How To Adjust Your iPod Backlight: Here is a short film showing you how to adjust your iPod backlight, something that can even save battery life on your iPod. Adjust your iPod backlight. Click through to watch this video on videojug.com
Trying to replace your iPod battery, change the screen, or doing some modification that a MAC pro wouldn't suggest you doing yourself? Before you can start tinkering around inside this delicate piece of equipment, you're going to at least need to know how to get it open and ta ...more
Change a normal 9v battery into a life saver. If you have ever run out of juice on your phone and could really use a quick charge, then you need a USB battery. Take a look at this instructional video and learn how to create a pocket USB battery. Materials you will need for thi ...more
Check out this electronics tutorial video to learn how to open an iPod mini. Just insert the blue tool between the white plastic end-caps and metal edging. Removing the white end caps from the top and bottom of the iPod mini is necessary in order to access the iPod mini batter ...more
Check out this instructional electronics video that illustrates the simple procss of reconnecting the ribbon cable on a 4th generation iPod. Sometimes the ribbon cable that tethers both halves of the fourth generation iPod during the battery replacement process needs to be rea ...more
Just about every household gadget we own runs on 1.5 volt batteries of one size or another. Wouldn't it be great if you could reuse all of those dead AA, AAA, and D batteries after they've passed on? It turns out you can make a simple circuit called a "Joule Thief" to reanimat ...more
The Stun-Gun In this article, I'll show you how to make a small, weaponized highlighter. Before I get into how to built this device, let me warn you. This device is harmful! When used, it can cause burns and/or serious muscle spasms. The voltage is potentially deadly! DO NOT ...more
In this article, I'll show you how to make a glowing orb. The orb is a fun, round flashlight useful for lighting your path in a magical way. Consisting simply of LEDs, a tennis ball, a battery and a switch, it's a great simple project for beginners with electronics. Here's a v ...more
Around the world, X-People (yes... there are X-Women, too) are under attack from an intolerant sapiencentric ruling class. Integration without equality is a farce. Autonomy is denied outright. Human prejudice cannot abide a mutant state. Human fear, born to hate, imposes itsel ...more
Electronics seem to fail on you at the worst moments, don't they? Luckily, if your iPod freezes, there is a quick and easy fix. Check out this video and learn how to reboot your iPod on the spot and solve many issues. You Will Need • An iPod • A power adapter Step 1: Make s ...more
Learn how to unfreeze a click wheel iPod properly in simple steps. If your iPod freezes suddenly while using it, you can easily unfreeze it. Just hold the 'Menu' button and the 'Center' button on your iPod for a few seconds until the iPod turns off and a apple logo appears. No ...more
Ready to play scientist? This video will show you how to make a cool electro magnet out of a 9 V battery, a 9 V battery connector and parts from a Nokia phone charger. Use a fully charged battery for stronger magnet. Then solder the two parts together and plug in your battery. ...more
In this video, we learn how to build a portable personal heater. This is a great weekend project that is easy to make and will keep you warm during a freezing winter. You will need: two double a batteries, charger, twin double a battery charger, winding wire, and balsa wood. F ...more
This how-to video serves as a disassembly guide for MAC's 3rd generation iPod Nano, breaking it down into the pieces: display, battery, logic board, housing, cables, etc. If you're determined to do your own iPod repairs, installations, or modifications, at least follow some ad ...more
The days of trundling hoops, hopscotch and painted wooden rocking horses are long since past. The latest trend in toys? Biofeedback. Electroencephalography. A decade into the 21st century, the toy market is awash in products that incorporate functional neural sensors. One suc ...more
Whenever we make a homemade circuit, we use what are called through-hole components. Any components with long metal leads is a through-hole component. They are great for soldering to, but it's tough to fit enough through-hole resistors and capacitors into a smartphone. To get ...more
Check out this instructional electronics video that illustrates the simple process of removing the foam padding of an iPod Photo. In order to get the case to close when installing the battery you may need to remove some of the blue foam padding from the underside of the hard d ...more
Jailbreak your iOS 4.2.1, 4.2 or 4.1 mobile device with Redsn0w 0.9.6b4! One catch: If you're using an iPhone 4, 3GS (new boot ROM), iPad, iPod Touch 3g or 4g, this will be a tethered jailbreak. That is, you'll need to rejailbreak your iOS device every time your battery dies. ...more
When I was attending college, my friends had a phantom thief in their dormitory. Almost every night, a different item of food would go missing, never to be seen again. There was constant speculation as to whom the thief was and how to catch them. Security cameras were deemed t ...more
Learn how to properly charge your iPhone or iPod Touch in simple steps. Whenever you charge you iPhone let it charge until your battery is completely full. If you unplug in between that point will become the maximum capacity of the battery. Remember not empty you battery charg ...more
In this how to video, you will learn how to replace the touch glass screen digitizer on an iPod Touch. First, use a pry tool and run it along the sides of your iPod Touch. Once this is done, remove the cover. To remove the battery, run the pry tool along the edges and gently p ...more
Since the invention of the mechanical clock, enclosure of the commons, and proletarianization of labor, the alarm clock has been the bane of our existence. While not actually evil, it does represent the constant and uncompromising glare of our owners shaking a patronizing fing ...more
I love making beeps and bloops with the Arduino pitches library, but sometimes archaic 8-bit tunes just don't cut it. Whether you want your robot to terrify your enemies with a demonic synthetic voice, you just need a pocket boom box on the go, or you want to a miniature guita ...more
In this article, I'll be showing you how to make a simple yet effective static electricity generator. Basically, this device allows you to carry a constant static charge on your body and discharge it on anything grounded or of opposite polarity. The electricity generated is ar ...more
This video from Powerbook Medic teaches us how to take apart a 3rd generation iPod. First step is to use a putty knife or a flat head screwdriver to break apart the two pieces. After that remove the headphone cable and set the bottom pan aside. After this, you disconnect the h ...more
In this article, I'll show you how to create a simple yet effective way of scaring off intruders. Of course, there are methods around this approach, but it's great for office pranks and general fun. The project requires a little background knowledge in electronics and circuitr ...more
Watch this three-part series on how to assemble battery cells for your radio controlled vehicle. First, see what is needed to assemble cells and to get them glued. Second, see how to solder an entire NiMH and NiCad LiPo cell pack. Then, see how to test the packs and do some ...more
This video is on how to install a Deans connector by using basic soldering. The battery pack for your radio controlled vehicle will never be better.
Apple products can be really expensive for some of us but we can’t live without them, especially the Apple iPods. For those that want to keep their iPods healthy and up to date, it may be a good idea to know the make-up of the interior to get an idea of how you can replace o ...more
Check out this electronics tutorial video to learn how to reconnect the hard drive for a third generation iPod. Getting the hard drive re-connected to the logic board inside a 3rd generation ipod can be a little tricky to do, but watch as a technician shows you how to do it. T ...more
As some of you Mad Science readers will remember, we recently covered the separation of water into hydrogen and oxygen using electrolysis. Passing a current through water can rend it apart, but we can also recombine that oxygen and hydrogen to make electricity! This is the pri ...more
Turn a 'toy' radar gun into the real thing! Cops don't even have one like this! While this is a completely new and different design, the inspiration for this video is from an article by Ken Delahoussaye in MAKE Magazine. Just watch this video tutorial on how to hack a toy rada ...more
It's one of the most popular queries on the web, meaning the wet electronic disaster is likely a common mishap. There are many answers out there, but if you're lucky enough to have never googled it, pay attention now. You never know when you may drop your cell phone or iPod in ...more
It turns out that the popularity of soft circuit electronics has leaked out of the interwebs and into the hands of the U.S. military. Soft circuit electronics allow you to literally sew electronics circuits into fabric using flexible conductive thread instead of wire. Soft cir ...more
In this tutorial video, hosted by harrymedan, you will learn how to fix a broken or nonfunctional select button on your iPod, as well as the common causes of the select button no longer working. According to the host this problem is usually caused by the battery in the iPod it ...more
Arachnophilia and technosexuals rejoice. This whimsical, skittering robot takes only 5 minutes of tinkering. This simple toy is made possible with a bit of solder, AAA battery, copper wire and an old mobile phone's vibrating motor. Like the EvilMadScientist's Bristlebot, this ...more
Want to spice up your origami cranes? MIT's High-Low Tech Group made two electronic origami cranes that flap their wings when you squeeze their tails. Video: . If that's not cool enough, they connected them wirelessly so that when one flaps its wings, the other lights up. Vide ...more
The electric air freshener is one of those devices that seems like it could only have one possible function, but can actually be repurposed in a few different ways. If you're looking for a practical use, you can turn it into a bug killer, but it's also perfect for pranks. Wit ...more
At night, it can be pretty difficult to see what's inside drawers and cabinets, unless you have night vision or something. Sure, you can turn on the light, but sometimes you're in such a hurry that you don't have 5 seconds to walk over to the light switch and turn it on. Perh ...more
If you're an AirPods owner, you know the sound — that decrescendo of little beeps and boops means imminent "death" for your wireless earbuds. Other than that infamous chime, however, it's not overly clear how to check your AirPods, AirPods Pro, or AirPods Max power levels. Tha ...more
When the 6.1 version of iOS was released back in February, complaints of severe battery drainage for iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch users exploded onto every Apple-related forum on the Internet. Everyone was either losing a percentage every three or so minutes, or their battery ...more
If your iPhone can't last a full day without being recharged multiple times, something's wrong—but it might just be working harder than it needs to. So before you take a trip down to the Genius Bar, try some of the tricks out first to conserve your battery power throughout th ...more
Uh-mazing...London based designer team Francesca Rosella and Ryan Genz have created a dress embroidered with 24,000 LEDs. From Wired, "'We used the smallest full-color LEDs, flat like paper, andmeasuring only 2 by 2 mm,' said the designers. 'The circuits are extra-thin, flex ...more
Sometimes the best way to hide things is in plain sight. Whether you're trying to sneak some medication past security at a concert with a zero-tolerance policy, or you're just worried that maybe Omar comin', YouTuber MrGear has a clever way to put your mind at ease. In the vi ...more
There are plenty of times when we need to charge our phones but don't have access to electricity. Whether the power is out do to storms, you're camping and run out of juice, or you're in a Tom-Hanks-like Castaway situation, it's important to have a charged phone in case of an ...more
A flashlight is one of those things you rarely need, but hardly ever have when you do. The normal-sized ones are unwieldy to carry around, and the small ones that you keep in a purse or car are easy to lose. You can solve both of those problems and get the best of both worlds ...more
In the following video, I demonstrate how to create a device capable of charging the body of anyone who wears it with static electricity, allowing a powerful shock to be discharged into anything that is touched. This grants the wearer the ability to do some pretty amazing thin ...more
In early-2014, Facebook had the brilliant idea of auto-playing all of those annoying videos in your news feed that you never wanted to see in the first place. Fortunately, they realized their mistake and have provided a way to disable auto-play, which means you can now get rid ...more
Inductive charging is already a reality on popular smartphones like the Samsung Galaxy S III and Google Nexus 4, and Apple has recently published a patent that would make inductive chargers a reality for the iPhone. There are also several phones that have the capability for wi ...more
[community/members/babblin5/ Babblin5] is a tenacious tinkerer. Here he shows us HowTo get a dead battery running again. How? Well, it becomes a bit involved as he splices together a cordless drill, voltage regulator, alligator clips, a circuit board and a hand crank. What w ...more
After Apple's recent fiasco, it's now common knowledge that smartphone batteries degrade over time. But aside from causing terrible battery life, a degraded battery can also trick your phone's software into thinking the device has more juice left than it actually does. I'll e ...more
If you ride your bike at night frequently, you've probably had at least one close call with a car, pedestrian, or some other moving obstacle because of reduced visibility. Not only is it dangerous to ride at night without lights, it's illegal in a lot of places. Make sure no o ...more
If you want to get started sniffing Wi-Fi networks, you usually need to start with a wireless network adapter. But thanks to a Wi-Fi sniffing library written in Arduino and the ultra-cheap ESP8266 chip, you might not need one. For less than $10 in electronics, you can build a ...more
A deck of cards may be a magician's best way to demonstrate his or her's sleight of hand, but for the prankster, it's the perfect way to deliver a shocking 300 volts of electricity! And that's exactly what I'm going to show you how to do today. Stuart Edge used it in his "Elec ...more
The battery icon in your iPhone's status bar gives you a visual idea of how much power is left, and there's a battery percentage option you can switch to or view in the Control Center, depending on your model. But what you may not know is that there's a way to view the battery ...more
The new iOS 11 was just released by Apple, and you can install it right now. Overall, it's got some great features, but how does it fare battery-wise on your iPhone? And how can you increase daily battery life for more juice and less charging every day? No matter the iOS vers ...more
Model Airplane News Editor John Reid shows how to soldering connectors on to Lipo Batteries. Proper technique is essential not to heat damage the batteries. Watch this video tutorial and learn how to solder connectors to the batteries on an RC vehicle.
Musical boxes are best known for their kitschy designs and somewhat trivial renditions of musical masterpieces. They tend to frequent the dresser of young girls or elderly woman hanging on to their youth, and for the most part, they remain cutesy and harmless, but when feature ...more
Fire. It’s everywhere— always has been. From the Ordovician Period where the first fossil record of fire appears to the present day everyday uses of the Holocene. Today, we abundantly create flames (intentionally or unintentionally) in power plants, extractive metallurgy, i ...more
This video covers the steps for creating USB Christmas lights. Take battery powered Christmas lights and convert them to USB powered to decorate your office. Take apart the battery casing. You have to rewire this. You also need to cut open a USB cord and do some soldering.