While there are some pre-built voice changers out there for defenders of the Empire, this solution is both compact and low cost. With only a handful of parts – a Teensy 3.2, Prop Shield Board, small speakers, a microphone, and a battery – this solution can fit entirely in a helmet.
Christoph put together a soft power button with sense output to power up a Teensy and allow the application to turn itself off the power when necessary.
The project started with list of desired features including: one button to enable power to a circuit, keep the power on as needed, sense the output so that the microcontroller can sense the power button’s state and turn itself off when told to do so, use a single LiFePO4 battery, and use no specialized parts. Christoph was able to make this happen using a Teensy 3.6, a 5V step up/down regulator, a PCB he designed for the pushbutton, and a few passive parts.
Code for the project can be found on this Hackaday.io project page.
Jarkko Lempiainen has improved his Arduino Music Player to play MOD, S3M, XM, and IT music files
Originally built on a Teensy 3.1, the player has been upgraded to a Teensy 3.6 to take advantage of improved performance and increased memory. It features 8 channels that can be individually controllers and supports various effects such as vibrato and arpeggio.
Shawn McCombs added IR remote capabilities to his laptop so that he could control his YouTube playlist from the comfort of his bed.
Some older laptops don’t have IR sensors or remote control capability, but Shawn worked around that by using a Teensy, and IR sensor, and the IRremote library. This project allows you to take a remote and reprogram the buttons to control your laptop.
This controller uses a Raspberry Pi running RetroPi to run the game ROMs and a Teensy 3.2 to act as a game controller using a modified version of the USB Joystick code. The controller also features an HMDI port to plug into your TV as well as 2 USB ports in case you want to plug in your own arcade controller rather than use the 2 that are built-in.
Lili put together a great Instructable on the project that details how to build your own and also provide the code for the project.
Dave retrofitted a couple of Wii Nunchuks into custom controllers for Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (CS:GO).
Dave was already working on a project using two Wii Nunchuks for a custom controller when he came across a Reddit post about using a Wii Nunchuck to aim when playing CS:GO. He had a breadboard on his desk with a Teensy-LC, some Nintendo Extension CTRL (NXC) breakout boards he developed, and some Wii Nunchuks wired up. After a bit of programming he was up and running playing CS:GO with his new controllers.
Jesse M put together a MIDI to DMX controller to provide an simple way to control a variety of lights with any software or hardware that can transmit MIDI.
This low cost, easy to build MIDI2DMX board makes it easy to sequence lights for live music performances. Jesse developed the board after discovering it was difficult to find good, well supported, inexpensive DMX controllers. The Teensy is programmed to be a USB MIDI device so it will show up in any MIDI capable software.
Ishkabbible (forum user) is part of a team of scientists is building a camera simulator that’s being used to validate commands that will be sent to the cameras on the OSIRIS-REx spacecraft.
The OSIRIS-REx spacecraft is traveling to Bennu, and asteroid that has a relatively high probability of hitting impacting the Earth in the 22nd century. The mission seeks to sample and study different aspects of the asteroid. The team is working on the OSIRIS-REx Camera Suite (OSCAMS), one of the five sets of instruments that will be used to explore Bennu. A Teensy 3.2 replaced an underpowered PIC processor in the camera simulator and is simulating the mechanical portion of the cameras.
More information on the mission can be found here.
Frank Adams used a Teensy to turn an old laptop into a server crash cart.
A popular tool in many server farms, a KVM (Keyboard, Video display, Mouse) or “crash cart” is a diagnostic tool you can wheel up and plug into a crashed rack mount server to figure out what went wrong. Frank converted an old, broken laptop into a KVM by replacing the motherboard with a Teensy and a video converter card.
Ben Krasnow of Applied Science reverse engineered an electron microscope to add image capture using a Teensy-LC.
The image capture system allows Ben to connect a computer to the electron microscope and capture images directly.
He started with analog video signal that the SEM (scanning electron microscope) is outputting and digitized it using a Teensy-LC to send the digital values over USB to the computer. On the computer a Processing.org script displays the image in real time and optionally saves the frames.
The microscope doesn’t have a port to capture an analog video signal, so by probing around on the circuit board along with the schematic, Ben was able to find a signal that would work.
He used opamps to translate the -12V to 12V signal to a zero to 3.3V signal, and also extract the video sync pulse. After searching around around he found that using the programmable delay block (PDB) is recommended for projects like this. This seemed like the way to go until it was discovered that he had a Teensy-LC on the shelf which doesn’t have a PDB. When he started coding he had a challenge on his hands to made the signal processing code work without the PDB. He ended up using interrupts, which proved to be challenging. Interrupts can’t be trusted for accurate timing because there could be an undetermined delay when the interrupt fires leading to variable timing. Playing with interrupt priorities and writing the code as efficiently as he could he was able to get consistent timing for 142 kHz sampling.
It’s well worth the time to watch the full YouTube video. Ben does a great job explaining how he accomplished this project. Ben has a link to his source code in the video’s description.
