Hackaday Links: February 1, 2026

For many readers, more snow is the last thing they want to see right now…but what if it comes in the form of an online simulator in the style of an old DOS game? Created by [Potch], it works like one of those “falling sand” simulators, with sliders that let you control various elements of the wintry action. For more a immersive experience, open the window and let some cold air in while you play.

If those old school graphics have you yearning for a simpler time, then you’ll love Places to Telnet, a page on the very slick CRT-themed telnet.org...

The Latest from RepRapMicron – Nail Gel, First Objects, and More

We’ve been following [Vik Olliver]’s progress on the μRepRap project with interest for some time now. The project’s goal is to build a 3D printer that can print feature sizes down to about 10 microns – the same feature size used in the Intel 4004 processor. At the recent Everything Open 2026 conference, [Vik] presented an overview of all the progress he’s made in the last year, including printer improvements, material woes, and the first multi-layer prints (presentation slides).

The motion stage has undergone some fundamental improvements recently. The original XY motion table was supported on four flexures which allowed movement...

A DIY Headset For SteamVR

https://invidious.privacyredirect.com/watch?v=-QzfaM0PtaY

The modern era of VR started a long time ago, and a wide range of commercial headsets have proliferated on the market since then. If you don’t want to buy off the shelf, though, you could always follow [Manolo]’s example and build your own.

This DIY headset is known as the Persephone 3 Lite, and is intended for use with SteamVR.  It’s got the requisite motion tracking thanks to a Raspberry Pi Pico, paired with an MPU6500 inertial measurement unit. As for the optics, the headset relies on a pair of 2.9-inch square displays that operate at a resolution of 1440...

Fusion HAT+ Review – Adding AI voice and servo/motor control to Raspberry Pi for robotics, Smart Home, or education

SunFounder has sent me a review sample of the Fusion HAT+ Raspberry Pi expansion board designed for motor and servo control using audio interactions with its built-in microphone and speaker, as well as LLM models. It can be used as an AI-enabled robot controller, a smart home hub, a voice assistant, or an interactive learning platform. In this review, after an unboxing and going through the installation of the Fusion HAT+ on a Raspberry Pi 5 2GB, I’ll mainly focus on the voice interaction part using text-to-speech (TTS), speech-to-text (STT), and local and cloud-based LLMs and VLMs, and also quickly...

Name that Ware, January 2026

The Ware for January 2026 is shown below:

Enjoy!

[update: added photo of top side, since the ware was already guessed – just for more enjoyment]

Winner, Name that Ware December 2025

The Ware for December 2025 is a Spectral Instruments Series 800 camera. I was pretty shocked at how quickly this was guessed given the very small portion of the instrument that was shown, but, then again – that’s how it goes sometimes. Congrats to johslarsen for nailing this one; email me for your prize.

I had prepared a series of “hint” images in case it turned out to be too hard to guess the ware – they’re too neat not to share, so here they are:

The module above is the “other half” of the assembly – you can see the tips...

M5Stack AI-8850 LLM Accelerator M.2 Kit offers an alternative to Raspberry Pi AI HAT+ 2

M5Stack has launched the “AI-88502 LLM Accelerator M.2 Kit 8GB Version” based on its LLM-8850 M.2 card with a 24 TOPS Axera AX8850 SoC, and offering an alternative to the Raspberry Pi AI HAT+ 2, supporting both LLM and AI vision workloads. The kit is comprised of the M.2 card and a Raspberry Pi-HAT 8850 board with USB PD power input for the card and Raspberry Pi 5, a 16-pin PCIe connector and 40-pin GPIO header for connection to the SBC, as well as accessories. M5Stack AI-8850 LLM accelerator M.2 kit specifications: M5Stack LLM‑8850 M.2 card SoC – Axera AX8850 CPU...

Forlinx OK153-S12 Mini – A low-cost Allwinner T153 SBC with Raspberry Pi GPIO header and long-term availability

Forlinx has introduced the OK153-S12 Mini, an Allwinner T153 SBC/development board, which looks to be a low-cost version of the OK153-S SBC that we previously covered. It keeps the same FET153-S SoM, but swaps the industrial terminal blocks, mini PCIe, and some other interfaces for a more compact footprint and a Raspberry Pi-compatible 40-pin header. The SBC supports up to 1 GB of DDR3 memory, up to 512 MB of NAND flash or 8 GB eMMC flash, and also features a microSD card slot for storage. Other interfaces include two Gigabit Ethernet ports, two USB Type-C ports for power, data,...

Microchip PIC32CM PL10 Cortex-M0+ microcontrollers are pin-to-pin compatible with AVR MCUs, support 5V operation

Microchip has added the PIC32CM PL10 MCUs to its PIC32C Arm Cortex-M0+ microcontroller family. Pin-to-pin compatible with AVR MCUs, the new PL10 MCUs feature a range of Core Independent Peripherals (CIPs), 5V operation, and functional safety (FuSa) compliance. The microcontrollers notably integrate a 12-bit ADC with strong noise immunity, a Peripheral Touch Controller (PTC) for responsive touch applications, and two serial communication interfaces with USART, I2C, and/or SPI support. Target applications include industrial control, building automation, consumer appliances, power tools, and sensor-based systems. Microchip PIC32CM PL10 specifications: MCU core – Arm Cortex-M0+ core up to 24 MHz Memory –  Up...

Большая модернизация настольной стеклодувной горелки своими руками

Горячая работа со стеклом, декоративным или техническим, в наше время обычно выполняется при помощи ручных или стационарных горелок — в их пламени стеклянные заготовки размягчаются и формуются, а края деталей спаиваются. Тип, количество и форма горелок, конечно, сильно зависит от марки обрабатываемого стекла, другого оснащения мастерской, потребных операций и манеры работы мастера, однако, более или менее универсальным вариантом, как и десятилетия назад, остаются горелки настольные, по возможности с большим (для формовки) и тонким (для спаивания) факелом или же горелка большая настольная и малая ручная. Горелка стеклодува — предмет его гордости, основной инструмент, от удобства и безопасности работы с ней зависит многое. Жалеть времени на совершенствование и настройку своих горелок ни в коем случае...