Category: DIY + Hacks

Those of you with Sony’s PSP portable gaming system can now install a menu system that looks remarkably similar to the one on Apple’s iPhone. The iPSP software installs onto a Memory Stick and provides ready access to your e-mail, photos, instant messaging, and other applications on the PSP. The menu is a portal to a variety of web-based applications as well as a couple that run directly on the PSP, like the calculator and PSPTunes media player.

The guys over at RedPost come right out and say it. They want you to hack their new digital picture frame and do whatever you want with it. For starters, the RedPost/Kit is a gorgeous digital picture frame with a large 19-inch Hannspree LCD screen.

Using a couple keys from a spare keyboard, this guy made up his own custom USB memory stick that looks like a computer key. Modder Alex over on Hacker Zen shows you step-by-step how to make your own using an old keyboard, a flash drive, an Xacto knife, a file and some glue.

As great as the Xbox 360 is, there’s no question that its thermal control issues are its biggest flaw. Since day one, there have been rampant problems with consoles overheating, with some reports claiming as much as a 30% failure rate. So what can you do to keep your cool?

This cool hack takes videos from YouTube, converts each frame to ASCII text, then plays them back in all their alphanumeric glory. Warren Harding (Linux geek, not the 29th President) put together a script which uses the text-based Lynx web browser along with Mplayer to to render the video.

I came across this cool video on YouTube that shows off some pretty cool interaction with Nintendo’s Wii-mote controller. The video shows off a nifty typographic animation designed by Erik Loyer which lets the user move the Wii-mote to influence the rendering of the text.

This has gotta be the best hack I’ve seen in a while… Scott Walker’s DigitalBox Newspaper Machine automatically displays the day’s latest news on an LCD screen that’s installed in the front of an old newspaper vending machine.

You won’t have any trouble finding the buttons on this massive replica of Nintendo’s famous NES controller. Game fan Philip Torrone and his team of builders put together this 5-foot wide joypad for the recently completed 2007 Maker Faire.

So what do you do when you crack your iPod screen? This industrious hacker has decided to turn his broken eggs into an omelet by turning his fractured iPod into a tiny little laptop. Owen McGarry created his iTop mini laptop by cutting his old iPod in half, keeping only the screen, battery and audio portions intact, then flipping that portion up at a 45-degree angle.

A console modder known as sir crx has fabricated a mashup between an Xbox 360 controller and a Wii-mote, allowing the Wii control to operate the Xbox 360. From what I can tell, he modified the 360 controller to accept Bluetooth commands, then uses it as a proxy for connecting to the Xbox through Microsoft’s proprietary wireless scheme. While the controller is currently pretty limited in its functionality (just the joypad and buttons work at present) sir crx plans on getting more of the controller’s functions to operate with the 360 in the near future.

If you’re the adventurous type and think the stock case design for the Nintendo Wii is a bit bland, look no further. Check out the new I-Case Chameleon from Team Xtender. The clear replacement shell features a cool glow in multiple LED colors.

While it’s certainly not the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen, you’ve got to hand it to this casemodder for his gumption. This supremely modified Nintendo Gameboy has become host to an entire Windows XP computer.

Here’s what looks like a very cool portable casemod for the Nintendo GameCube. The so-called “GameCube Advance” handheld opens up to reveal access to a large LCD screen and complete gaming controls. On the outside, there’s OLED display for accessing the system’s built-in MP3 player. To me the whole thing looks awfully Photoshopped, but it’s a cool idea if it really does exist.

The wizards on the R&D team for Zoozen have created this totally redesigned console body for the Xbox 360. Rather than simply a replacement case, the Ovo 360 completely changes the Xbox 360 into a bubbly, blue lit console.

Have a hankerin’ for some old Super Nintendo games, but don’t want to spend all your cash on Virtual Console downloads? French game modder Kotomi has just the solution for you. He’s taken a Super Nintendo console and smashed it down into the case of a Nintendo Wii .

Hot on the heels of Ben Heck’s last mod, the PS360 hybrid joystick, he’s at it again. This time he’s cranked out another Xbox 360 laptop, which improves on the original one he did a few months back. This time out, Ben has implanted the brains of the 360 in a black laptop case with green accents, versus the white case of the original.