender that can automatically pour 15 different pre-programmed cocktails. With 9 different liquors and 7 mixers on board, it's got ...
News: DIY Laser Tripwire System That Tweets Whenever Sharks Swim Past
If you've ever wished you could keep tabs on the fish in your aquarium, Justin of Antipasto Hardware Blog has just the mod for you! He created this DIY "shark detector" that sends out a tweet whenever Bruce the shark breaches a perimeter that he set up in the tank.
News: Artist Uses 300 Apples to Power 30 LEDs for 1 Electrified Fruit Battery Science Experiment
You've probably seen the classic fruit battery science experiment a thousand times, but I doubt you've ever seen it turned into an art project! Photographer Caleb Charland uses everyday objects like apples, coins and vinegar to create makeshift batteries, then takes these gorgeous long exposure photos. For the apple tree photo, Charland got about 5 volts for every 10 apples, so he had to wire 300 apples to power the lamp for several hours. He used a zinc-coated galvanized nail and copper wire...
News: Volkswagen's Underwater 'Car' Cage Lets Divers Get Up Close and Personal During Shark Week
As if the world needed one more reason to be obsessed with Shark Week, Volkswagen has teamed up with Discovery Channel to create this awesome "underwater car" that's actually a mobile shark cage.
News: The World's First LED Buddha Board Delivers Evaporative 'Water Light Graffiti'
From dynamite to lasers to LEDs, you can make graffiti with a lot of different things. Parisian artist Antonin Fourneau has added water to that list. He created this incredible LED wall that lights up wherever it's touched by water to create what he's dubbed "Water Light Graffiti," which can be simply described as being an LED Buddha Board.
News: This Chinese "Noah's Ark" Can Survive Earthquakes, Fire, 350-Ton Impacts—Even the Zombie Apocalypse!
No one likes to think about the possibility of natural disasters, but we all know they could happen at any time. Some of us are a little more paranoid than others, but wouldn't it be nice to know that you'd be protected if anything really crazy ever happened? Like the zombie apocalypse?
News: Take Your Angry Birds Game to the Next Level with This Haptic USB Slingshot Controller
Playing Angry Birds on a computer just got a lot more interesting. Design students Andrew Spitz and Hideaki Matsui made this awesome slingshot controller for one of their classes at the Copenhagen Institute of Interaction Design.
News: Little Boxes Turns Your iPad into an Old-Fashioned Music Box
Technology is awesome. You can use your iPad to record music or even turn your tunes into a solar system, but sometimes being plugged in all of the time can leave you nostalgic for simpler times. This new concept by Joelle Aeschlimann brings together the best of both worlds by turning your iPad into an old-fashioned, hand-cranked music box. The artist created three different music boxes, each one with its own unique song and visualization. The music boxes were made using wooden cylinders with...
News: Scan Your Food for E. Coli and Salmonella with This Smartphone-Based Bacteria Detector
As deeply as smartphones are integrated into our daily lives, it's no surprise that people are finding ways to use them to stay healthy. From detecting cancer and radiation to diagnosing STDs, phones have come a long way, baby.
News: This Mini "Jesus Bug" Robot, Soon-to-Be Spy, Walks and Jumps on Water
Gerridae—you've probably seen these weird bugs gliding across the surface of the water when you're out swimming or fishing. These insects are commonly referred to as water striders, or more cleverly, Jesus bugs, for their ability to "walk on water". It's a pretty cool trick, but what could it do for science, right? Turns out, quite a bit. Photo by felixtsao
News: Unencrypted Air Traffic Communications Allow Hackers to Track & Possibly Redirect Flights
Considering how often many of us fly on commercial airlines, the idea that a hacker could somehow interfere with the plane is a very scary thought. It doesn't help to learn that at Defcon, a researcher found that the Automatic Dependent Surveillance Broadcast (ADS-B), transmissions that planes use to communicate with airport towers are both unencrypted and unauthenticated.
News: Homemade Vinyl Cutter Turns Your Old Music CDs into Records
Even in the MP3 world, vinyl is still king among music lovers. Unfortunately, making your own record is nowhere near as simple as burning a compact disc or throwing some files onto an MP3 player. One clever inventor isn't letting that stop him though, putting together his own homemade vinyl cutter out of old parts. The end result—CD records!
News: Light Up Your Next Party with This DIY LED Beer Pong Table That Dances to the Music
Want to liven up your game of beer pong? You could always add more cups or play with paddles, or you could make your own custom table with 500 LED lights that flash in sync with your favorite tunes like Redditor did.
News: Inklewriter Lets You Write and Share Your Own 'Choose Your Own Adventure' Books
Remember those Choose Your Own Adventure novels? If your school was anything like mine, they were so popular you were lucky to find one to check out at the library. But there's no worries now, thanks to this handy HTML5 app, which makes it easy to write and share your own 'choose your own adventure' novels. inklewriter is a free tool designed to make writing interactive stories simple. Basically, you start typing and inklewriter helps you organize your story, making it easy to add, remove and...
News: Shop for the Best Cashback Deals Online with This Money-Saving Browser Bookmarklet
Online shopping is way more convenient than brick-and-mortar stores in a number of ways, not the least of which are the discounts. But with so many online stores and sites like Amazon which feature thousands of retailers, how can you know you're getting the best deal?
News: Quite Possibly the Best Lightsaber Replica Ever (This Is Not a Jedi Mind Trick)
Bradley Lewis is a visual effects artist for BioWare by day, but in his spare time he runs Slothfurnace, a blog dedicated to showcasing his incredibly realistic lightsaber replicas. His latest, which took 18 months to build, is Obi-Wan Kenobi's Reveal Lightsaber from A New Hope. It was made with a real crystal, just like the movies, and has a Crystal Focus Saber Core designed by Plecter Labs which controls the light and sound. The blade is composed of 84 LED lights and powered by two 3.7 volt...
News: The Ultimate Cable Cutter's Guide to Watching TV and Movies Online (Legally)
Redbox recently announced a partnership with Verizon to bring a new streaming video service called Redbox Instant to an already crowded table. No prices have been released yet for the service, but with Netflix, Hulu, Amazon, YouTube, iTunes, and many others all attempting to get a hold of your dollars, what are currently your best options? Subscriptions Services
Summer Learning: The Best Places to Take Online Classes for Free
It's summer, which means vacations, barbeques, and, most importantly, no school. But that doesn't mean you can't learn something while you lounge by the pool. Schools and organizations all over the country are offering online courses taught by real professors—for free.
News: LED Faucet Light
Video: .
News: iOS 6, Coming This Fall
The next mobile operating system for the iPhone, iOS 6, will be available in fall 2012. The major details and features were released 2 weeks ago a Apple's World Wide Developers Conference (WWDC). While the goal of these yearly OS updates is to move forward with technology, there are a couple of this to watch for. Keep reading to see the good and the not so good. Do Not Disturb
News: Metalworker Builds Tiny Marriage-Proposing Robot to Pop the Question for Him
What's the geekiest way to propose to your girlfriend? Make a robot do it for you. As a self-declared dork, RangerX52 wanted to take a simple task like proposing and make it as utterly complicated as possibly—by having a DIY robot do it for him. With knowledge of his lady's infatuation with the childlike personality of GIR, one of the main characters from the animated Invader ZIM series, he went ahead and built a tiny robotic replica of GIR to do his bidding.
News: New Mobile App Lets You Order Food for Delivery Practically Anywhere, Even the Beach
Chilling on the beach and want some grub? If you're starving and can't afford to lose those sun rays walking around for some lunch, have the food come to you instead!
News: Coming Soon to a Smartphone Near You: 3D Navigation for Buildings!
Now that everyone has an Android or iPhone in their pocket, there's no excuse for being late to an appointment or job interview. Thanks to that GPS receiver in your smartphone, navigating your way through city streets and highways is a cinch, in or outside of your vehicle. But once you get inside a building, that fancy GPS feature doesn't know what to do. Which direction is the elevator? How do you get to room 819? Where's the nearest fire exit? The bathroom?
Solidoodle: Cheap 3D Printing at Home for Under $500!
The possibilities are endless for 3D printing. With your very own 3D printer, you can make spare parts, circuit boards, inflatable balloons, duplicate keys, Minecraft cities, and even tiny replicas of your face. From a more artsy standpoint, you can make complex sculptures, like this cool mathematical sculpture of thirty interwoven hexagons by Francesco De Comite:
News: Panasonic's New Millimeter-Wave Radar Technology Could Save Lives at Intersections
Panasonic announced an interesting concept today that could advance millimeter-wave radar technology for automotive safety uses in detecting pedestrians, bicyclists, and other motorists.
News: Instead of Images, This Digital Camera Spits Out Descriptions!
Today's digital cameras record not only the images themselves, but also the metadata behind the scenes, like camera settings, location, date, time, etc. But there's a lot more to say about a photograph. What's the subject? Is it night or day? Outside or inside? Person, place or thing?
News: Who Needs Clowns? 3D Printer Lets You Print Inflatable Rubber Balloon Animals
When you're just a child, there's nothing better than a clown and a few balloon animals to make your birthday party one to remember. There's just something unforgettable about experiencing a balloon twisting in action—the contortion of the balloon, that rubber smell, and the inevitable high-pitched squeakiness that fills the room until a bunny or giraffe appears.
News: In Just a Clik, Turn Your Smartphone into a YouTube Remote for Any Web Display
No longer do you need to crowd around your tiny smartphone to watch a funny YouTube video with your friends. If you've got a display nearby with a web browser and internet access, you can take control of it with your mobile device for free with the new Clik app.
Watch Out iMovie: Avid Studio Is Now Available for iPad
Despite starting on Macintosh computers, Avid focused their non-linear video editing programs on Windows systems after stiff competition from Final Cut Pro. But now they're coming back around, with Avid introducing their first iPad version of the Avid Studio home editing software, a miniature version of their industry-geared Media Composer. It will be directly competing with Apple's own iMovie for iPad.
News: 8 Tips for Creating Strong, Unbreakable Passwords
This weekend, hackers broke into the servers of the popular shoe shopping site Zappos, giving them access to the personal information of 24 million Zappos customers. The user data taken included names, email addresses, billing and shipping addresses, phone numbers, the last four digits of credit card numbers, and encrypted passwords. However, full credit card data was not lifted, and passwords were cryptographically scrambled.
News: The Best Apps for Customized Cover Photos on Your Facebook Timeline
By now you're probably already an expert at creating cover images for your Facebook Timeline, especially if you've taken advantage of those free Facebook cards that were (and still are) being offered. But just in case you need some help making eye-grabbing cover images, there's a few tools you can try out to streamline the process.
News: Geomagic and Cubify Make 3D-Printing Yourself Easy with Kinect-to-3D
Even though the Kinect has been on the market for over a year, Microsoft's motion sensing device is far from old news. In fact, Microsoft announced at this year's Consumer Electronics Show (CES) that the Kinect for Windows hardware and accompanying software is finally arriving at the start of February. There's even an Amazon page for it already.
Great Deal: Free Facebook Timeline Business Cards
When you're meeting new people, chances are they're no longer interested in collecting your phone number or email address. Instead, they're more interested to see if you have a Facebook account. So, what's a better way to get connected online in the offline world than a business card of your Facebook Timeline? The new cover image and info section on your profile makes for a great Facebook business (or personal) card.
News: CloudOn Is Back, Plus 4 More iPad Apps for Working with Microsoft Office Docs
A few days ago, CloudOn released their free mobile app that brought Microsoft Office directly to your Apple iPad. The cloud-based service effectively runs Office on their end, allowing you to use apps like Word and PowerPoint to edit your documents, which you would house in Dropbox. But after overwhelming demand, they removed the free app yesterday from the iTunes App Store.
Great Deal: RIM Slashes Prices on BlackBerry PlayBook Tablets to $299
Missed the holiday tablet sales? If you were hoping to grab a cheap BlackBerry PlayBook, you're in luck. All of the PlayBook models have been reduced to $299 in a limited-time sale by Research in Motion. But you better hurry, because the sale only lasts until tomorrow (February 4th).
Great Deal: $0.99 EA & Gameloft iOS Games for Christmas
Looking for last-minute Christmas gifts? Give the gift of mobile gaming! Electronic Arts (EA) and Gameloft are having their annual holiday sales just in time for Christmas. If you've got a gamer on your shopping list with an iPad, iPhone or iPod touch, a mobile game will make the perfect last minute present. Games that are usually anywhere from $2 to $10 are now on sale for just $0.99, and there's lots to choose from.
News: 12 Tips for Perfecting Your New Facebook Timeline
Facebook's new Timeline feature has been rolling out gradually since its unveiling in September, but yesterday it finally became available to Facebookers everywhere. It's even available on your mobile device, too. Those who want to upgrade to the radical new profile design can do so by simple logging into their Facebook account and visiting the About Timeline page on Facebook.
News: Nextdoor Brings Private Social Networks to a Neighborhood Near You
Social networks like Facebook and Google+ are great for staying connected with family, friends and coworkers—even fans. But sharing and communicating with practically anyone in the digital realm has alienated us from most of the flesh-and-blood beings we see everyday—our neighbors. How well do you know your neighbors?