I have always wanted to enter Retro Challenge, ever since I first heard of it nearly 24 hours ago. I followed a link that took me to http://retrochallenge.net/ and I read up on what it was all about, scrutinised the rules and checked out what others were doing. I quickly came to the conclusion that […]
When I bought my Sinclair C5, it came without many parts, such as wheels, motor, batteries etc. Seeing that my Robomow robotic lawn mower had all of these, I hit upon a foolproof plan! You should see the out-take video!
Back in July 2013, someone in the office mentioned the beautiful iconic 80’s disaster that is the Sinclair C5. Inevitably someone asked what they’re worth now, and apart from the fact they cost £400 new, was dropped to £199 shortly after and then the price plummeted like a stone, I had no idea. So I […]
In posts to come I’ll go in to some details about the breadboard Z80 computer I built recently, but, in the mean time, here’s a video that Computerphile made about it Be sure to check out Computerphiles Youtube channel too!
I bought a mobile phone mount for my car several months ago, and it was one of those with the sticky blue dot on. It was fine, worked great, and simple to use. For a while. Then one day my phone flew off whilst going around a sharp corner. And again a few weeks later. […]
So, the goal of switching from Windows 8 to Linux was to get myself a usable computer. One where I can just log on and do whatever it is that I was going to do, without having to fight the OS just to do something simple. One which is intuitive to use. One where I don’t have […]
Just over a week ago, I took the plunge, and installed Ubuntu Linux on my main home computer. It’s not the kind of decision I take lightly, and I’ve probably been building up to this for some 10 years or so. But a few recent events have told me that the time is now right for me […]
A little while back, Nottingham Hackspace got the opportunity to buy a bunch of Minimus V1 AVRs at a very good price. Not being one to turn down a bargain, I bought a few of these little critters to see what they can do. On paper, they look great. USB programmable micro running an Atmel […]
Whilst clearing out my wardrobe recently, I discovered I had 40 ties. Most of which I no longer wore. Some I have never worn. And some that I wouldn’t be seen dead in. But rather than just dispose of them all in one go, I decided to give them each one last outing, and I […]
Whilst clearing out my wardrobe recently, I discovered I had 40 ties. Most of which I no longer wore. Some I have never worn. And some that I wouldn’t be seen dead in. But rather than just dispose of them all in one go, I decided to give them each one last outing, and I […]
As mentioned in a couple of other posts here, the Z88 is a great machine. It comes with 32k of RAM, although this can be expanded with plug in cartridges. An alternative, however, is to replace the internal 32k with something larger. This photo tutorial shows how you can expand the onboard memory to 512k. […]
If you’ve been reading this blog in cronological order, you’ll know about the FTDI adapter I made for the Z88. If you don’t read this in order, you’ll know about the Minimus programming I’ve been doing and what the Minimus is (note that I’ve not blogged about that yet… be patient!) Now to turn […]
I have already blogged on here about how awesome the Z88 is, and how ahead of it’s day it was. Well, being awesome in your own right doesn’t cut it these days – so you’ve got to be able to communicate and talk to things to be considered worthwhile. The biggest weapon the Z88 has […]
When there’s a wedding coming up and the bride-to-be says she would like something, it’s only fair that everything is done for her wishes to come true. And if those wishes are for pink pom-poms, well, who am I to shy away from such a task! I remember pom-poms being made when I was a […]
Back in September last year, I was fortunate enough to go to a very unique art exhibition in East London where prosthetic limbs are the canvas. Spare Parts was organised by Priscilla Sutton and timed to coincide with the Paralympics, which was being held just around the corner. Whilst I went with the intention of just looking […]
I got my Google Nexus 4 phone just over 3 weeks ago, and I love it. It is, without doubt, the best mobile I’ve ever owned, and I’ve had some really good phones before! If you want to read about how good it is, then just about every review out there will rave about it. […]
One of the great things about the Raspberry Pi is the general purpose input output (GPIO) pins. They allow it to interface with other circuits. The Arduino, however, is all about connecting with other stuff, and with analog input and PWM output, it’s better at it than the Pi. But the Pi has more processing […]
I have seen the future of computers. Yes, really I have. What would you say if I said the future would be something about the size of a pad of paper. Which runs off of 4 AA batteries, giving it about 20 hours of use or 100 days of standby. Storage is solid state with […]
A machine is a device that does something useful, right? Well, what about if the thing it does is useless? Well, here is my useless machine
When I ordered my £25 Raspberry Pi, I didn’t know what I was going to do with it, but when I heard that XBMC had been ported to run on the Pi I realized that I needed 2 Pis; one for XBMC, and the other so I could have one I didn’t know what to do with!