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What Can You Do With $100?

Posted by Cliff on from the frugal-hacking dept.

An anonymous reader asks "I was recently gifted with $100 and thought, 'What's the coolest geektoy--new, used, cobbled together, hacked--that one hundred clams could buy?' Home automation? Older PDA streaming client? Bathtub ROV? Basic stamp robotic kit? Something fun, something useful, something educational, something that says 'Look what I put together for $100.' Lemme know!"

21 of 223 comments (clear)

  1. SCO License by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    If you find 6.99 other friends with the same amount of cash on hands, you can get a swell new SCO license.

    1. Re:SCO License by CTalkobt · · Score: 4, Funny

      >> If you find 6.99 other friends with the same amount of cash on hands, you can get a swell new SCO license.

      If you have a 99/100th of a friend laying around, please don't make friends with me....

      --
      There's a gorilla from Manilla whose a fella that stinks of vanilla and has salmonella.
  2. 512MB iPod Shuffle by objekt · · Score: 5, Interesting

    http://www.apple.com/ipodshuffle/ doubles as a flash drive.

    --
    -- Boycott Shell
  3. a blowjob by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    A blowjob, plain and simple.

  4. Tools by BandwidthHog · · Score: 5, Funny

    With a Dremel and a decent soldering iron, all your geeky dreams can come true. (well, okay, not that one with the blonde and the midgets and the mayonaise, but all the *other* geeky dreams)

    --

    Quantum materiae materietur marmota monax si marmota monax materiam possit materiari?
  5. magazine article by zerkon · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Computer Gaming World Magazine runs a segment every month on what to do with $100, and they're usually right on, grab an issue and see what they say.

    --
    The Answer
    1. Re:magazine article by over_exposed · · Score: 5, Funny

      But then he'd only have ~$94.05 left...

      --
      "The object of war is not to die for your country, but to make the other bastard die for his." - Patton
  6. Save It! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Avoid knee-jerk consumerism and put it in savings. You might need it someday.

  7. Take your significant other out... by jbarr · · Score: 4, Insightful

    ...and have a good time. Good memories will last much longer than geek toys.

    --
    My mom always said, "Jim, you're 1 in a million." Given the current population, there are 7000 of me. God help us all!
    1. Re:Take your significant other out... by antifoidulus · · Score: 4, Funny

      I keep on doing this, but people tend to give funny looks to the guy making out with his hand in the corner......

      --
      Monstar L
  8. Christmas Lights by xmas2003 · · Score: 4, Funny
    Buy some christmas lights and convince everyone you have a webcam where people can turn 'em on and off

    5,000 Christmas lights at post holiday prices: $100
    Linux/Apache/Perl/etc.: Free
    Duping the world: Priceless! ;-)

    Doing it for real will cost a little more than $100 if you want a decent webcam, but maybe I'll do that Christmas 2005 ...

    --
    Hulk SMASH Celiac Disease
  9. Buy a grammar primer by pavlov112 · · Score: 4, Funny

    Or really, anything that will demonstrate how evil it is to use "gift" as a verb... ;-)

  10. Take a look at Make by lysander · · Score: 5, Informative

    Perhaps you should look at Make magazine. Their first issue had some pretty cool stuff. The aerial kite photography project might be doable for $100, if you've got the tools.

    --
    GET YOUR WEAPONS READY! --DR.LIGHT
  11. A bunch of stuff! by stefanlasiewski · · Score: 4, Informative

    Being good open-source citizen, you will immediately donate that $100 gift to your favorite OSS project! Thank you! Or Maybe just a few bucks.

    Or, you can buy a bunch of little stuff, like:

    Super-strong neodymium magnets. Magnets sound boring, but these things are really, really strong. Get the spherical ones.

    There's a whole host of cheap, unusual geeky projects at American Science & Surplus.

    Get a cheap computer. Buy a Used Xbox, and install Xbox Linux on it.

    Color changing lights. The color change is nice and smooth. Popular with the kids.

    --
    "Can of worms? The can is open... the worms are everywhere."
  12. I'll tell you what I'd do man... by Matt+Amato · · Score: 5, Funny

    ...two chicks at the same time.

  13. Brew your own beer! by warpSpeed · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Get a complete kit to start brewing beer at home here

    It is only $70, you can use the other $30 for a Brew ingredients Kit

    Nothing beats home made beer.

    1. Re:Brew your own beer! by pclminion · · Score: 4, Interesting
      I strongly agree. Brewing beer is kind of like biological hacking -- can you learn to use living organisms (and not those big ones that think, that's cheating) as a tool to accomplish what you want?

      The number of variables and parameters that can be tweaked throughout the beer brewing process is a hacker's dream come true.

      Plus, it helps to relieve some of the general ignorance that most people have about what beer actually IS. I actually read here on Slashdot once that different beers are achieved by, get this, roasting the hops in various ways. My gawd.

  14. wifi detector, the canary by way2trivial · · Score: 4, Interesting

    with SSID detection
    http://www.canarywireless.com/
    leaves half your cash in pocket.

    --
    every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
  15. Wipe your ass with it by dtfinch · · Score: 5, Funny

    For $100, you can get 100 or more rolls of toilet paper, which ought to last a few years.

  16. Re:neodymium magnets by stefanlasiewski · · Score: 4, Funny

    This is more evil.

    Let someone play with the magnets. The magnets are so strong, that most people will pinch their fingers within a few minutes :)

    --
    "Can of worms? The can is open... the worms are everywhere."
  17. For about $100... by cr0sh · · Score: 5, Interesting
    You can build a video rocket camera.

    What I mean by this, is that you can buy the rocket (D thru F engine model), launch kit (launch pad, controller, engines, igniters, batteries), and wireless video camera - and do something that while it has been done before by others, is still a cool thing to do for yourself.

    First - the camera: For about $30.00 (approx. $10-20.00 for the camera, and $10-15.00 shipping, depending on seller), you can buy off of ebay drop-shipped from hong-kong a miniature 900MHz-1.2GHz wireless "sugar-cube" camera and receiver combo, which runs off of 9 volt batteries. The camera is designed to transmit a few hundred feet thru walls in a security setup - but outdoors up in a rocket you can expect around 1000 ft or so. This is the cheapest way of getting these cameras - don't bother with an american dealer, they will charge you $80.00 minimum, plus s/h - not a good deal at all.

    The rest of your money will go into the rocket and launch needs - a larger scale Estes rocket will be perfect - you might even be able to get away with one of the egg lofters if you want (you might want to try a different/lighter battery tech for the 9V camera, though). Anyhow - you won't spend anywhere near $70.00 on everything - the rocket kit will be about $20-30.00, everything else will fill (or not) the rest of the cash.

    Then - spend your time to build the thing. Remember to pad/protect the camera, and mount it securely (but make it airodynamic, too!). Mount the battery securely as well, so it won't rattle around and change your C/G mid-flight. You are going to want a rocket made for payload lifting or similar - something designed for the extra weight (unless you want to experiment!).

    Take it to a field, set it up, check your camera feed (heh - maybe some extra cash could be thrown to a 12VDC video recorder - you want to record your first flight, right?), install the engine and igniter, begin your countdown - and get ready to enter an interesting aerial photography hobby!

    --
    Reason is the Path to God - Anon