Hackaday.com

The Bomem DA3 is a type of Fourier transform spectrometer used for measuring various spectral data and [Usagi Electric] has one. On his quest to understand it he runs down …read more

We aren’t sure why, but [Lev Chizhov] and some other researchers have found a way to make you smell things by hitting your head with ultrasound. Apparently, your sense of …read more

In our modern world full of planned obsolescence helping to fuel cycles of consumerism, the thing that really lets companies dial this up to the max is locked-down electronics and …read more

An interesting trend over the last year or two has been the emergence of modern retrocomputer PCs, recreations of classic PC hardware from back in the day taking advantage of …read more

Remember the Key Bridge collapse? With as eventful a year as 2025 has been, we wouldn’t blame anyone for forgetting that in March of 2024, container ship MV Dali plowed …read more

The BBC wanted to show everyone how a computer might be used in schools. A program aired in 1979 asks, “Will Computers Revolutionise Education?” There’s vintage hardware and an appearance …read more

We’ve probably all had a few conversations with people who hold eccentric scientific ideas, and most of the time they yield nothing more than frustration and perhaps a headache. In …read more

You know those old cliche that the younger generations have begun to cynically despise: “follow your dreams!” “You can be anything you put your mind to!” — well, perhaps they …read more

Today’s pressurized water reactors (PWRs) are marvels of nuclear fission technology that enable gigawatt-scale power stations in a very compact space. Though they are extremely safe, with only the TMI-2 …read more

One of the hardest things about owning a classic car is finding replacement parts. Especially if the car is particularly old or rare, or if the parent company is now …read more

There’s just something about an analog synthesizer. You’d think that for electronic music, digital sampling would have totally taken over by now, but that’s really not true. The world of …read more

We think of radios as audio devices, but for people who are visually impaired, it can be difficult to tell which channel you are listening to at any given time. …read more

Transcutaneous Electrical Nerve Stimulation (TENS) is one of those things that sounds like it must be woo when you first hear of it. “A trickle of current that can deal …read more

A Crookes radiometer, despite what many explanations claim, does not work because of radiation pressure. When light strikes the vanes inside the near-vacuum chamber, it heats the vanes, which then …read more

That MacOS (formerly OS X) has BSD roots is a well-known fact, with its predecessor NeXTSTEP and its XNU kernel derived from 4.3BSD. Subsequent releases of OS X/MacOS then proceeded …read more

One of our newer writers, [Tyler August], recently wrote a love letter to plasma TV technology. Sitting between the ubiquitous LCD and the vanishing CRT, the plasma TV had its …read more

We absolutely adore inspired labor-of-love tales such as this one. [Alastair] wanted to build a synth for his daughter’s third birthday in spite of having no prior hardware knowledge. It …read more

There’s more to making an oscillator than meets the eye, and [lcamtuf] is here with a good primer on the subject. It starts with the old joke that if you …read more

The history of the game Zork is a long and winding one, starting with MUDs and kin on university mainframes – where students entertained themselves in between their studies – …read more

You have that slide rule in the back of the closet. Maybe it was from your college days. Maybe it was your Dad’s. Honestly. Do you know how to use …read more