Preamble
I found a Sky router. Is it possible to put OpenWRT on it?
Category: Project
Z80 microcomputer on breadboard
Preamble
Following on from the 6502 on a breadboard, and seeing as the Z80, IMHO, is vastly superior… How about a nice ZX Spectrum compatible Z-80 type computer on a breadboard, stripboard..?
Audio sampling IC from the late 80s
Preamble
Long ago, back in the late 80s (1988/89?) I had a venerable Maplin’s catalogue from that year, which listed an audio sampling IC, that could write to up to 1 MB of RAM, which was a lot of RAM in those days (not to mention expensive). I wanted to incorporate in my final year project, along with a 68000 to control it. I had the idea very roughly sketched out in my head.
However, unfortunately, I ended up with the worst project supervisor, who was infamous for being awful, a certain Dr. Mercer, and I was forced to work on a bicycle speedometer, using some crappy microcontroller, I forgot which one. I was so dispirited that I hardly worked on it at all. The biggest pain that I remember was making a test bed to simulate a bicycle wheel which was a motor that had a perspex disc with a magnet attached to it. I think that is as far as I got, although I vaguely remember wire wrapping a board up as well. Bloody pointless.
Anyway, having just remembered all of this, I wonder what the sampling IC was..?
Loft legs usage
My Pi Cluster – BOM
Raspberry Pi clusters
Preamble
After watching Jeff Geerling’s videos on Pi Clusters, and the Turing Pi, I decided it was time to finally build a cluster…
Pi Zero and Pi Cams
Preamble
For Paul McWhorter’s portable streaming Pi Cam, lesson 62 – AI on the Jetson Nano LESSON 62: Make a Streaming IP Camera from a Raspberry Pi Zero W. Paul uses a Pi Zero W (not Zero 2) and a Pi Camera v2.1.
However, in order to do an accurate comparison test, a combination of devices are required.
Also, the PiCams in Jetson Xavier NX Lesson 7: Connecting and Controlling Servos with a PCA9685: Servos; tilt and pan; long cables.
Make a MacBook Pro battery
Preamble
Sick of having to fork out for expensive MBP batteries? Is it possible to make one from an old exploded battery pack and some 18650 cells..?
MBPs have a huge discharge rate, so any MBP left unused for a few months will result is a dead battery, ad the MBP will actually flip a kill switch in the BMS. It is possible, however, to reverse this, and revive the battery, so long as none of the LiPo cells have not blown.
OpenWRT and Asus DSL-N12U
Preamble
Finally I found, for 30 baht, an Asus router (DSL-N12U) for the Roomba project, that does have a USB port…
OK, it’s not one of the latest and greatest and isn’t on the OpenWRT hardware list, as it is one of the 4/32 routers (it actually has 16/32)… but it is one that closely matches the Asus WL-HDD and Linksys WRTSL54GS router used in Hacking Roomba.
Whilst the OpenWRT page for DSL-N12U provides no instructions on how to load OpenWRT, I found a useful tutorial that does show you how to port OpenWRT to a device whose platform is already implemented.
There’s a promising looking link on Asus WL-HDD, titled Asus Flashing but it hasn’t yet been written, although there is this: oldwiki:openwrtdocs:hardware:asus:flashing – OpenWrt Wiki
Creating PCB masks as PDFs from Gerber files on OS X
Preamble
I had a set of Gerber files (one for each layer) for the PCB layout of piport, from Create_2_Serial_to_33V_Logic.pdf (see Serial comms for Roombas and routers), but my PCB manufacturer doesn’t know how to use Gerber files (he’s a bit slow) and will only accept PDFs.
Continue reading Creating PCB masks as PDFs from Gerber files on OS X
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