All posts by Utkarsh

Solution designer with Firstsource solutions. A post grad in Networks and IT Infrastructure. Technology enthusiast, blogger, webdesigner, Network security aspirant and in love with electronics and gadgets. This blog is an attempt to share what I find interesting... almost anything @Mtaram on twitter and
Gadgets

What is inside iPhone 5

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What’s inside an iPhone 5?

Luckily you don’t have to take one apart yourself to find out. The tech website iFixit has just released its annual look at the guts of Apple’s latest device, and it’s a pretty interesting read (depending on where you fall on the nerd scale).

http://i.huffpost.com/gen/782084/thumbs/s-IPHONE5IFIXITTEARDOWN620-large.jpgDespite Apple usually being reluctant to make its products easily repairable at the expense of design quality, iFixit’s experts say the new phone is not as obtuse as previous versions.

It says the case is easier to open, the battery is not as difficult to replace and the Home button is supported in a metal case which should stop it wearing out as often.

The phone also has a pop-out ear speaker, a 28nm Qualcomm MFM9615 chip to handle its LTE connectivity, and a light metal case.

Gadgets

Galaxy S3 vs iPhone 5

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Head-to-head ... the Samsung Galaxy SIII, left, and Apple's iPhone 5, right.

Even with a bigger screen, Apple’s iPhone 5 struggles to match Samsung’s Galaxy S III, at least on paper.

Apple’s new iPhone 5 is so incredibly thin and light that it even puts the waif-like Galaxy S III to shame. Even so, Apple lovers hoping to make up ground on Samsung’s 4.8-inch Android champion are likely to be underwhelmed by the iPhone 5’s extra screen real estate.

The iPhone 5’s larger, four-inch screen is only taller, not wider, than the iPhone 4 and 4S, so it doesn’t make what’s on the screen any larger (unless you turn it sideways, to watch a movie, for example). Its improved colours and whiter whites still look better than the slightly overblown colours on the Galaxy S III.

Read more here
How Tos

Torrents blocked? No more!

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Recently all the major torrent download sites have been blocked. This started off with Reliance blocking the torrents and now it seems all the major ISP have blocked the torrents sites. Apart from torrent sites major video sharing sites have been blocked citing piracy as the major reason, I guess these people forgot the way Kolaveri Di raised to international fame in a couple of days.

image

However where there is a blockade there is a way. First of all lets understand how torrents work.

There is this small torrent file that contains the information about the main file(s) and who all have that file on the internet. The ISPs have blocked the access to the sites that host these torrents not the actual content.

The actual content is still stored on computers of users like us, so once we get hold of the torrent file there is no stopping us.

Following is a sure shot method of accessing the torrent download websites to download torrent, and once you have the torrent file then there is no stopping the download as it runs on the P2P network and the ISP have no control over it.

http://ultrasurf.us/images/closed-button-300.gif

Download ultrasurf from the above link.

Unzip the files.

Run u.exe.

It will show up as a small yellow lock on the right bottom corner and show up a pop up as shown in the picture.

image image

Once the connectivity is established and there is a green light you are ready to go.

This program launches Internet explorer by default with the proxy settings used by the program.

I recommend using the same IE window and head over to your favorite torrent site.

Download the torrent file.

Fire up the torrent client of your choice and do the rest.

The torrents would be downloading fine. Remember the ISP blocked access to the torrent file not the actual content.

Do let us know of any other ways that you are using.

How Tos

Control Laptop from Android

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There is always a time when you have a party going on and you have a huge list of songs playing and all of a sudden a unknown unwanted track plays up. Now you have to go look for your laptop to skip the track.

How about you just pull out your android phone out of your pocket. Unlock it and skip the song with just a tap and keep partying without going to look for you machine.

Unified remote does just that.

It is based on a client server model, where the machine runs the server and the android phone runs the client.

It can connect over WIFI as well as bluetooth.

Install the application on the phone.

Install the server on the computer.

And connect.

After that you can select the type of remote you want from the plethora of options available.

I prefer the media control one.

 

 

How Tos

Android as Bluetooth Keyboard for PS3

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I’m sure that all those who own a PS3 have sometime or the other tried to browse the internet on the PS3. The browser is a pain and specially when you have to login to sited using the on screen keyboard and type by the six axis controller.

There is a easy way out if you own an android phone. The following steps mention how to get this done.

I have a Xperia Neo V

This needs a rooted phone, so please google the method to root your phone and proceed with this.

Start PS3

Goto Accesories setting

Pair a New device and Pair it with your android phone.

Now move to the phone, goto Google Play store and download Blueputdroid

Run the application

If all goes well it will show up PS3 with its MAC address on the screen.

Tap it to connect. The symbol on the right turns blue when active.

Once connected it gives options of several types of layouts.

I am most comfortable with the track pad on the top and keyboard in the lower half.

It also has the option for six axis controller.

Now it is all set.

Enjoy typing on the PS3 with your android phone.

General

Entertainment Setup Updated

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I had an entertainment setup and of late I have bought some more gadgets to make it better. The below snapshot has the overview of how it has been wired up.

Currently I have a 22 inch HD TV

5.1 Speakers with DVD player

PS3

Two notebooks Alienware M11x and Dell XPS M1210

Two Android phones Galaxy 3 and Xperia Neo V

A Samsung Tablet

Seagate Goflex Home NAS, connected to wifi router over LAN and WD My Book Essentials 1 TB plugged into the USB port of the NAS dock.

The speakers are connected to the PS3 via optical cable for Dolby 5.1 and to the TV for 2 channel Aux input.

The PS3 is connected to the TV via HDMI and TV set top box is connected to the video in on the TV.

The NAS can natively download torrents and also runs a media server. The torrents can be controlled remotely via a SSH tunnel between my Android phone and the NAS. This feature is still buggy and I would need to get a new router to get this fixed.

My XPS runs PS3 media server and can stream all the content on the XPS. That makes two media server in total.

When needed I plug in my M11x to the TV and play the games on the TV via a wireless Keyboard and mouse.

This has been my setup, I might have missed out on some details, do let me know what do you think about this.

 

Gadgets

Seagate Goflex Home Enable Torrents

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I had plans to buy a NAS for my storage and media server requirement. I had zeroed in on Iomega Cloud edition but some how I ended up buying Seagate Goflex home.

To my disappointment Goflex Home does not have support for downloading torrents natively as of firmware update 2.6.xx. Firmware 2.5.3 had this built in.

After some research I found that there is a way to enable the torrents on Goflex Home. Although it does keep giving me  error in the Seagate control panel but the torrent client keeps working normally.

Following is the method to get this done.

SSH into the NAS. Use a terminal on Mac OS X or Linux. If you are on Windows you can use putty.

$ ssh [username]_hipserv2_seagateplug_[XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX]@[NAS_IP_Address]

Where
[username] – User account on the Seagate GoFlex Home NAS
[XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX] – Product key. You can get it from “About GoFlex Home” on the main application in left bottom corner.
[NAS_IP_Address] – IP address of the Seagate GoFlex Home NAS

– After logged in gain root access.

$ sudo -E -s

– Edit the features.conf file to enable transmission client. Change “supportstransmission=0″ to “supportstransmission=1″. Save the file and exit.

$ vi /etc/features.conf

Post this we need to install the torrent client on the NAS.

The guide is available at the wiki

Once installed I did the following things to make sure that it works as I wanted it to.

I made the transmission folder in /home because the one I made on the hard drive failed to load settings post restart.

I specified the download location as /home/0common/Downloads.

I disabled access patrol.

I updated the firewall rules.

 

 

 

 

 

After going through all this I am thinking that I should have bought the Iomega one. And also after comparison I have found that the Iomega has more RAM and would have had saved me all the hassles.

 

 

Arduino

Verbalizer – Google voice search with Arduino

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The Verbalizer connects wirelessly to a personal computer via Bluetooth. When you trigger it, it opens google.com in a new tab and activates Voice Search. An audio notification is played, signaling when google is ready for your queryYou speak into the mic, and the query starts. Breakfast released all the plans and firmware appropriately, and left some I/O pins open for those who want to play with it.

Read here

Arduino, General

LASER scanners for vector projection

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I made a LASER projector with DC motors. This can display only circular forms. I wanted to make one that can display vector graphics. There is an instructable to make these from speakers. I am also trying that but my setup has a lot of distortion.

In this alternative I have used the read head of the CD ROMs to move the mirrors and bounce the LASERS to make figures

What you need

Junk CD drives, screw driver star head, small round mirrors, glue and lot of patience.

You need to open the CD drives part by part till you reach the actual lens mechanism.

cd drive

What we need is a the actual read head with all the mechanism built around it.

lens mechanism

This is actually a set of two coils in between two very powerful magnets and it is used to focus the laser and read the CD. One of the coils moves the lens up and down and the other coil moves it left and right.

My concept was as follows.

Apply a constant voltage to push up the lens. Attach a mirror to it. and use the varying High, Low voltage at both ends to move the mirror left and right.

Following are the pictures that I have taken for my setup.

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2012-02-05 22.46.51 2012-02-05 23.40.45

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The pictures show different views of the lens mechanisms. Wires have been soldered to the coil ends for the ease of connecting it to the microcontroller board. Mirrors have been glued on the lens and the mirror moves with the lens. Following is the video that shows these in action.

Following pictures have been taken after the setup was done and the microcontroller was programmed to move the mirrors.

I am able to draw something but one of the heads seems to be having some issues as it is creating a lot of distortion.

2012-02-06 00.21.08  2012-02-06 00.21.37

2012-02-06 00.12.43  2012-02-06 00.15.23

2012-02-06 00.55.21  2012-02-06 00.56.44

The pictures show the setup on a cardboard box wit the LASER. A small paper screen has been setup to have a look at the drawing. I was successful in drawing a horizontal and vertical lines. Slanted lines have some distortion and a lot more distortion is noticed when drawing characters.

I will be working on a more stable version and will post all the updates when it is done.

Arduino

Arduino–breadboard hookup

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I have been facing lot of issues with so many hookup wires running between the breadboard and the controller board. A small shake at times dislodges the cables and things stop to work. This inspired me to make hookup cables which do not get dislodged with small shakes and movements.

This is what it looks like

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This is a nice rugged setup when a lot of cables need to run between the arduino and the breadboard.

I made these because I could not find male to male jumper with headers for cheap. This works good for me and was made from the spares that I had lying around.

These can be made in a couple of minutes.

Parts needed are: ribbon cable, male headers, solder wire and soldering iron.

2012-02-06 15.39.15

Cut out desired length of ribbon cable in group of 6. Arduino has output in group of six. This will work for any other board too just the number of wires that are to be kept together will be different.

Clip the make header pins in group of 6 and solder to each end.

And you are good to go.

To make the soldered ends more secure i taped the solder joints with foam tape from both ends. This way the solder points dont hurt the fingers and also the joints are kept intact and are insulated too.

2012-02-06 15.40.21 2012-02-06 15.43.23