Engadget

How-To: Automatically back up your computer

by Will O'Brien posted Mar 21st 2007 at 5:51PM

We've seen plenty of crazy ways to keep your precious data safe. Some people burn a few tons of DVDs, others make a montly habit of swapping hard drives into a safe location. In today's How-To we'll show you how to automatically keep your data backed up from your computer with ssh and rsync. Feel that? That's our warm comfy safe-data blankie. Check it out.

Continue reading How-To: Automatically back up your computer

How-To: Make your own MP3 player

by Will O'Brien posted Dec 19th 2006 at 6:43PM

We got a whiff of MAKE's Daisy a while back, but now we've finally managed to get our hands on one of these open source MP3 player kits. Today we'll whip out our soldering iron and show you how things shake out. The kit isn't dirt cheap at $115 each, but it's completely open source and flexible - making it ideal for a SunDIY afternoon (har), or for that soldering-iron-weilding open source fanatic in your life. Read on!

Continue reading How-To: Make your own MP3 player

How-To: HD projector wrap up and review (aka Part 7)

by Will O'Brien posted Dec 13th 2006 at 6:34PM

In our latest series of How-Tos(see: parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6), we built our own HD LCD Projector. Once the saw dust settled, we set it up in our home theater, cabled things up and hit the couch for a while. Now that we've spent some quality time breaking it in, it's time for us to wrap it up and give you guys the low-down on how well it actually works.

Continue reading How-To: HD projector wrap up and review (aka Part 7)

How-To: Build your own HD projector (Part 6)

by Will O'Brien posted Dec 6th 2006 at 10:13AM

Smell that? Is it the insulation burning off those wires? Nope, it's the sweet smell of success. Today we're wrapping up our series on building your own HD projector. We've got to wind up a few construction details, some electronics hacking and then we'll fire up our new photon cannon and check out the results. Better dig in, this is gonna take a while. See also:

Continue reading How-To: Build your own HD projector (Part 6)

How-To: Build your own HD projector (Part 5)

by Will O'Brien posted Nov 21st 2006 at 8:13PM

The neverending How-Tooo... This time we're back with friggin laser beams. We're still building our HD projector. Today we'll nearly finish up mounting all the components. We're almost done, soon we'll have our HD projector running, plenty of screen shots, and some sweet tweaks of our own. Oh, and if you need to catch up, check out:

Now, on to the show.

Continue reading How-To: Build your own HD projector (Part 5)

How-To: Build your own HD projector (Part 4)

by Will O'Brien posted Nov 13th 2006 at 3:11PM

The buzz of powertools and the smell of sawdust is rising as we get to work on making our own HD projector. We went shopping in part 1, LCD gutting in part 2, and discussed design considerations in part 3. In today's How-To we're finally building the housing for our projector, also known as the fun part.

Continue reading How-To: Build your own HD projector (Part 4)

How-To: Build your own HD projector (Part 3)

by Will O'Brien posted Nov 1st 2006 at 5:03PM

So, in case you haven't noticed, we're building our own LCD projector! In part one we specced out what we needed and got together some optics. In part two we really tore into our 19-inch Samsung monitor. Today we take a dive into the most difficult part of the projector: designing it to be built. It's easy to talk about something when you're just putting it down on paper. But now it's time to put it together and build it. It's crunch time. Jump into today's how-to; we'll show you how we're going to pull it off and the details that have to be considered.

Continue reading How-To: Build your own HD projector (Part 3)

How-To: Build your own HD projector (Part 2)

by Will O'Brien posted Oct 30th 2006 at 6:30PM

Pssst. Yeah, you. Wanna learn how to build your own digital projector? Last time we started building our own DIY HD projector. Today we're voiding the warranty and stripping down our 19-inch Samsung display. Next time we'll start preparing the LCD's new living quarters -- that is if we don't end up with a $340 door stop after today.

Continue reading How-To: Build your own HD projector (Part 2)

How-To: Build your own HD projector (Part 1)

by Will O'Brien posted Oct 17th 2006 at 4:05PM

Been eyeballing those sweet new high definition projectors? So have we. We're not going to feel guilty for it either, we know what we like. But if your wallet is a little light from your last Engadget inspired shopping session you might dig our how-to latest project. In Today's how-to, we'll start taking a look at building your own HD projector... from an LCD Monitor. This isn't one to be missed.

Continue reading How-To: Build your own HD projector (Part 1)

How-To: Make a simple sound mixer

by Will O'Brien posted Sep 20th 2006 at 2:24AM

We like using a few computers at the same time -- big surprise, right? Ubuntu box here, Vista box there, Leopard box, well, somewhere; but unless the speakers have multiple audio inputs, it's a bit difficult to get audio from our everything in our stack of machines hooked up. Today's How-To involved a late night parts run, some Bawls, and some true and proper self humiliation.

Continue reading How-To: Make a simple sound mixer

How-To: Serve video to your TiVo

by Will O'Brien posted Sep 12th 2006 at 4:57PM

TiVos have been hacked on and modified by dedicated hardware enthusiasts ever since they first showed up on the scene in the late 90s. Video streams can be pulled off of them and re-inserted by hand, but previously that was a rather painful process -- and playing non-TiVo video was even more painful. In today's How-To, we'll show you how to serve up your archived video to your TiVo with a click of your remote.

Continue reading How-To: Serve video to your TiVo

How-To: Make a component video switch

by Will O'Brien posted Sep 5th 2006 at 7:15PM

Maybe you've got a few HD devices around and only one component video input on your HDTV. We've even got component out on our dear old laserdisc player. So we were rooting around in our box of parts and realized that we could make our own component video switch. HDTV switches are ungodly expensive, but KVM have gotten dirt cheap; in today's How-to we'll show you how to turn one into a component video switch.

Continue reading How-To: Make a component video switch

How-To: Make a custom projector screen

by Will O'Brien posted Aug 29th 2006 at 7:09PM

The quest to build a great home theater is one of our recurring themes for Engadget's How-To Tuesdays. And as anyone home theater buff will tell you, any HDTV worth its weight in salt will present its viewer with a 16:9 (1.78:1) aspect ratio display, or in some cases, project a 1.8:1 ratio. For todays How-To, though, we're building one of the holy grails of the home theater: a 2.35:1 widescreen. Yep, that's movie theater widescreen, alright.

Continue reading How-To: Make a custom projector screen

How-To: Run your own network wiring

by Will O'Brien posted Aug 22nd 2006 at 9:44PM

Wherever you call home, it probably didn't come wired up for that most precious of home utilities: internet access. Sometimes wireless networking can only take you so far. Guerrilla network wiring might sound a little strong, but sometimes it ends up feeling like an episode of MacGyver, without the bombs. (Unless you count flaming laptops.) In today's How-To, we'll show you how to make your own cables and teach you a few tricks for getting them where you need 'em most around the house.

Continue reading How-To: Run your own network wiring

How-To: Revive your TiVo

by Will O'Brien posted Aug 15th 2006 at 2:39PM

It's no secret: we love our DirecTiVo. But last week a power outage mysteriously took out one of our poor, beloved time shifting friends. After the carnage, the poor critter powered up and displayed the Green Screen of Death. In today's How-To we'll grab some junk out of the closet and rebuild our TiVo -- maybe, just maybe this could help if you too have a dead or dying TiVo in your home.

Continue reading How-To: Revive your TiVo

How-To: Mod your espresso machine

by Will O'Brien posted Aug 8th 2006 at 2:44PM

The quest for caffeine leads many a geek down the road to espresso, as we know all too well. We haven't gotten around to turning a MacBook into an espresso machine... yet, but we just can't resist modifying our stuff. Today's How-To is a bit along the lines of Tim Taylor, but it's all about the espresso.

Continue reading How-To: Mod your espresso machine

How-To: Measure your bandwidth with SNMP

by Will O'Brien posted Aug 1st 2006 at 8:54PM

Considered upgrading your DSL/Cable modem connection lately? Been wondering just how much of that high speed Internet connection you've been using? (Or if one of your kids or housemates is eating up all the bandwidth with BitTorrent again.) Today we'll show you how to use some handy free tools to keep an eye on your precious bandwidth. Hey, it just might save you from having to bleach your eyes if you walk in after Bob's download finishes.

Continue reading How-To: Measure your bandwidth with SNMP

How-To: Network your UPS

by Will O'Brien posted Jul 25th 2006 at 7:33PM

Lately, the power grid appears to have gone to hell. An Uninterruptible Power Supply(UPS) just isn't an optional piece of equipment anymore -- it's not for nothing that very decent UPS has a computer interface port. If your computer is connected to the port, and the software is set up, the UPS can tell your computer to safely shut down before the battery runs out.

Got a couple of machines sharing a UPS? In today's How-To, we'll show you how to use your network to shut down all of the computers plugged into it and keep your precious data safe.

Continue reading How-To: Network your UPS

How-To: Dial in your surround sound

by Will O'Brien posted Jul 19th 2006 at 12:19AM

A while back we dug into setting up a front projection system for that oh so sweet movie experience without the extra sticky floors. Today we're digging into the other side of the electromagnetic spectrum.

So you trekked over to your favorite electronics wonder barn and picked up a receiver, a bunch of speakers, and several tons of speaker wire. In an angry Hulk moment, you pulled the entertainment center away from the wall, hooked it all up, arranged your speakers, and then also your furniture. A few times, in fact. You popped in the most powerful sounding movie you could think of (don't tell us, T2?) and crashed on your couch in exhaustion. You've got surround sound.

In today's How-To we'll show you how to dial in your audio to help get the most out of your monster (or not so monster) sound system.

Continue reading How-To: Dial in your surround sound

How-To: Build your own CNC machine (Part 3)

by Will O'Brien posted Jul 11th 2006 at 9:45PM

Back in Part 1, we introduced the basics and started building the electronics. In Part 2, we finished up the controller and started building our machine. Today we complete our unholy marriage of cutting boards and dot matrix printers in Part 3 of How-To: Build your own CNC machine. Good luck.

Continue reading How-To: Build your own CNC machine (Part 3)

Resources

Sections