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The Ultimate Hackaday Supercon 2018 Roundup

This year in Pasadena, California, I had the immense pleasure of attending my first Hackaday Superconference. It was equal parts inspiring, exciting, energizing, and utterly fantastic. If you haven’t been, then you must make it in 2019, because there is nothing else quite like it.

From the amazing speakers, to the melding of magnificent minds, there was no shortage of things to see and do during the event, which ran from November 2nd to the 4th. While I could easily fill a novel with all the things I saw and did, we’re going to distill this into a concentrated post. Join me as we take a journey through Supercon 2018!

Superconference 2018 Highlights

This year’s conference spanned across three different venues. We began in the Supplyframe HQ on Friday for talks, badge hacking, and the SMD soldering challenge. For Saturday and Sunday, Supercon took over the Supplyframe DesignLab and the Los Angeles College of Music (LACM) next door.

If you weren’t able to make it, I highly recommend you check out the talks, all of which are available in this handy playlist. Of course, all of this wouldn’t have been possible without the amazing work from the Supplyframe team and the 500+ hours our volunteers put in to help it all run as smoothly as it did.

Now, without further adieu, here are some highlights from the event!

We had multiple Tindarians at Supercon, including Sarah Petkus who did a captivating talk on her ongoing project, SHE BON.

In the space between the two venues, an epic Badgelife exhibit adorned the wall, complete with several badges from Tindarians:

Over at the DesignLab, Brian Benchoff also hosted a KISS Tindie Pad Printing demo:

As it turns out, this process is used to print text on all manner of things, including branded pens. After taking a pen from the Vatican, Brian recounted a series of unfortunate events, which led to this amazing quote:

“I learned three things: God exists, he’s catholic, and he uses comic sans.”

As the talks continued, the alley behind the DesignLab was filled with people hacking their badges and participating in the SMD challenge:

Let’s not forget the amazing Tindie meetup on Saturday either:

People wasted no time when it came to badge hacking. After all, there were cash prizes and Tindie gift certificates at stake for the winners of the contest.

Saturday night also played host to the Hackaday Prize 2018 award ceremony, where the trainable robotic arm Dexter took home the grand prize!

On Sunday night, the audience decided who would win the badge hacking awards. The badge hacks did not disappoint! We had everything from a 3D-printed enclosure, to amazing musical renditions, and even a rubber band gun powered by the badge!

When the sun went down, things got really intense. High voltage and explosions galore!

Once again, a huge thank you to all of the people who helped make this happen!

See you in 2019 for the next Hackaday Supercon!

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Give Your Next Project Motion Detection Powers With This 3-Axis USB Accelerometer

Accelerometers have applications in a wide variety of projects. Whether you’re making a motion detector, a gaming peripheral, or even a home security system, this type of tech is incredibly useful.

This USB accelerometer, based on the ADXL345 IC, offers a compact and accessible solution for your motion detecting needs. Simply plug the device into your USB port on a PC, Mac, or Raspberry Pi and the data begins streaming. An onboard STM32 takes care of the connectivity and the polling of the accelerometer values.

By using a program like SerialPlot, you can also plot everything in real time or send commands as well. If your goal is to acquire data and save it to a file, you can also use a port reader like Cutecom, or any other preferred solution.

With three different commands to choose from, the accelerometer allows you to stop or start data streaming, change the frequency of data sampling, and adjust the range. Any project, large or small, that requires the ability to detect movement, could easily benefit from this USB accelerometer.

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Raspberry Pi Meets LoRa and ESP32 in this IoT Learning Kit

Depending on who you ask, the Internet of Things is either a technological renaissance, or the next inevitable step towards Skynet. In either case, it’s a technology that you would do well to learn, as it’s making its way into all kinds of industries and devices.

With this IoT Learning Kit, you’ll find everything you need to start developing IoT applications. It includes a TTGO ESP32 LoRa which is programmable via Arduino IDE. It also includes a 3D-printed enclosure so you can quickly start using LoRa, WiFi, or Bluetooth for your IoT projects.

With this kit, you’ll have a fully featured and cost-effective solution to start practicing with tech like wireless sensors, robotics, computer vision, and plenty of other applications. With simple and straightforward code samples, along with learning materials, this is also a great kit for any skill level.

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Bring Your Commodore PC-I/PC-1 Back From the Dead With This Restoration Kit

Raise your hand if you remember the Commodore PC-1. It was the smallest IBM PC clone, with an 8088 processor and a whopping 512 KB of RAM. If you have a vintage Commodore PC-1 lying around, it’s probably not working as well as it used to, thanks to the passage of time. Materials science strives to make parts age gracefully, but every chain has a weak link.

This Commodore PC-1 restoration kit offers your vintage computer a new lease on life by providing Panasonic capacitors, a PC speaker/beeper, a System Reset Switch, and even replacements for the rubber feet that have no doubt worn down over the years. By far the capacitors are the most important part of the kit as the electrolyte of the originals has degraded over time and their role as defenders of regulated voltage is at risk.

The speaker was not originally included with the computer, but there’s a connector on the main board for it. The reset switch is also optional, but it’s a feature that many people miss in the original design.

Basic soldering skills are required for replacing the capacitors, but it’s always smart to at least replace these on vintage computers, even if they are seemingly still functional. Doing this will ensure your Commodore continues functioning for several years into the future.

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PiDog2 is a Faithful Guardian of Your Raspberry Pi

The Raspberry Pi is a pretty capable device that has been the foundation of countless projects. However, it’s not without flaws. Namely, the power management capabilities. There’s also scenarios where the device isn’t easily reached, and when RPIs crash, it’s a headache to reset the device.

While the included hardware can reset a Pi, it doesn’t possess the ability to turn it off and on again. There’s no way to completely power down a Raspberry Pi, it’s always pulling power in some form. The owner of South Berkeley Electronics had this problem when they were setting up Raspberry Pi-based cameras around a campus.

The solar-powered solutions worked great, but they soon ran into issues with low light conditions and outages throughout the network. This required manually resetting the Pis, which was neither fun nor efficient.

That’s when they got the idea for the PiDog2. This handy hat for Raspberry PI has the ability to cut power from the Pi after a set period of time. It also has the ability to power up the device as well. Finally, it can provide the Pi with a measurement of the 5V and 3.3V supplies, along with two other voltages of your choosing.

The result? Your software can make choices about when to shut down and save battery or avoid flash corruption. The PiDog2 will wake up or boot the Pi again periodically and decide if it’s best to power back down or operate normally.

The PiDog2 is powered by an ATtiny84 microcontroller connected to the Pi via the GPIO header and the SPI interface. You can still use other SPI devices that work off other chip selects. A Python library allows you to interact with the registers, and a good portion of the soldering is already done when you receive the kit.

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Build A Portable Gadget and Learn to Solder With The “STOP ME” Game

Learning to solder and end up with an electronic game on your key chain. The STOP ME GAME is designed to teach soldering skills, while also giving you the chance to create a nifty portable game.

Once soldering is done, the game will light up the LEDs one at a time. Just press the button when the green on comes on! Each time you get it right, the game gets a little bit faster.

The kit is based around the ATtiny13 microcontroller. A CR2032 battery on the back gives the device portability. The kit includes everything you’ll need, including the LEDs, pushbutton, microcontroller, switch, battery holder, and the PCB. Soldering instructions are available on the GitHub page. And you can reprogram this chip using an Arduino so if the game gets old, invent a new one!

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This Open Source Wrist Watch Features a Sleek ePaper Display and 3D-Printed Case

With the rise of smart watches and smartphones, you don’t see many classic wrist watches anymore. Even so, there’s something endearing about a classic look and feel, which is why ePaper displays have always been popular.

The Agora watch kit takes inspiration from both old and new with an open source watch that features an ePaper display and a 3D-printed enclosure in a variety of colors. The firmware is also customizable to meet your needs and preferences.

The kit comes with an assembled and programmed PCB, the ePaper display, a rechargeable battery, vibration motor, and fasteners. Take a look at the video below to see it in action!

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Program and Debug Your Chips With Ease Using The PogoProg Pin Programmer

A smart practice when creating a custom PCB is to add a SWD programming header to the board for programming and debugging purposes. The Model C version of the PogoProg is designed for use with 4-pin, 1.27 mm pitch headers that utilize SWDIO, SWDCLK, VDD, and GND pins.

That being said, it’s also useable with any 4 signal lines, so long as the pitch is compatible. If you work on a lot of custom projects, then you know how difficult it is to get by with make-shift programmers. A product designed for this purpose is exactly what motivated the makers at Electronut Labs to create the PogoProg.

This relatively inexpensive solution will also save you a great deal in the long-term, as sourcing pogo pins in small quantities can quickly add up. Instead, this device offers a pre-soldered option that won’t break the bank.

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SyncSlayer Converts SCART to VGA, and That’s Just The Beginning

It takes a lot of effort to bring something from the past into the present. We’d all like to dust off those old retro gaming consoles hiding in closets and basements, but the second you think about hooking it up to a modern display things get tricky. Not even nostalgia can save you.

Enter SyncSlayer, a fully assembled SCART to VGA adapter that includes RCA audio and a breakout header for expansion. It includes terminal posts for Vsync, Hsync, Csync, RGB, and even left and right channels for audio.

The adapter outputs a 15Khz VGA signal, so you’ll need the correct type of monitor to support it, as this is a low refresh rate that many current monitors don’t support. That being said, it’s still a lot easier than trying to find something with a SCART input so your retro gaming nostalgia will thank you.

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Simplify Your Next Retro Gaming Project With The Power Block Arcade PCB

There’s no denying the complexity of building something from nothing. Even the most experienced makers will look for a way to streamline the process, though, which is why things like the Power Block Arcade PCB exist.

This PCB takes out the headache when you’re distributing power to a mini-arcade built with a Raspberry Pi or another single-board computer. It has easy terminators for wire pairs or DC pigtails to make the wiring process easier.

If you’re using a 12V DC input on your arcade, the PCB also supports adjustable LM2596 DC buck converter modules commonly stocked by many electronics suppliers. Using this, the PCB essentially becomes a universal PSU hub for any of your projects that require power.

You can even stack the PCB into a multi-voltage power supply. By using the proper soldering and resistors, it can even function as a high-current USB charger. The resistors, of course, are not included.

The board breaks out switch jumpers to screw terminals as well, so you can add on/off switches into the design. The creator, RetroBuiltGames, designed this PCB after completing hundreds of mini-arcades and sought to take away the issues associated with wiring in such a small space.

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