Australia’s Silliac Computer
When you think about the dawn of modern computers, you often think about the work done in the UK and the US. But Australia had an early computer scene, too, …read more Continue reading Australia’s Silliac Computer
Author Archives: Al Williams
MIT Wants You to Secure Your Hardware Designs
When you think of attacking or defending computer systems, you probably think of software viruses and the corresponding anti-virus software. But MIT’s 6.5950 class teaches secure hardware design — how …read more Continue reading MIT Wants You to Secure Your Hardware Designs
The Magic Touch: A 555 Touch Switch
There seems to be nothing a 555 can’t do. We’ve seen it before, but [electronzapdotcom] reminds us you can use a 555 and a few parts to make a reasonable …read more Continue reading The Magic Touch: A 555 Touch Switch
Zink is Zero Ink — Sort Of
When you think of printing on paper, you probably think of an ink jet or a laser printer. If you happen to think of a thermal printer, we bet you …read more Continue reading Zink is Zero Ink — Sort Of
Tiny Bubbles in the Memory
We are always fascinated by bubble memory. In the late 1970s, this was the “Next Big Thing” that, as you may have guessed, was, in fact, not the next big …read more Continue reading Tiny Bubbles in the Memory
Protocol Analyzer Remembered
Anyone will tell you that as hard as it is to create a working system, the real trick is making two systems talk to each other, especially if you created …read more Continue reading Protocol Analyzer Remembered
Pictures from a High Altitude Balloon
How do you get images downlinked from 30 km up? Hams might guess SSTV — slow scan TV — and that’s the approach [desafloinventor] took. If you haven’t seen it …read more Continue reading Pictures from a High Altitude Balloon
Tech in Plain Sight: Hearing Aids
You might think you don’t need a hearing aid, and you might be right. But in general, hearing loss eventually comes to all of us. In fact, you progressively lose …read more Continue reading Tech in Plain Sight: Hearing Aids
RTL-SDR with Only a Browser
Surely by now you’ve at least heard of RTL-SDR — a software project that let’s cheap TV tuner dongles work as a software-defined radios. A number of projects and tools …read more Continue reading RTL-SDR with Only a Browser
Booting a Desktop PDP-11
Ever heard of VENIX? There were lots of variants of Unix back in the day, and VENIX was one for the DEC Professional 380, which was — sort of — …read more Continue reading Booting a Desktop PDP-11