• Augmented Xylophone
[Ania's] been working on extending a xylophone in a project called Multixylophoniomnibus. She’s fitted a piezo sensor on the bottom of each xylophone key, interfacing it with an Arduino. When when a mallet hits a key the corresponding box augments the sound in one of several ways. It looks like she’s prototyped a box that [...]

• ArduiNIX: Nixie shield for Arduino
Flock of Butterflies has just published their third post in a series about the ArduiNIX, an Arduino shield that drives Nixie tubes.We’ve featured Nixie tube projects such as a single tube clock, free-formed Nixie circuits, and tubes in a bottle. Now the hurdle of handling high voltage tubes while protecting low voltage logic circuitry has [...]

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• We’ll take the fries.
We’ve all been there; hardest decision we’ve ever had to make. College and debt or freedom but no career? Start a family or live out alone? The number 2 with a small shake or side of fries?!
[Leon] sent in his random number generator, oddly enough not to just generate a number, but help us through [...]

• Easy dial telephone
[Taufeeq's] Grandmother needed to be able to call her family members but due to ailing eyesight and memory this was a difficult task. He decided to help her with this by building a telephone that will auto-dial a number at the push of a button. [Taufeeq] built a case to hang on the wall which [...]

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• Another mini KeepOn?
[Eustice Scrubb] has posted some videos and pictures of a robotic “eye stalk” that he’s building. It looks like the final version is using 3 servos in an arrangement like tendons through a slinky jr. The ping-pong ball on the top has a BlinkM inside it. You can see a video after the break that [...]

• Name that thing
[Alan] over at HackedGadgets.com has been doing a “Name the Thing” contest where he occasionally posts an image and people try to figure out what it is. We’ve seen similar posts on some other web sites too. We usually don’t post them here because they’re not only not a hack, they’re usually not even projects. This one, [...]

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So I’ve been sick for the passed couple of days. It has been nothing serious really. I’ve been feeling lethargic, a bit feverish (at times), runny nose, a bit of phlegm, and a cough, which was minimal. It turns out though that I had the swine flu. This has been the easiest flu to deal with that I have ever encountered in my entire life…I caught it because idiots at school like to go to class while sick and cough on each other. News stations give this flu way too much attention. It’s similar to any normal flu that you would catch too. With that said, don’t go to school if you have swine flu, even if you have a fetish that pertains to coughing on people. K thanks.

• Time-lapse courtesy of Arduino
[Ross] put together a small package for use with time-lapse photography. The Nikon camera he’s using can snap a picture when it receives an IR command. [Ross'] solution connects an IR LED to an Arduino to generate this signal. The delay between frames is set with a potentiometer that is read in through the ADC. [...]

• Processor built with Transistor-Transistor Logic
[Donn] wanted know exactly what is going on inside of a processor so naturally he built a CPU out of TTL components. He had previously built a couple of versions of a computer based on the Z80 processor. Using the troubleshooting skills he learned and a second-hand textbook, he set to work using 74LS series [...]

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• Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala
Today is the official release of the latest version of Ubuntu, the most popular Linux-based operating system. Someone mentioned that there had been a new release of the Windows OS recently and if you’re thinking of going with that one, we feel you should a least give Ubuntu a try. Now in its 11th official [...]

• Linux iPhone sync draws near
[Emuboy] lets us know about some software advances that will make iPhone and iPod Touch syncing possible under Linux. Apple made big changes to how the iPhone syncs compared to legacy iPods. Locking out all communications other than through iTunes was surely part of their motivation. This has left Linux users out in the cold [...]

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The requirement for the contest that I mentioned earlier is now only 10 posts. That’s very, very easy to do.

Check out this post Here for details.

• Upgraded Atari 1024STf
[Gerritt] wanted to give his crippled Atari 1024 STf a new purpose in life. He cracked it open and set to work filling it with some modern components. The keyboard from the nearly 25-year-old dinosaur doesn’t have all the keys we’re used to, nor did they all work, so he replaced the original with a [...]

• Xerox ink will print circuits
Xerox has announced a breakthrough in printable circuits. They’ve developed a conductive ink called “silver bullet” that can be printed on many different types of substrate to create circuits. The key part of the new ink is its lower melting point. Plastic film substrate melts at 150 degrees Celsius but the ink is liquid [...]

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That’s right! You can earn a 1-year for one of the best malware protection suites out there! Here’s more info–

We will be holding a contest for Kaspersky Internet Security 2010 1-Year licenses!

Please note that this giveaway was sponsored by A Blog for Geeks. It’s a cool website. Check it out!

It fairs well! I meant to post the link to this, but I wrote a review on my ASUS EeePC 1005HA-PU1X-BK with my thoughts on it. I am overall satisfied. So..how about that RAM upgrade though? There has been virtually no difference in performance. I say “virtually” because my scores will have raised by a point or two on benchmarking software, which isn’t really too obvious at all. This is to be expected though, as there was never a big need to upgrade initially. It is comforting though that the extra ram is there.

I haven’t been playing with my tablet lately. Yes, I know…I’ve been slacking! I haven’t even explored all of the features that it has yet. In my defense though…at least I wrote a couple of scripts for some upcoming animations I’m planning to do. We’ll see how things go!