On Wed, Jul 13, 2011 at 9:44 AM, Levi Pearson <[email protected]> wrote:
> Heh, the keyword for open source hardware is "arduino", because it seems to > have completely taken over the "I want to make a smart gadget but I'm not an > EE" space. No one makes stuff that's just a USB hub or card reader because > those are a dime a dozen, as you say, and you couldn't make your own > anywhere near as cheap. I've seen lots of cards soldered to Arduinos, > though, so apparently it's not very difficult to read from them. > Even though I can't build a usb hub or card-reader cheaper, I could make my device smaller: http://hphotos-snc6.fbcdn.net/278601_10150247408205502_723670501_7254858_3420305_o.jpg I've buying buying and ripping apart various usb hubs, card readers, and sata-usb adapters in order to find the smallest and easiest to reverse engineer. If I could get a case designed for it, it would be fine to just order the parts, rip them apart, and reassemble them, but that's not a long term solution since most of these companies are little chinese shops that shoot up, produce 10,000 units, and go out of business. I guess it's putting the cart before the horse a little bit, but reducing the size of MediaBox from 5 inches to 3 inches and knowing that I can get it down to an inch and a half with just my bare hands and a soldering iron is really motivating. AJ ONeal /* PLUG: http://plug.org, #utah on irc.freenode.net Unsubscribe: http://plug.org/mailman/options/plug Don't fear the penguin. */
