Standard PC components mounted to a $20 rack-mount shelf. This is a project from about 3 years ago, when anything “Rackmount” was even more expensive than it is today (not that Rack PC’s are all that cheap now…). With a system board that has on-board Ethernet, and 1U power supply from ebay, this could easily be a $20 or $50 1U setup as well. Thanks Brian! Link.
Peter Kirn has a great overview of how Chris O’Shea is going open source with his experiments in building tangible interfaces — interactive tables on which moving physical objects (like blocks) create visuals and sound. One obstacle in this technology has been people haven’t been able to refine the techniques; they just create bare-bones proof-of-concept but haven’t been able to build on others’ work. This is really encouraging. Link.
Tom’s Hardware takes a look at the build-it-yourseld laptop systems. If you like building your own PC, this might appeal to you. It seems like it will always be a little more expensive, but you’ll get exactly what you want. The cool part is in the end you get to put it all together yourself, the article also includes a video. Thanks Spyder. Link.
This will likely come in handy for someone- incompetech,com has PDFs you can print out in just about all the graph paper styles one may need- Metric, Multi-Width, Asymmetric, Dots, Iso-Dots, Hexagonal, Hex Dot, and Celtic Knot. Neato. Link.
At Obtainium.net, you can get an old refrigerator (for example), get rid of one, or discuss what kind of art you can make with one. Many beautiful Burning Man projects have been sourced through this site, but it’s open to people of all faiths. Link.
Finally, all those OmniSky, PointCast, COMDEX and piles of other shirts in that bottom drawer can be used to make a huge quilt. I just gave a bunch of shirts, but I think I have enough to make a quilt. And here’s a