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CVS Disposable Camcorder Hacked
ptorrone writes "We've been watching this on MAKE closely- and the king of the one-time digital camera hacks/analysis finally got his hands on a CVS Camcorder on Friday, the 24th via someone shipping him one FedEx. Within 18 hours, he had slurped the flash memory and has the unencrypted, XVID codec, 320x240, 30fps movies stored in the camera on his computer."
Now the obvious answer is "hack the camcorder. Then it doesn't cost so much and you get more value for your money." Hmmmm... I can get a 16 ounce sh*t-flavored milkshake for $3, but with a little trick, I can turn that into a gallon. What a bargain, so long as I don't mind that it's still sh*t-flavored. If I want more sh*t-flavored goodness, then darn, I better learn the trick. If I want a milkshake that doesn't taste like sh*t, I think I'd better save my pennies.
The ONLY reason I can think of getting this is to get a camcorder for your kid. If they break it, big deal.
It also sort of reminds me of that old Mattell video camera that recorded grainy B&W on audio cassettes. Though crappy, it has its own kind of retro cool if you can find one now. Perhaps these cameras have value as collectors items.
- Greg
Start a happiness pandemic
Getting a used Pure Digital / CVS Disposable Camcorder shipped to you... $15 dollars
Taking the day off work to be at home for the Fed-ex delivery... $140 dollars
Spending 18 hours hacking the camera for 30secs of video... Priceless!!!
"Simplify, simplify, simplify!" Thoreau
... isn't nothing sacred anymore? The next thing someone will hack will be the Hubble Space Telescope.
...do they completely reformat the flash every time one of these is returning for processing. This could become a strange form of voyeurism.
Disposable Digital Camcorder Interfacing
Pure Digital's Single Use Camcorder for CVS
[PureDigital CVS camcorder]
Introduction
This web page is a little raw because I just got the camera and I'm leaving on a trip soon. So, I'll be brief and hopefully informative.
If you're not familiar with the camera, here is a good review.
Disassembly
Here's a photo gallery of the disassembly of my unit.
Similar in constructioon to the PV2, this unit is rugged and can be easily recycled.
Preliminary Analysis
Others found that pressing the Record and Delete buttons while turning on the camera yields a special diagnostic page. Mine said:
FW-VERSION: 03.40
CAMERA ID:
6B7051xxxxxx
PCB VER: B2
FLASH Memory Analysis NEW
I was able to get my videos out of the camera and onto my home computer by removing the 128MB flash memory chip and putting it into my home-built flash reader. I originally built the system for the PV2 camera -- here's some more info on it. The only modification I had to make was for the increased memory size of the new part. The reader is nothing special -- just a cheaper (and slower) version of comercially available units.
I've placed my analysis of the camcorder's flash memory on its own page. That page also has sample videos I have recovered from my camera.
Resources
The most current discussion that I follow is on the Camera Hacking message board. There is also discussion on Dakota PV2 discussion board.
contact me: my email address is my first name (john) at my last name (maushammer) dot com.
Is this legal? Yes.
Info on the original most recent still disposable digital camera
other systems I've played with
visit my homepage
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I figured someone would criticize me. You're seeing low-res version for slashdot - sorry, bandwidth trumps aesthetics today. Tomorrow the pretty pictures will go back up.
Check the file sizes:
-rw-r--r-- 38000 Jun 24 21:09 PICT0001-info.png
-rw-r--r-- 13343 Jun 25 12:36 PICT0001-info.jpg
-rw-r--r-- 10958 Jun 25 12:38 camcorder-icon-full.jpg
-rw-r--r-- 2334 Jun 25 12:38 camcorder-icon.jpg
-rw-r----- 4547 Jun 25 13:02 index.html
-rw-r----- 23960 Jun 25 13:25 flash.html
My low-res pictures are 13k vs 38k, and 2.3k vs 11k. Overall, loading flash.html is 40k instead of 73k. That means (roughly) 80% more visitors for the same bandwidth!
I also tried GIF and TIFF - they were pretty close in size to the original PNG.
HIV Crosses Species Barrier... into Muppets
As a current CVS employee, I can tell you that these camcorders and their digital camera like brethren are going on sale the week of July 4th. They are going to be 19.99 but you get $10 in "ExtraBucks" back. As the ad flyer says, "Its like paying $9.99".
The ExtraBucks print from the register 2 days after the qualifiying purchase and although you do need your own ExtraCare card, the information you provide can be as false as possible. ExtraBucks are good on anything in the store excluding tobacco, alcohol and prescriptions.
He might have gotten charged with a felony.
A use for hacking disposable cameras: They're disposable. That is, they're cheap enough that if you break them, you haven't lost much. That's useful for this kind of thing:
http://www.xkcd.com/kite/
I was so confident of my engineering skill and my insistence on multiple safety measures that I sent my nice, $150 digital camera up the kite line. It worked for a few hours after the 70-foot fall, but hasn't since.
xkcd.com - a webcomic of mathematics, love, and language.
This will finally enable you to create your own cheap sextapes, without the chance that some curious CVS employee(s) will see your work..
And the fact that it only works for 30 seconds is perfect for Slashdot users!
Sure I could Google it, but my point is that I don't know what CVS cameras are, and I'm sure I'm not the only one. An explanatory link like this one would be nice.
For the rest of us, CVS is a chain of pharmacies, they're selling a small, locked, one-time use digital video camera for $30 and charging $13 to get the data off it and onto DVD.