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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.
Read MoreWe 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!
Read MoreIn 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.
Read MoreSmell 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: Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5
Read MoreThe 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: Build your own HD projector (Part 1) - concept and parts Build your own HD projector (Part 2) - LCD teardown Build your own HD projector (Part 3) - build process and mounts Build your own HD projector (Part 4) - chassis and lens Now, on to the show.
Read MoreThe 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.
Read MoreSo, 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.
Read MorePssst. 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.
Read MoreBeen 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.
Read MoreWe 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.
Read MoreTiVos 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.
Read MoreMaybe 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.
Read MoreThe 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.
Read MoreWherever 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.
Read MoreIt'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.
Read MoreThe 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.
Read MoreConsidered 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.
Read MoreLately, 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.
Read MoreA 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.
Read MoreBack 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.
Read MoreIn today's How-To, we're still pimping out our dremel tool with parts from old printers. In Part 1 we got started with the controller and covered all the basics. Today we'll get into the details and get busy with the power tools. And that, of course, is always the best part.
Read MoreReady for some hard core gadget creation? If you thought your dremel tool was handy before, in today's How-To we'll start building our own CNC machine. Aside from the geek factor, it can be handy for making things like PC boards without chemicals or maybe some little styrofoam voodoo heads of all your enemies, uh friends.Gentlemen, start your soldering irons.
Read MoreDear Ma Bell,We've been together for a long time, but we think it's time for us to take a break up. It's just... we met someone else; someone who will hook us up with free long distance. But don't worry, we'll give you a call sometime next year when we're looking for faster internet.In today's How-To, we're taking the diagonal cutters to the Ma Bell umbilical cord and hooking up our voice over IP adapter so we can use our old phone jacks. No soldering irons or caustic acid required. This time.
Read MoreYour machine is modded out. It's got plexi hard drive windows, silent fans ,and it's half refrigerator. The other appliances are starting to get jealous and it's time to even the score. In today's How-To, we're modding an innocent alarm clock to provide five fine volts of USB juice right on the nightstand. Perfect for a bed-side USB fan on those steamy summer nights, a cheeky USB lava lamp, or, erm, a USB massager. Check it out.
Read MoreBad things happen. If you've ever worried that the over caffeinated tech might spill his latte down your web server, then today's How-To will help you out. Forgetting to back up your blog (or your website) is something that isn't a big deal until you need it -- like backing up anything, really. But your blog's files and databased aren't really so simply accessible as the files on your PC, so today we're showing you how to automatically back up your blog (or website) with some freely available tools that will use a minimum amount of your precious bandwidth.
Read MoreNetwork appliances don't always offer all the firewalling features a user needs -- you know, the advanced port blocking and security procedures we'd like to keep our little home network fiefdoms secure. In today's How-To we'll show you how to build a firewall out of an old PC with a live Linux CD and some spare ethernet cards. It's the perfect use for that machine with the dead hard drive (or no hard drive at all).
Read MoreIn today's How-To we get to play with other people's toys. We upgraded a home theater to a high definition front projection system. We lay it out, set it up, drill holes, nearly die in a Texas attic, and bring home the popcorn.Our project home theater already has the essentials for taking advantage of a high definition display: a progressive scan DVD player with component video output and a hi-def DISH Network satellite receiver provide a HD video source for the projector.Screen SelectionIt may seem counter intuitive, but it's helpful to consider (but not purchase) the screen before choosing a projector. Knowing the size of screen you want in your room will determine where the projector needs to be mounted, and how bright it needs to be. If you're not sure, marking out the dimensions of the screen with some blue masking tape and checking out the view from your seating area can be helpful. Click on to read the rest of this week's How-To!
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