Author Archives: Elliot Williams

34C3: Hacking into a CPU’s Microcode

Posted on by

Inside every modern CPU since the Intel Pentium fdiv bug, assembly instructions aren’t a one-to-one mapping to what the CPU actually does. Inside the CPU, there is a decoder that turns assembly into even more primitive instructions that are fed into the CPU’s internal scheduler and pipeline. The code that drives the decoder is the CPU’s microcode, and it lives in ROM that’s normally inaccessible. But microcode patches have been deployed in the past to fix up CPU hardware bugs, so it’s certainly writeable. That’s practically an invitation, right? At least a group from the Ruhr University Bochum took …read more

Continue reading 34C3: Hacking into a CPU’s Microcode→

34C3: The First Day is a Doozy

Posted on by

It’s 5 pm, the sun is slowly setting on the Leipzig conference center, and although we’re only halfway through the first day, there’s a ton that you should see. We’ll report some more on the culture of the con later — for now here’s just the hacks.

Electric Car Charging Stations: Spoofing and Reflashing

Electric autos are the future, right? Well, for now we need to figure out how to charge them. All across Germany, charging stations are popping up like dandelions. How do they work? Are they secure? [Mathias Dalheimer] bought a couple loading stations, built himself a car …read more

Continue reading 34C3: The First Day is a Doozy→

Hackaday at 34C3

Posted on by

It’s that time of year. While the rest of the Christmas-celebrating world sits around and plays with the toys that they got out from under the tree, German nerds head off to the biggest European hacker con: the 34th annual Chaos Communications Congress, running Dec. 27th through 30th.

The CCC is both a grandparent among hacker cons, and the most focused on using technology to improve the world and bringing folks together. (The “communications” in the name is a dead giveaway.) This year’s motto, “tuwat!” is slangy-dialecty for “do something!” and is call to get up off the couch and …read more

Continue reading Hackaday at 34C3→

Coin Cells: The Mythical Milliamp-Hour

Posted on by

Just how much metaphorical juice is in a coin cell battery? It turns out that this seemingly simple question is impossible to answer — at least without a lot of additional information. The problem is that the total usable energy in a battery depends on how you try to get that energy out, and that is especially true of coin cells.

For instance, ask any manufacturer of the common 3 V lithium 2032 batteries, and they’ll tell you that it’s got 230 mAh. That figure is essentially constant across brands and across individual cells, and if you pull a constant …read more

Continue reading Coin Cells: The Mythical Milliamp-Hour→

Coin Cells: The Mythical Milliamp-Hour

Posted on by

Just how much metaphorical juice is in a coin cell battery? It turns out that this seemingly simple question is impossible to answer — at least without a lot of additional information. The problem is that the total usable energy in a battery depends on how you try to get that energy out, and that is especially true of coin cells.

For instance, ask any manufacturer of the common 3 V lithium 2032 batteries, and they’ll tell you that it’s got 230 mAh. That figure is essentially constant across brands and across individual cells, and if you pull a constant …read more

Continue reading Coin Cells: The Mythical Milliamp-Hour→

Mike Harrison at the Superconference: Flying LCD Pixels

Posted on by

Mike Harrison, perhaps better known to us as the titular Mike of YouTube channel mikeselectricstuff, is a hardware hacking genius. He’s the man behind this year’s Superconference badge, and his hacks and teardowns have graced our pages many times. The best thing about Mike is that his day job is designing implausibly cool one-off hardware for large-scale art installations. His customers are largely artists, which means that they just don’t care about the tech as long as it works. So when he gets together with a bunch of like-minded hacker types, he’s got a lot of pent-up technical details that …read more

Continue reading Mike Harrison at the Superconference: Flying LCD Pixels→

How Cheap Can A 3D Printer Get? The Anet A8

Posted on by

The short answer: something like $200, if your time is worth $0/hour. How is this possible? Cheap kit printers, with laser-cut acrylic frames, but otherwise reasonably solid components. In particular, for this review, an Anet A8. If you’re willing to add a little sweat equity and fix up some of the bugs, an A8 can be turned into a good 3D printer on a shoestring budget.

That said, the A8 is a printer kit, not a printer. You’re going to be responsible for assembly of every last M3 screw, and there are many. Building the thing took me eight …read more

Continue reading How Cheap Can A 3D Printer Get? The Anet A8→

How Cheap Can A 3D Printer Get? The Anet A8

Posted on by

The short answer: something like $200, if your time is worth $0/hour. How is this possible? Cheap kit printers, with laser-cut acrylic frames, but otherwise reasonably solid components. In particular, for this review, an Anet A8. If you’re willing to add a little sweat equity and fix up some of the bugs, an A8 can be turned into a good 3D printer on a shoestring budget.

That said, the A8 is a printer kit, not a printer. You’re going to be responsible for assembly of every last M3 screw, and there are many. Building the thing took me eight …read more

Continue reading How Cheap Can A 3D Printer Get? The Anet A8→

Mike Ossmann and Dominic Spill: IR, Pirates!

Posted on by

Mike Ossmann and Dominic Spill have been at the forefront of the recent wave of software-defined radio (SDR) hacking. Mike is the hardware guy, and his radio designs helped bring Bluetooth and ISM-band to the masses. Dominic is the software guy who makes sure that all this gear is actually usable. The HackRF SDR is still one of the best cheap choices if you need an SDR that can transmit and receive.

So what are these two doing on stage giving a talk about IR communication? Can you really turn traffic lights green by blinking lights? And can you spoof …read more

Continue reading Mike Ossmann and Dominic Spill: IR, Pirates!→

CNC Milling is More Manual Than You Think

Posted on by

I was in Pasadena CA for the Hackaday Superconference, and got to spend some quality time at the Supplyframe Design Lab. Resident Engineer Dan Hienzsch said I could have a few hours, and asked me what I wanted to make. The constraints were that it had to be small enough to fit into checked luggage, but had to be cool enough to warrant taking up Dan’s time, with bonus points for me learning some new skills. I have a decent wood shop at home, and while my 3D printer farm isn’t as pro as the Design Lab’s, I know the …read more

Continue reading CNC Milling is More Manual Than You Think→