We know this looks like a plastic trashcan full of junk electronics, but it’s actually the inside of WowWee’s Rovio robot webcam just after he’s been given a remote-control mod. Obviously blind to the dangers of granting your robot power over high-voltage appliances, RoboCommunity member Thel has hacked together a system whereby he can switch devices on and off at the mains using Rovio.
A week ago we described HTC’s HD2 as the poster-child for Windows Mobile 6.5, despite HTC having to replace, rework or generally junk a lot of the Microsoft OS’ native functionality and replace it with their own. One such change – and a particularly welcome one at that – is multitouch support, but HTC have limited its use in the final build to the browser and a few other apps. Now there’s a nifty app which unlocks multitouch support in every app system-wide.
Zooomer for the HTC HD2 will work with any .exe executable file on the Windows Phone, and basically add in multitouch control. That’s going to be of mixed use, of course, since not all apps will really benefit from it, but we’re glad to at least have the choice ourselves. The functionality is selective, too, which means you can turn off Zooomer’s multitouch on an app-by-app basis if you’re experiencing problems or just find the zooming frustrating (such as in certain games, perhaps).
Meizu’s M8 started out as a comedy iPhone clone and gradually developed its own – at least partial – identity; now some earnest modders have given it a complete OS upgrade. Out went Windows CE, to be replaced by Google’s Android platform, though it’s still very early days and you lose more than just the original UI in the process.
Video demo after the cut
It’s taken them over 500 pages of hacking, but earnest tweakers over at xda-developers have managed to get Android 1.6 Donut running on the hitherto Windows Mobile 6.1 HTC Diamond. The first-gen Diamond has a compact 2.8-inch resistive touchscreen running at VGA resolution, and the hacked Android ROM is reportedly responsive together with offering support for both WiFi and GPS.
Video demo after the cut
Android is slowly but surely appearing on a number of UMPCs and MIDs, but if you actually want to buy one – as opposed to just read about it – your options are still pretty limited. Over at jkOnTheRun our friend Kevin C. Tofel’s patience has expired and so he’s loaded Android 1.6 onto his Samsung Q1UP UMPC, courtesy of the Android-x86 project.
Dell’s Mini 9 netbook may be a little old in the tooth these days, but its angular casing makes it a great donor machine for a netslate project. That’s just what MyDellMini forum member Rob did (to his Dell Vostro A90, the business-rebrand of the Mini 9), adding a touchscreen layer, flipping the display and relocating the power button.
NES console mods are cool, HTPCs are pretty cool, and nettops with NVIDIA Ion graphics are darned cool too, so when you put all three elements together you’ve got a recipe for something with a whole lot of cool potential. Modder drumboog has been video documenting his work transforming a NES into an Atom 330 based Blu-ray HTPC with GeForce 9400M graphics, and while it’s not quite complete yet, it’s certainly 99-percent awesome.
Video after the cut
A page of CrystalMark benchmark results may not be the most interesting image to lead with, but when you’re showing the overclock results of pushing Sony’s VAIO P not-a-netbook from its stock 1.86GHz up to 2.3GHz, then we’ll take notice. EeeUser Forum member Cerano was responsible for the modifications, and in fact got his VAIO P cranked up to 2.4GHz (though he didn’t benchmark it at that speed).
Opening up your brand new HDTV and soldering wires directly to its control board takes a certain type of devil-may-care attitude, but in doing so one new owner found he could bypass HDCP. HDCP is the often-frustrating copy-protection system that insists on a “digital handshake” between DVI/HDMI connected components; however, the InstaPort Fast HDMI Switching system in this “big brand” TV fails to re-encrypt with HDCP in-between the control board and the switcher.
Part of Nokia’s challenge to cement the N900 and Maemo is in drawing developers to the open-source platform, and to do that they’ve kicked off PUSH N900, a “unique design, hacking and modding project”. To mark the event – which will see winning proposals rewarded with an N900, funding and support to deliver on their idea – the Finns commissioned four sample projects, inspired by the ’80s and using the N900 in distinctive ways. These ended up including a 3D ViewMaster camera, digital Rolodex, 80’s radio tagger/Last.fm integration, and a Speak and Spell mashup.
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