Icy-Flo - The solution to this summer's heat

Steve Kerrison writes "Desperate times call for desperate measures, but I'd like to think of this as more of an exercise in cunning. It's hot, but I'm not, thanks to an Icy-Box and a Panaflo. This was nearly categorised as hardware hacking, but then the only 'hacking' required was the removal of four thumb-screws."

Comments

Go To Hell...

[jkrise]

That's a better solution to this summer's heat... with Vista and DNF REALLY REALLY likely to get shipped soon, it should be quite cool in Hell.

Wow

[I Like Pudding]

How in god's name was this article accepted? HE PLUGGED A FAN INTO A POWER LEAD! WOW!

Alert the media.

Go buy a (floor) ventilator...

[madsdyd]

Honestly. That seems to be about the most silly thing I have seen in ages.

A floor ventilator around the corner from where I am sitting, goes at about $30.

Smaller models (like the one he is using) goes as low as $10-15.

If your time worth so little (and remember, the FTA says its for those that _has_ to work) that this is a solution for you, find a better paying job!

Re:Go buy a (floor) ventilator...

[madsdyd]

Well, I always thought it was also about beeing clever, and implementing stuff that in some sense was "better" than what non-hackers would think up.

And, even applying my most friendly view on it, there is nothing clever about powering a (5V) fan from the (12V) power supply on a portable hd.

In addition to that, its a somewhat dangerous solution, and it is suboptimal even to the cheapest ventilator you can buy. (Which will most likely rotate, and thereby make the airflow more tolerable). So I do not believe it qualifies for beeing better in any sense.

But, perhaps I am just beeing harsh because I did not expect slashdot to post such a "story".

Regards hack value: Last year, some guy posted a story about doing his own air-condition. That was a worthy hack, IMO.

Impressive

[digitalhermit]

Wow.. He took a case fan and powered it from a, uh, power supply. But that's not all that impressive. One time, at band camp, I attached a CD-ROM drive and used power from *ANOTHER* power supply sitting in a *DIFFERENT* machine. And once, at a hacker convention (well, at my friend's house really), we super-hacked a a PS2 mouse to work with a USB interface by using an adapter we rigged (well, it came with the mouse actually).

article dead already

[bobamu]

So I have to guess the other comments.

He attached a fan to an electrical supply?

All I can say is, as an article, that blows.

Re:IDGI

[unts]

Wow, I really didn't expect the Slashdot editors to accept my submission of this. Still, this is what happens when you can't be arsed to go out and buy some proper cooling. Take it at face value folks, it's just a bit of light humour! I'll just sit here staying cool.

Real Men...

[Curious Yellow 82]

...would use a superfluid to keep themselves cool. They would also draw upon inspiration to explain the birth of the universe from it.

Alternatively, I could say, "on another hot summer's day where there was absolutely nothing newsworthy, /. decides to publish something that was born of a jobless geek's attempt to soothe his fevered brow while entertaining himself watching pornography."

/. effect

[Presidential]

Okay, here we see uncontested evidence that the /. effect overheats computers. Er, it overheats computers whose fans have been removed by their owners to cool their own paltry 98.6F down a degree or two, completely ignoring the smoking machine whose processor just jumped to that magical 170F.

I can't even RTFA on this one.

Should have saved the fan

[advocate_one]

for that poor little server...

This reminds me

[iogan]

of this fine article..

Re:OMG Net Neutrality!

[GuidoJ]

Or we just found where he took the fan from ...

Refresh?

[Vo0k]

The hack seems really simple:
"Please try again by clicking the Refresh button in your web browser."

I did, but I don't feel more refreshed really. What am I doing wrong?

Re:IDGI

[I Like Pudding]

Take it at face value folks

So, retarded then?

Re:And the news drought continues....

[harrkev]

Tomorrow's news: A guy figures out how to use a wall-wart power supply, thereby avoiding spinning a hard drive and decreasing the heat in the room even more.

In next week's news: A guy puts a cup of ice in front of the fan for even more X-treme cooling. You have to use the "X-treme" because it points out how really radical this idea is.

Ok, /.. You just took five minutes of my life. I want it back! I even had to go to Mirrordot to see this bit of moronic stupidity.

Attempting real discussion...

[tweakt]

In the hopes of salvaging this discussion (TFA is a non-story)

Has anyone tried one of these? The priciples behind it make sense:
http://www.sharperimage.com/us/en/catalog/product/ sku__SI758SL2

And since hearing about this development:
http://www.stanfordalumni.org/news/magazine/2005/j ulaug/features/cool.html

It makes even more sense, though a neck-worn device is more practical for mobile usage.

Re:Attempting real discussion...

[MrDoh1]

I have a "Personal Cooler" from Sharper Image, though it is about 5yrs old. Looking at the picture on their site it doesn't look like they've changed it much. (But I don't know that for a fact so this all refers to my little bit older one.)

My review: Like most other things that Sharper Image sells, save your money!

I've used it (or tried to) while walking, while mowing, while working in the yard and in a few other instances, some during leisure, some during manual labor.

First, I'm not a very large guy. My neck is pretty small in diameter. The thing doesn't hold on tight enough for my neck and it ends up sliding around or facing completely backwards and falling off before I can grab it. This happens much more frequently as you get hot and sweat more. Forget wearing it to play sports.

Here in SE Texas, I can't even tell I am wearing it. The metal plate that contacts my neck becomes just as hot as I am in a very short amount of time and you can't tell there is any kind of cooling effect from it at all, save for the first couple of minutes you put it on until the metal plate gets to your temperature. (And trust me, this doesn't take long!)

If it's like it used to be, you put water into a hole in it and a sponge soaked the water up in an attempt to keep it from spilling. Well, just a little too much water and this little water retention system ends up cooling you off inadvertently because it spills all over you. (Hey, at least it has the potential to cool you off, at least a little, somehow.)

At least on mine, the little fan that spins that is suppose to help provide the evaporative cooling is so weak that I can put my hands over the little vent and barely tell if there is any air moving at all, though its close enough to my ears that I can hear it unless I'm doing something that makes a lot of noise.

I think it could be made to work, if they have not gotten the kinks out already. The fan needs to be larger and more powerful, there needs to be a real way to contain the water and there has to be some way it can stay on anyones neck, regardless of their size. The principles involved seem sound, it's the implementation that needs work.


As for the other link (didn't read TFL, just looked at the pictures), I haven't seen one of those before, but based on previous experience with similar methods, I believe that it is also based on sound principles. As an ex-firefighter in hot Florida I can tell you when we needed to cool off fast the best thing to do was run cool/cold water over your wrists. This helped with evaporative cooling on the skin, and if you are skinny like me with large veins close to the surface, it also might cool the blood itself a little.

Dumbest. Story. Ever.

[smithmc]

In other news, man quenches thirst by filling cup with water, then pouring water into mouth.