Justblairs Audio and Electronic's Pages

The O2 Joggler (A rebranded OpenPeak device) is out of the box a fairly mediocre device.  However when it started selling at a £50 price mark quite a few hackers got interested in the capabilities of the Linux driven unit.   Now there are a number of software options available to Joggler that take it from mid table obscurity to being a top performer. 

I have already investigated improving the cooling on the Joggler and replaced the standard cooling system with something more substantial.  I have also been using and improving the Squeezeplay software ported over by Tarkan. 

All in all my Joggler is providing excellent value as a touchscreen media player on my headphone rig… But I had a niggle or two left to solve… Here is the problem, a standard Joggler has one side mounted USB port, and that is awkward and limiting in equal measure.  Time for change!

I like this hack, mostly because the builder took a very pragmatic approach to achieving his goal.  The RFID (Radio Frequency ID) reader used s designed to work on a serial port. 

Rather than build a circuit from the ground up to get this working on a USB port, a USB to serial adaptor was used instead. 

The end result is rough and ready, but think how much work and money was saved by using a cheap adaptor. 

Not only that but an un-needed MAX 213 was salvaged for the parts bin.  OK these can be ordered on Maxims sample program, but parts bins always need that extra piece.

Read more at….Elektronika.ba - Lazy man's USB RFID reader

Josef Prusa has published a short article on a recent hack that he has done to a Netbook battery.  He added a USB socket to the battery to allow him to charge devices such as i-phones independently of the PC.  His Acer Wind in fact is surplus to requirements these days so this is an interesting way to recycle the old parts.

Be warned however, you can’t just wire up the USB socket to the batteries, notebook batteries output 12v or more. 

The World Wide Web has made the sharing of information easier, more convenient and more rapid than ever before.  It’s not without it’s flaws though the main one being just the huge wealth of sites to peruse, remember and revisit.  It makes it easy for a product to go astray and last week I discovered such a product.