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Hardware Hacking Projects for Geeks
Fullam takes the reader from the very basics of hardware hacking and quickly gets up to speed with some fun and interesting hacks. Projects start out easy and increase in complexity and cost as the book progresses. Hardware Hacking covers many popular hacks we've all seen before, such as the "Macquarium" (Mac Aquarium), a web-enabled coffee machine, and the Blinkenlights building-sized display.
The book is divided into two main parts, the first covering basic hacks, and the second covering more advanced hacks.
Part One:
Starting with the basics, Fullam takes the reader through a crash course in electronics, covering concepts like soldering, using a voltmeter, identifying various electronic components and reading schematics. This section of the book is by no means a replacement for a course in electrical engineering, but it is definitely a solid primer for those of us who weren't born with a soldering iron in our hands. If you've never played with electronics before and don't know the difference between a resistor and a capacitor, this section should get you up to speed fairly quickly.
After the brief basics lesson, the next chapter dives right in to the first project, which is a portable laptop power supply made with a pile of D-cell batteries, a battery holder and some wire. This project is very simple and requires no soldering at all, yet it gives the reader a quick and easy way to make something useful with very little investment in time or money.
Each of the projects is presented in a well-organized manner, starting out with a brief summary and some background information about where the hack originated. A list of necessary tools and materials is also given, followed by a project overview, outlining the major tasks required to get the project completed. Each project outline gives estimates for the cost range, time required and difficulty level for the hack.
After the introductory stuff is out of the way, step-by-step instructions are given on how to assemble, modify or hack the device in question. The instructions are easy to follow and are complete with images or illustrations where appropriate. Many pages contain sidebars that contain additional information related to the project, such as more photos, hints and tips, and links to relevant websites. These sidebars really help to fill in any gaps that may be present in the main text.
At the end of each chapter, Fullam has an "extensions" section, where he suggests ways the hacks can be hacked further, to improve upon the design or alter them to offer more or different functionality. This is one point where the book really shines, advocating the true spirit of hacking and encouraging creativity and experimentation whenever possible throughout the book.
At the end of each chapter is a "Bill of Materials" and schematics for the hack. The bill of materials outlines in great detail all tools and hardware required for the project, including approximate costs as well as sources where they can be purchased.
Some of the highlights in the first section of the book include the "Macquarium," a water-based PC cooling system, and the infamous Furby hack. The Macintosh mod teaches some valuable lessons on using a Dremel tool and working with Plexiglas, which are great skills any budding case modder would want to have. The water-based PC cooling project is one of the more useful hacks presented in the book, showing the reader how to create an inexpensive but effective means to cool down an overclocked CPU. And hacking the Furby to give it a new vocabulary is... well, definitely a great topic for conversation if nothing else. If you have to ask why someone would do such a thing, you wouldn't understand the answer.
Part Two:
Part Two of the book starts off with another more advanced lesson in electronics. It delves into more detail, describing different types of resistors, capacitors and connectors. It also introduces transistors, looking at integrated circuits and surface-mount components as well. One thing I found particularly useful was the section explaining how to read and interpret manufacturers' data sheets for integrated circuits.
The advanced hacks featured in Part Two of Hardware Hacking are a little more exciting than those featured in the first half of the book, but are definitely more involved. The section starts off with a chapter on building a PC-based PVR, using Mandrake Linux. Sample code is included to create shell scripts for a simple, text-based interface, although Fullam does briefly mention some of the more popular GUI-based PVR software available, such as Freevo and MythTV.
Another great hack featured in the advanced section is the "Building-Size Display" hack, reminiscent of Blinkenlights. The chapter starts off with instructions on how to build a display matrix on a much smaller scale, using a series of ultra bright LEDs, but later shows how the project can be expanded to create a 12-story display using an entire building.
Some other mentionable hacks in the advanced chapters include a cubicle intrusion-detection system, an Internet-enabled toaster and coffee maker, and a remote object tracker. These projects provide instructions on how to use more advanced components such as photodiodes, lasers, GPS receivers and microcontrollers (such as the BasicStamp2, in particular).
Two other noteworthy projects in Part Two include a MAME cabinet and a wearable computer.
Plans for the MAME cabinet are very well done, taking the reader through cutting MDF, building the cabinet, installing the software and interfacing the controls to his PC. This chapter goes into great detail, even covering things like creating a monitor bezel and a backlit marquee, and using T-molding for that authentic arcade machine look.
The wearable computer hack is very interesting, covering a wide range of concepts I would never have considered. Fullam gives ideas on what to use for a head-mounted display (HMD), what types of motherboards and CPUs work best, and looks at various power sources, including batteries, solar panels and different generators. The chapter also presents ideas for input devices, such as keyboards and mice, but also speech recognition systems, cameras and GPS receivers. At the end of the chapter, there is an extensive list of websites related to wearable computer projects, offering much more reading to the interested hacker.
The appendixes, while quite brief, do offer more information on topics like creating and editing schematics, using microcontrollers and using different power sources. There is also a list of resources for further reading and a short list of parts suppliers.
Hardware Hacking also has an accompanying website, where readers can download all of the images, illustrations and schematics from the book. The files are available in EPS, PDF and TIFF formats, although they are all gzipped, and are not readily viewable without downloading and extracting first. The website supposedly has code downloads as well, but the links are broken as of this writing, so you'll be stuck typing in code from the book until the site is fixed.
Overall Thoughts
Overall, I was very impressed with this book. Fullam has given the geek community a valuable resource that will provide inspiration for aspiring and veteran hackers alike. It covers many projects that I have personally wanted to build or learn more about, and presents concepts that would be of interest to many fellow Slashdotters.
The only things preventing me from giving this book a 10 are the aforementioned issues with the accompanying website (which I'm sure will be fixed soon) and the quality of some of the photos. Most of the photographs in the book are crisp and clear, but some are rather grainy or pixelated, as if they were enlarged from a website image. Fullam does make mention of the image quality, stating that many photos actually were taken from the original Web sources, and "the clarity of the photograph suffers in print." It's a small point, but definitely noticeable in certain sections of the book. However, as mentioned, the images are available online, and often do look better on a monitor in full color, as opposed to the black and white images in the book.
I highly recommend Hardware Hacking Projects for Geeks to anyone with an interest in those fun projects that only nerds can understand.
You can purchase Hardware Hacking Projects for Geeks from bn.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.
Why not? Isn't hacking just making something do it wasn't designed to to, or improving the way it does what it was designed to do?
Back when, my Commodore 1541 disk drive (1st gen with the built in PSU) would overheat all the time. They all would, it was a design flaw. One day I jammed unsharpened pencils into the screw holes, putting it on stilts. Never had any overheating problems, plenty of airflow.
That was a simple hack, and the fact that I told my friends what I did, and they all did the exact same thing doesnt diminish it. Hell, I'm sure millions of other folks came up with the same, or similar idea.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
One of the simplest and coolest hardware hacks of all time is hooking up a carbon microphone (like old-style telephone handsets had), a miniature speaker, and a 9 volt battery. point the speaker at the carbon mike and move it closer, voila! Instant oscillator. Probably the world's simplest electrical oscillator. And it shows how remarkably powerful an amplifier the carbon microphone is. (I believe the carbon microphone was invented by Thomas Edison.)
-- SKYKING, SKYKING, DO NOT ANSWER.
Have to start somewhere.
"they help build stupid peoples' egos..."A very elitist statement that clearly shows the size of your ego...
"Who are in control, they are not in control of anything - they don't even control themselves!" - Glen Beck
I'm not really a "geek," nor do I play one on TV. But after looking through a book like this, I might just be motivated to try and become one. This book is one that appeals to the "mad scientist" in all of us, the one that is always looking for ways to build the better mouse trap or the perfect home "do it all device." While some of us less "handy types" would be better off not coming anywhere near this book, there are enough projects listed here that even someone with little or no hardware experience would find at least a handful of projects doable. Projects like the "Macintosh aquarium" or the laptop PC power supply. In fact the book is divided into Basic and Advanced Hacks and techniques, so if you've started off with a couple of the basic projects finished, you can move on to more advanced ones. Very cool.
And for each project, there is a graph for project cost, time and difficulty on the beginning page. For some projects, there's a list of what items you will need. There are also extensive step by step instructions for each "project," along with drawings, photos and diagrams. You'll love this book if you're one of those people who loves taking apart products and trying to "improve" upon their original design.
On the other hand, if you want to become a chef, you are definitely going to read quite a few cookbooks. It's only by mastering the basics that you'll become an expert.
The review says that the book contains "all you need to know to get started in the wonderful world of hardware hacking". By following the instructions and having a clear explanation of the rationale behind them, one would quickly gain enough knowledge and understanding to become a hacker in the sense you describe.
Perhaps the title should have been "for Wannabee Geeks" instead. :-)
Using HTML in email is like putting sound effects on your phone calls. Just say <strong>no</strong>.
I have hacked up an old phone and connected it to my PCs parallel port. This, in combination with a perl script and a couple other programs, results in a machine that waits for calls with "UNAVAILABLE" or "PRIVATE" Caller ID tags, answers only those calls, plays prerecorded wave files designed to emulate a conversation, uses silence detections to allow the telemarketer to speak and think he's talking to a real human, and records the entire conversation. I have example WAV files of these conversations and a How-to page at http://www.pagerealm.com/tc2k. The example WAVs are VERY entertaining!
Really simple, all I used was a soldering iron, solder, blue LED. You can pick everything up at the local Radio Shack. The Radio Shack I visited had 3000mcd super bright blue LEDs. I eventually bought a 9000mcd super bright blue LEDs but I found out later that it's super bright coz the manufacturers tighten the angle of projection meaning brighter center spot thus higher mcd. 3000mcd still works well. My first concern was whether the LED was brighter than the normal red LEDs since they are on different ends of the wavelength and red is easier to pick up. Didn't really matter if you have a good enough pattern or surface, like a mouse pad made for optical mice.
I modded my blue Logitech Optical Mouse (USD$20 the last time I checked). Removed the regular red LED and replaced with the blue LED. Now my mouse glows blue. Looked kinda weird previously coz the mouse was blue, with semi-transparent blue plastic but glowed red underneath.
Easy modding... takes less than 15 minutes, unless you lose a spring or something.