Hi, Welcome to Ben's Basement. The 21st Century Basement containing everything from a CD to the new Xbox Kinect.

Wednesday, 30 November 2011

TXT to Speach

Text to speach is very usefull. Here is how to make your computer talk.

Windows: 
Open notepad and type
Dim message, sapi
message=InputBox("Type your text here","TXT to SPEECH")
Set sapi=CreateObject("sapi.spvoice")
sapi.Speak message
save the file as "Speek.vbs" and make sure that "all files" is selected. Then go to the location where you saved it and open it. A window will appear. Type your text in the box and press "OK".

Mac:
Go to "Utillities" and click on "Terminal". Then Type "Say". Press enter and type what you want it to say. Then Press Enter. To exit click close.

Changing a users password Hack (Windows 7/Vista)

If you really want to get into someones stuff or you want to pull a prank, This tutorial will show you how. Go to the start menu and type in "CMD" and wait for it to load. When you see the icon Right click it and select "Run as admin...". Then it will open command prompt. First you might need to see the user names on your computer so type "Net User" and press enter. This will display all the users on your computer. Then type "Net User (username) *" the brackets are where you put the desired username. To see a load of intel on this user drop the wildcard (*). Type a password. No text will show up so don't worry. Then press enter when you are finished. It will ask you to repeat the password. Press enter again and it should work.

If It displays  "Error 5" or "access denied" then make sure you run as admin at the start.

Monday, 28 November 2011

Electronic Suppliers

There are so many electronic suppliers out there, the problem is which one should you choose? Hopefully this post will help you decide. I constantly find myself visiting Maplin stores. However thair range of electrical components is lacking. I tend to keep away from Digi-key as they never have what I want. My favourite is RS Components as they have an extreemly wide selection of components.  If you need a very unique item then this is your best bet. I also recently descovered sparkfun. This is amazing if you are working on PIC, PICAXE or somthing similar. I recently perchaced a load of components for the iPod. This was really helpfull.

So which one should I choose?
It is really  up to you and it depends on what you are doing. Sparkfun is a little pricy on P+P where as RS conponents doesn't deal with iPod and similar DEV packs.

Sunday, 27 November 2011

Any Screen to Android


The Android OS is the most used mobile/tablet operating system. But it's really annoying when your TV screws up as its interface isn't user friendly. You sit back and think "I wish this was an Android TV". This would be amazing with all the apps available. Well now you can get Android on anything that has a screen. With an HDMI port on one end, and a USB plug on the other for power, just plug in FXI Technologies’ Cotton Candy dongle to create a 1080p Android television. The price is not yet set but it is expected to be under $200. Considering what’s inside that’s pretty reasonable. There’s a dual-core 1.2 GHz ARM processor, 1 gig of RAM, 64 gigs of storage, Bluetooth, WiFi, and a microSD card slot. That's amazing for the size! So for the price you could either buy an Android tablet or this. The Problem is you now need a keyboard. But you can just get one for about £10. Unfortunately the company doesn’t intend to bring Cotton Candy to the retail market. Instead, they will sell the device to developers who may do what they wish.
 Is it a good idear? Please comment.

Saturday, 26 November 2011

Hacking VS Cybercrime

There is alot of people out there who say that hacking is illigal. But is it? The Term Hacking has two defenitions:
1.  An enthusiastic and skillful computer programmer or user.
2.  A person who uses computers to gain unauthorized access to data.

The Second one is the one that most people refer to. The Term CyberCrime is crime committed using a computer and the internet to steal money or ID. So technically it could be either.

I love taking things apart, modding them and upgrading them. This is also "Hacking". I am not commiting a crime or breaking the law. If I was to takedown or deface a website then that would be illigal hacking. That would be number two. However if I hacked into, Natwest for example and stole some cash then that would be CyberCrime. Over all CyberCrime is worse but what if someone "Hacks" into your personel account or E-mail then would that be worse. There are many cases where the hacker gains access to your e-mail accounts and holds it to randsome. The poor people who get hacked often get there E-mail back, Just like in this story. I shold hope non of my readers commit CyberCrime or hack computers(iligally). Hopefully you now have a good idear of what hacking and Cybercrime is. Please Comment on your thoughts.

Welcome

Hi and welcome to my blog. My name is Ben and hopefully I will be posting Electronic Projects, experiments and loads of geeky stuff along with all sorts of computer mayham every day, but for now I am working on Robotics. I Currently have a website called xYdapt! You can visit it at www.xydapt.co.cc .I am currently Running a Competition for the best robot design. The website is currently under construction but you can still enter by clicking the link on the home page.