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Magazine’s aim: Demystify how-to in today’s world

Magazine’s aim: Demystify how-to in today’s world

20096354 747892118C T Front page! You’ve driven 50 miles into the deep woods, and snowy weather is expected within 10 hours. Your cell phone is out of range and out of juice. And “someone” left the parking lights on, so the car battery is dead, too. If you were MacGyver, or a Make magazine subscriber, you might think to crush a few aspirin from the first aid kit into the battery, add some water, wait awhile, maybe pray, then crank the engine and hope it works. Link.

Propeller Clock

Propeller Clock

Mclock02 S Another POV project- this one is neat clock. A motor spins the “propeller”, and a small microprocessor keeps track of time and changes the pattern on seven LEDs with exact timing to simulate a 7 by 30 array of LEDs. It is an illusion, but it works nicely. Link.

Linux Laptop-HOWTO

Linux Laptop-HOWTO

Images-50 An old how-to, but still useful- Laptops are different from desktops/towers. They use certain hardware such as PCMCIA cards, infrared ports, batteries, docking stations. Often their hardware is more limited (e.g. disk space, CPU speed), though the performance gap is becoming smaller. In many instances, laptops can become a desktop replacement. Hardware support for Linux (and other operating systems) on laptops is sometimes more limited (e.g. graphic chips, internal modems). Laptops often use specialized hardware, hence finding a driver can be more difficult. Link.