Tindie

Portable experiences, be they music players, phones, or game consoles, require a headphone jack for the most enjoyment. After all, you’re not using these devices on your couch, you’re often on the bus, riding in an Uber, or sitting in a waiting room.

The Game Boy Advance SP, arugably one of the best portable gaming consoles, shipped without a headphone jack originally. Thankfully, this PCB add-on can finally remedy that issue.

It requires a little more than just soldering it to the motherboard, but when you’re finished it works quite well. The seller recommends you have a drill/rotary tool and a craft or exacto knife to complete the install. A pictorial install guide helps you through the process, and you’ll enjoy it even if you’re not performing an install. It’s impressive to see what it takes to add something to an existing product. The shard of PCB that backs this connector has had a lot of consideration go into it.

It may take a few extra steps, but a headphone jack is exactly what the doctor ordered!

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Until today, I had not heard of Plantoid Robotics, and frankly, I wish I had heard about it sooner. The idea of creating a robot that supports the life of a living plant is just incredible. As it turns out, the folks at Citizen Scientific Workshop have already been working on this very concept.

The Tenax Mundus is a prototype plantoid that uses an Arduino-based sensory suite to explore its environment and find an optimal location for the plant housed in its center. The full plantoid robot kit has everything to build one yourself, including a seed pod kit and soil to grow the plant.

The sensors in the kit include soil moisture, air temperature, humidity, ambient light, MQ/AQ gas sensors, and ultrasonic so it doesn’t crash into things. You’ll find the Arduino code on their website.

While plantoids remain a largely conceptual part of robotics, they have huge applications for growing plants in new environments or even on other planets as they continue to evolve. This kit allows makers of any skill level to experience the concept first-hand.

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Gating audio signals is an incredibly fun and expressive way to make music, but it’s usually confined to software sequencers. The Super Smash Button is a hardware audio gate which uses an arcade button to trigger sounds – simply run any signal through the box for rhythmic stutters, staccato drones and chopped melodies. Anyone familiar with button-bashing arcade games will love using this; finally your Track and Field skills have a practical use!

The Super Smash Button allows any audio signal to pass when the arcade button is pressed – from a tiny nanosecond to as long as you want to hold it. It has applications for many sonic/musical elements, including drones, vocals, drum machines, transistor radios, foley recordings, electromagnetic microphones and pretty much anything else you can think of! Add some delay effects or a loop pedal for an extra dimension of experimental sound.

There’s a toggle switch letting this stay connected for times when you want to continually pass the signal. The Super Smash Button comes in a strong aluminum enclosure, and it’s ultra responsive, reliable and long-lasting. It comes fully constructed and boxed by midierror who’s based in Brighton, England.

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Pixel art is absolutely gorgeous, but have you ever thought about how it could be tied into blockchain tech? Neither did I until I saw the PixelCon Frame, which combines the two in a sleek 3D-printed display.

The pixel art itself is displayed on a 8×8 matrix of LEDs and powered by a WiFi enabled ESP8266 board, all of which is enclosed in a 3D-printed case made from a matte black ABS filament.

Here’s where the blockchain comes in: all of the pixel art displayed on the frame comes from the PixelCon ecosystem in the Ethereum blockchain. You can create and explore other people’s work by collecting and trading owned pieces like cryptocurrency. The user guide provides more detail, plus the GitHub repo shows off what’s inside and lets you poke around in the source code if you’d like to make this do your own bidding.

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If you’re someone who looks at a circuit diagram and feels like they’re trying to decipher hieroglyphics, don’t worry, we’ve all been there. It’s an important skill to learn, but everyone has to start somewhere.

This 555 Flasher Kit includes everything you need except for the 9V battery, which are easy to come by. You can even choose between a red or green LED when you check out. Construction should take about an hour. The component values and orientation are all printed on the board. The seller also offers a circuit board download link on the product page.

Begin by soldering the low profile components first and continue based on size. Leave the battery connector for last and you’re all set!

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The Game Boy camera paired with a Game Boy Printer was when I first discovered my love of thermal printing. There was something so satisfying about watching your insanely low-res photos come to life from the miniature device.

For those who dream of once again printing any and all things on sheets of thermal paper, this hat for Raspberry Pi is the answer. The onboard power supply is capable of powering both the Pi and the hat, while serial communication happens over USB without any additional drivers.

Check out the video below to hear the pleasing sound of this in action. It prints one row at a time with a resolution of 7x105px so there’s room for you to get creative with your graphics. The seller also offers a shield for Arduino with the same functionality.

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For the high-tech guitar player, a laptop is a powerful and adaptable effects processor for making complex and experimental sounds beyond the familiar chorus, flange and distortion. The FS2M – Footswitch to MIDI adapter converts a conventional guitar switch/sustain pedal signal to MIDI for integration with a laptop or computer to control software!

You may want to engage an entire signal chain, insert some live audio stutters or open up a giant space-age reverb – all are possible with the FS2M! It allows you to select MIDI channel, message type (Program Change or Control Change) and method of operation. Modes include toggling between an on/off state, impulse for quick, and up/down for scrolling through different parameters. Let’s say you have Guitar Rig loaded up on your computer, the entire suite of presets are at your disposal, without touching the mouse.

The FS2M is a superb performance tool with configuration software for Mac, Windows and Linux to set up the adapter for your needs. It allows the processing power of a computer to effect the sound of the guitar in a seamless way with a TRS 1/4″ Jack input from your pedal and included USB-A cable to the computer.

It’s available now from the beatbars store, shipping from Poland now! Have a look at the video below to see it in action.

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With the right technology and the proper lighting, you can make some pretty magical displays. Whether it’s making water droplets freeze in place or move backwards, the application of fast strobe lights turn everyday things into works of art.

Inspired by the Slow Dance frame, this sLOMO (slow motion) DIY frame kit lets you create a conversation piece for your living room. The folks at the JoliiFactory took the same concept put forth by the Slow Dance frame and created a kit with readily available parts (as opposed to the custom parts in the original design) so others could make their own.

The result is a frame that makes objects move seemingly in slow motion. By blinking a light in the frame 80 times per second, the effect is achieved without your eye being able to perceive the blinks.

Several kits are available, but you’ll need to provide your own Arduino Nano or compatible microcontroller, along with the frame itself. Check out the video below to see it in action!

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Makers are at their best when they’re solving problems. For those who have a Raspberry Pi Zero or the Zero W lying around, you may have considered turning it into a Linux PC or handheld device at one point, but decided against it because you would need to connect accessories and inputs.

Well, the only thing better than a solid Linux PC is a portable one, and that’s where the SnapOnAir Raspberry Pi Zero PCB comes in. Keep in mind that this is the board only, so you’ll need to supply the components yourself, including the Raspberry Pi.

With everything in hand, the SnapOnAir allows you to build a true handheld Linux PC with a 2.8-inch color ILI9341 TFT display. You can also add a keyboard based on a TCA8418 I2C chip, and even throw a buzzer on there if you’d like.

You can use a digital microphone as well, and it’s compatible with nRF24 trx sub boards. This inexpensive but extremely useful board has been making the rounds on other sites too, like ZDNet and Fossbytes, so dust off your old Raspberry Pi and check it out!

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Lamps are great and all, but sometimes I wish I could change the color. Setting a nice ambience in your office or bedroom can help you relax and unwind. Similarly, if you have a small stage setup, the ability to utilize different colored lights could really take a performance to the next level.

Whatever your needs, this ESP-MeshKit Light offers hundreds of different colors, and the ability to change it via your Android or iPhone. It utilizes Espressif Mesh technology to make the magic happen.

Hackers will also be pleased to know that you can re-compile it or change values like delay between colors to make it your own.

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