Category: DIY + Hacks

Here’s a nifty idea for some nifty desktop speakers. All you need is 6 cheap square Mylar speakers, 21 cable ties, and the patience to stitch ’em together into a see-through cube. Et Voilà! This speaker cube was recently spotted over on the MAKE: Flickr Pool and seems like a really cool concept.

You know how karaoke is really fun until someone drinks a little too much and starts majorly hogging the mic for their less-than-moving versions of American Pie and N*Sync B-sides? Now you can shut them down with cold, hard facts about their blood alcohol content, by employing this sneaky breathalyzer microphone.

Spotted at this week’s QuakeCon 2008, this is one computer that probably doesn’t have to worry about overheating. The Barbecue Grill PC is definitely one smokin’ machine. But instead of cooking burgers and ribs, this grill conceals a complete gaming rig, capable of pushing plenty of pixels for playing the latest and greatest computer games.

Hardware hacker Ian Matthew decided to see if he could turn a hard drive into a clock. But this isn’t one of those lazy designs where you just stick some clock hands through a hard drive platter.

I had no idea you could get custom phones to look like food products, but I’m here to tell you that you can, and they’re… um… unique. It all started when I saw this phone that looked like a sandwich, or rather, that looked like a phone horribly smooshed into a sandwich.

The RoboStool is a homemade robotic footstool that’s ready and willing to support your tired tootsies whenever you summon it. It’s a little reminiscent of the Take A Seat robotic chair but differs in that it uses 3 different modes of control.

Here’s a dark and disturbing Gears of War Xbox 360 casemod that would make Cliffy B. himself proud. Modder DFW Monkie, the same guy who brought us this creepy alligator Xbox 360, has outdone himself this time with his new Gears 360.

Do you have loads of old hard drives laying around your house? Do you love the sweet tinny tones of wind chimes clinkity clinking on your back porch? If so, this is a great project for you- you can turn your old, unused or crashed hard drives into this set of aluminum wind chimes.

Looking for a way to keep your souped-up PC from overheating? This series of bold acrylic cases out of Japan does away with convention by doing away with the exterior case walls, thus eliminating much of the heat which might otherwise be trapped by a traditional enclosure.

Here’s another retro game console mod that’s sure to draw stares. This modder managed to cram a Nintendo NES 8-bit game system into a light gun controller. Go figure that no actual Nintendos were harmed in the making of this system.

I’ve seen some offbeat casemods in my travels, but I haven’t seen one quite this odd in a while. Apparently, some guy from Holland came across this cheese display prop and said to himself, “I’ve always wanted a PC that looked like a wheel of cheese”.

How’d you like a mouse like this connected to your PC? Looking like a mix between an electric shaver and some sort of mini tank, this Steampunk pointer definitely stands out from the pack (or more accurately in the case of mice, it’s actually known as a “mischief” – go figure).

The guys over at MAKE recently showed visitors how to make a “Brain Machine”, a trippy looking device which reaches into your mind and helps you to chill out. Now, thanks to the miracle of modern science, you can buy one in kit form and try it on for yourself.

If you don’t happen to have enough room for one of those 22-foot tall styrofoam robots to defend the homestead, that’s okay. Thanks to the wild and wonderful creations of robot insect builder TinyMinds, you can get your hands on some little robots which should do the trick just as well.

Got a broken old iPod lying around? Besides dropping it in the dumpster, what else can you do with it? Well if you’re like this resourceful modder, you turn it into a mouse. After stefferroo’s brother dropped his iPod under his car and then proceeded to run it over, it was surely headed for the trash bin.

This bold all-in-one computer borrows its combo concept from the iMac, but is actually a gaming PC. Modder Ville ‘Willek’ Kyrö always liked the idea of small-form-factor computers, but wanted the expandability and power to run his PC games.