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How to Make Ferrofluid: The Liquid of the Future

What Is Ferrofluid? Ferrofluid is a black, solvent-based liquid, that, in the presence of a magnetic field, becomes strongly magnetized. The fluid is made up of nanomagnetic particles coated with an "anti-stick" or surfactant compound, suspended in a "carrier", commonly an organic solvent. For mechanical applications, it is used in hard drives and speakers as a lubricant. However, it also has been implemented in artwork, as seen in the video below.

How To: Add Your Own Custom Screensaver Images to Your Kindle Lock Screen

Don't be too disappointed if you don't have the spiffy new Kindle Touch, there is an up side. The benefit to owning the older (duller) models is that the firmware remains the same throughought generations, so the hacks retain their usefulness. This has given the modding community for Kindle a bunch of time to flourish, with tons of great code, hacks and homebrew. Today's Null Byte is going to show you how you can root, and then remove the crappy original screensavers that come installed on th...

How To: Build a Laser Trip Wire Alarm System

Building a DIY Alarm System: The Concept So, you want to protect your property, or maybe a room, car, or even your backyard. The concept of an alarm system is to notify the "alarm administrator" that there is an intruder entering the previously designated boundaries. The triggers for this boundary could be as simple as a pressure sensor, or as complicated as a laser network. They all do the same thing, but some work better than others.

How To: Hack WPA WiFi Passwords by Cracking the WPS PIN

A flaw in WPS, or WiFi Protected Setup, known about for over a year by TNS, was finally exploited with proof of concept code. Both TNS, the discoverers of the exploit and Stefan at .braindump have created their respective "reaver" and "wpscrack" programs to exploit the WPS vulnerability. From this exploit, the WPA password can be recovered almost instantly in plain-text once the attack on the access point WPS is initiated, which normally takes 2-10 hours (depending on which program you use).

How To: Install an Off-the-Shelf Hard Drive in an Xbox 360 (Get 10x the GB for Your Money)

Since the day of the Xbox 360 release, storage space for the device has been overpriced beyond belief. OEM 250GB HDD models still cost $110 USD! A 250GB hard drive should not destroy my wallet, Microsoft. Storage space, especially on HDDs, is cheap. You can buy a removable 2TB external for only $100 USD, so it's a little beyond my comprehension to see how they calculate their MSRP to yield such a large profit. On the other hand, Xbox 360 had very impressive hardware specs back in the day, equ...

News: DIY Origami Christmas Tree

This is how my version of an origami Christmas tree turned out based on the instructions I posted awhile back. Cory also made a version from white glossy paper, which looks great. I opted for the green and brown look, but it wasn't easy.

How To: The Novice Guide to Teaching Yourself How to Program (Learning Resources Included)

Today's post is a small go-to guide for beginner programmers in Null Byte. With many of our community members picking up programming from our Community Bytes, it only makes sense to lay out a one-stop guide for your reference. Hopefully this guide will help you make an educated and thoughtful choice on what programming languages you want to learn, and how you want to learn said languages.

How To: Make Your Own Photo Snow Globe

As the holidays draw closer and closer, stores are getting more and more crowded, and of course, many have put off their Christmas shopping until the very last minute. Why not avoid the mall rush this holiday season and make a personalized do-it-yourself snow globe to gift to those closest to you? This is also a perfect opportunity to put of those cell phone photos that you've been snapping to use! What You'll Need

How To: Create Double Exposures with Your Cell Phone

In photography, creating a double or multiple exposure photo involves combining two different images to make one single image. This technique has been used in film photography by exposing a piece of film twice to two different images. The second image becomes superimposed onto the first image, creating various effects that may mirror one another or seem ghostly.

How To: Make 6-Sided Kirigami Snowflakes

We've all made them. I remember making hundreds of paper snowflakes when I was in elementary school. You take a piece of paper and fold it in half, then fold it in half again. You now have a piece that is one fourth the size of the original. Now you fold it in half diagonally. You then cut slices out of the edges of the paper, and unfold to find that you have created a snowflake. The resulting snowflake has four lines of symmetry and looks something like this: If you fold it in half diagonall...

How To: Fix Defective Pixels & Improve Image Quality on LCD & LED Monitors

I have owned quite the plethora of electronics in my life. A commonality between most of these devices' screens is frozen or dead pixels. This is probably the most annoying thing about buying new hardware—your LCD, or worse, LED display has one or more pixels that continues to stay lit. Most of the time, this will appear in the form of a brightly colored pixel that never changes, or a pixel that never displays the right color. Once you notice it's there, you just can't stop staring at it. It ...

How To: 4 Cheap & Easy Ways to Unclog Your Kitchen Sink Without Any Nasty Chemicals

Oh, boy. A stopped-up drain. It'll inevitably happen with any home plumbing system and your kitchen sink is no exception. That clog won't go away on its own and will require immediate attention to keep any standing water from rising. But you don't have to resort to calling an expensive plumber or using a bottle of hazardous chemicals. Using simple kitchen staples or common household objects, as well as some determination, you can unclog your kitchen sink on your own without paying a dime.

How To: Do a Business Part 2 of 5

Although a business plan is a technical document, remember that this first draft will not be. The audience and author of this document will be the owner/manager of the small business. The purpose is to get as much information written as possible so this draft can be used as a starter for versions of the business plan that are crafted for other audiences. It eliminates the possibility of the first business plan you write for other audiences actually looks like your first attempt. Since the lat...

How To: Make a Minecraft Creeper Costume

If you're a huge fan of Minecraft, then you probably know what a Creeper is and, therefore, want to be one for Halloween. After all, not everyone can be Steves and Snow Golems. This version uses printouts (templates below the video), and is very easy to make. Besides ink and paper, it pretty much only requires boxes (three different sized ones based on your size).

How To: 5 Annoying Things About iOS 5 (Plus How to Fix Them)

I admit, when the new iOS 5 update for Apple devices was coming out, I had iTunes open all morning with my iPhone 4 attached... waiting... waiting... waiting until finally the new version of iOS was available for download. I stopped everything I was doing and quickly initiated the process of updating my device. After two excruciating hours, my iPhone 4 was finally ready to go and I couldn't be anymore happy. Who needs an iPhone 4S when you've already got iOS 5?

How To: Make the Platonic Solids Out of Playing Cards

Computer Science Professor Francesco De Comité has a fantastic gallery of mathematical images on Flickr. As part of this collection, he has a few hundred images of real or rendered polyhedra made out of paper or playing cards which he calls "slide togethers." These are constructed by making cuts and then sliding one component into the other, creating a shape without using any glue. He constructed the entire set of the platonic solids—the cards form their edges—which can be seen in the image b...

How To: Open a Banana Like a Monkey

Sometimes when you have a really ripe banana or a green one it might become difficult to open it, or you break the banana when you open it. Bummer, I know! Well, all that headache and risk is over because I took a solution right from the animal kingdom. In this video, I will show you exactly how a monkey would peel a banana.

News: The Top 6 Apps for Enjoying Instagram Photos Away from Your iPhone (Mac or PC)

Instagram is one of the hottest mobile apps to date, yet they have no way to upload photos straight from your computer. You can log into the Instagram web app to like and comment on photos in your feed, but that's about it. Fortunately, there are third-party apps that let you do more on Instagram from your Mac or Windows computer, so you can enjoy Instagram pics on the big screen instead of your tiny iPhone or Android device.

How To: Play as a Mage in Terraria

Feel like playing as a Mage? Watch this video first. Learn everything you need to know about playing Terraria as a Mage. This video includes strategy secrets and instructions on keeping a healthy store of mana to keep your Mage powerful.

Manas: A Taste of India

The smell of hot curry pouring from room is inevitable. The mixture of spices filled up my nostril as I sat. The lighting of the room might not be pleasant but it is the way in which the restaurant owner set up his restaurant to stop excessive lighting, which is done with a huge decorative curtain. My attention was set on the glamorous uplifting Indian pop music, playing from the large high-definition televisions.