Systm was the first show launched by Revision3 and it won't be the last. Going forward, Systm will no longer be a weekly long format show. It will morph into regular, if shorter, hands on segments that will live inside Tekzilla.

I've made a lot of television in the last decade and gotten to work with a lot of fun people.

Leo Laporte, Kevin Rose, Roger Chang, Robert Heron, Serafina, Jim, the whole Revision3 crew... the list could go on for a while.

I have to say some of my most treasured memories will involve a pair of Davids: David Randolph and David Calkins and the -truly random- work we've done on Systm. Fire, molten steel, high voltage stupidity, long range WiFI, soldering, software tweaks, power tools, game controllers, six ton cranes... over the course of 97 or so of the 108 episodes of Systm, I've gotten to have a lot of fun and build a lot of projects.

There's also been a lot of insane 18 hours shoots, second degree burns, damaged hardware and massive amounts of stress, because, frankly, we've been doing a lot of work with very few people.

Episode 109 marks a major change in Systm. Going forward, Systm will no longer be a weekly long format show. It will morph into regular, if shorter, hands on segments that will live inside Tekzilla.

We hope David Calkins will keep joining us for projects on Tekzilla and would love to coax David Randolph back, too!

We do expect to release long format episodes in the future, just not on any regular schedule. (That could change. Remember when PixelPerfect ended? Then came back?)

It's kind of fitting. Kevin Rose, Dan Huard and David Prager launched Systm because they were frustrated with the show they were currently working on. They wanted a place to go deep on tech without having to cram a six hour project into a 3 minute TV segment.

Now we've got an online show where we can go a lot longer than 3 minutes on any sort of tech we want: it's called Tekzilla.

I hope you'll join us there as we roll in more hands on projects, and I'd like to thank everyone that's been watching over the years: it's been a pleasure building for you.

TV shows, like people, are born, live for a while, and pass on.

Systm was the first show launched by Revision3 and it won't be the last. I hope you'll check out the next show I'll be working on here. It's called HDNation.TV, and it's for people that love HD content and want to build the best home theater experience they can manage on their budget.

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Build the ultimate DIY network storage machine using free software, a mix of hard drives and an old PC.

We love a good FreeNAS... who doesn't? A Network Attached Storage box solves a problem lots of folks have: there's never enough space for all your data. Whether your storing documents, digital photos, music, movies or games you'll always need and want more space.

FreeNAS is a great free too for building a NAS... but today's build, LimeTech's unRAID softare adds a nifty twist. If one of your storage drives dies, it can replace the lost data.

All you need is a machine with an Ethernet card that can boot off a USB thumbdrive, and the free free unRAID software.

For a comprehensive list of your hardware options, check out the compatibility list.

For tons of helpful unRAID ideas, tips and tricks, check out: Getting Started with unRAID and unRAID Server Community.

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Everyone knows LEGO's are fun and incredibly creative toys for kids to play with, but did you know you could also build robots? Ones that can you program and build to do almost any task. Find out how on today's Systm!

Building a robot requires many skills: metal working, soldering, drilling, and of course programming. It also means investing in the right tools and materials. It also requires a ton of trial and error as you piece your way through a build.

Sound like too much work? Or maybe too expensive? Want the fun of getting into robotics -and a solid introduction to robot programming without committing to most the above?

LEGO just might have the answer.

LEGO's Mindstorm NXT is a robotics kit that mixes the traditional LEGO bricks, Technics pieces, with sensors, motors and NXT programmable brick. Using the included pieces and a PC users can create any number of robotic creations. Dave, our resident robotics mavin, works full time for LEGO Education, and shares his insight to help you create your first robot using the Mindstorms NXT kit.

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Summer roadtrip season is here, but you don't have to leave your desktop, or its contents, at home or work while you travel: it's all about remote access tools, from monthly fee to VNC!

Get to your home PC when you're on vacation, whether to download copies of the baby pixs, some fresh music, or upload a bunch of pictures you want off your camera!

Bypass network blocks at the office so you can run Twitter or browse to any website!

Fix Dad's PC... even when it's three states away!

Call us enthusiastic, but we're all about setting up remote access using remote control software on this episode of Systm!

There are a number of ways to do this... commercial tools, open source tools like VNC, and even something that Microsoft already stuffed inside some versions Windows XP, Vista and 7.

This is different from DynDNS , walked you through a few months ago... that allows you to find your home server no matter what IP address your ISP assigns you. Many of the services we're talking about today already have this ability built in.

There are tons of commercial applications to do this. They usually charge a monthly fee, but can save you lots of work setting things up. We talk the following applications, and tell you which ones are the best deal and why:

pcAnywhere GoToMyPC.com LogMeIn.com

We also walk you through setting up free tools, such as the Remote Desktop Connection tool that have been built into many versions of Windows since XP.

That includes the basics of port forwarding, which you'll need to set up in your router for most DIY remote connection tools.

Finally, we get our geek on and walk you thru setting up VNC , aka Virtual Network Computing on your machine.

On Windows, we like UltraVNC the best.... you can use it via a remote viewer, or any browser that has Java installed.

Want to get even more geeky? Try setting up VNC viewers that run on your iPhone or Android powered phone!

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Looking for an Open Source media server that works perfectly with the PS3 and a host of UPnP compatible set top boxes? Try MediaTomb!

Bank in January, in Video Jukebox Part 2, we showed you how to build a movie server with TVersity and iTunes.

This week, we build a MediaTomb, a free, open source media server that works great with the PS3, and just about any other media rendering box that is UPnP MediaServer compatible!

It currently won't work with the Xbox 360... for that we still recommend TVersity!

The hardware requirements are minimal, many folks run it on a NAS box such as Western Digital's MyBook World Edition with no problems!

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We update the classic beer keg with motorized wheels and a remote control tap to build the ultimate robotic beer keg.

Although the modern beer keg has been with us since the 1960's the technology surrounding it has advanced much. Sure the materials might be different, and the gas mixture more suited to wide variety of ales, brews and beer, but really it's still a big metal cylinder that's heavy and difficult to control access to. So we figured we put a few 21st century bits of technology on the thing and turn it into a mobile and easily controlled beer dispenser.

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We show you how to build a beer delivery robot that comes to you when the time is right and boss is gone. This works for other beverages too but beer is something everyone likes.

Robots are great. They do what you want without complaint. So instead of having a spouse or kin folk fetch you a cold one and complain when they bring it to you, why not build a robot that can do the same thing? Building off episode 40 we take everything we've learned and added the know project board how from episode 102 to build a robot cooler that brings beer at the appointed time. Perfect for home or office... well after the boss leaves.

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Learn how to use microcontrollers to control just about anything as we build a device that raises a flag every time you get a new email!

Microcontrollers form the heart of many electronics projects big and small. David uses them constantly for robots, and he helps you get the ball rolling with an introductory look at microcontroller, including Arduino and Parallax.

How? By building a simple gmail notifier and raises a flag whenever a new email message arrives in your inbox.

If you don't have an electronics supply store nearby Parallax is Dave's favorite store/supplier for microcontrollers. If you simply must go the open source route you can check out the Arduino board.

For a copy of the Python code that Dave used in the show just systm@revision3.com with "python code for gmail notifier" in the subject line.

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It's been super hot this week in San Francisco, which has the Systm crew thinking of home made ice cream, but using Liquid Nitrogen instead of a boring old ice cream maker!

Everybody loves home made ice cream, especially the Systm crew!

But making a batch usually involves an ice cream makerof some kind, possibly a lot of cranking, and, frankly a lot of waiting.

Being the ADD geeks that we are we decided to hurry things up a bit by making a quick trip to our fave welding supply store and picking up a $25 10 liter dewar of Liquid Nitrogen, then heading to our kitchen for a steel bowel, whisk and a wooden spoon.

The ice cream recipe doesn't matter... you can use the LN2 technique with any ice cream recipe for a delightfully light and creamy texture!

You do need to be careful! Liquid nitrogen is -extremely- cold, and can do serious damage. Practice good LN2 safety... at the very least, wear eye protection, and -never- put it in a sealed container or pour it down a drain.

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Systm hits the 100th episode, and to celebrate we decided to light up our cake with a DIY flame thrower!

Systm has finally reached 100! 100 episodes, that is. Today we explore one of the more novel ways of lighting our cake with candles by using a cobbled together flame thrower. Now, unlike a mil-grade flame thrower, our DIY version uses a mixture of butane and propane commonly used with camping stoves. Along with some empty AirSoft canisters and an ignition source you've got yourself a big flame shooter.

Word of extreme caution: This is FIRE you're playing with, so do not attempt this project unless you have the proper work space and take the necessary precautions. Do not use on siblings, neighbors, people, animals or vegetation. For use against inanimate objects in supervised settings that will not cause property damage, injury or death to any person or persons.

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Tired of not having enough power points in your car to keep your phone charged, your GPS on, and your DVD/monitor combo playing? Change all that by adding additional 12 volt power outlets to your car.

These days, with so many gadgets to keep powered and running, expanding on the number of power outlets in your car is a must! Most modern cars sport two or even three 12-volt outlets but if you drive something pre-21st century you're probably stuck with only one. So how do you convert that one into many?

One way is to use an adapter like this one here to turn one outlet into three. Simple, but not the most elegant solution especially if you want to locate an outlet somewhere other than near the front seats.

Alternatively you can purchase a single outlet and run the wires under the carpet to the back seats, trunk or elsewhere. Patrick prefers this method, as he runs additional leads out to the tailgate of his truck.

Of course, one thing to note is the capacity of your car's battery and alternator combo to keep up with the all the devices you're plugging in. You're pretty safe with small devices like GPS, cellphones, mp3 players but if you plan on using a power inverter, you want to calculate the total load to ensure you're not draining the battery even while the engine is on.

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Save yourself the hassle of rebuilding your system in the event of a catastrophic disk failure, by creating a custom recovery disc... and learn about Rescue CDs and Slipstreaming while you do!

Eventually it will happen: your hard drive gets corrupted, damaged or wiped. Your PC has become a giant paperweight. If you have backups all of your data -you do back up your data, right?- you can spend hours manually re-installing your operatings system, updates and programs.

Or , follow our instructions to build a custom recovery disk that will quickly rebuild your systm exactly how you want it!

For creating custom image restores Roger prefers Macrium Reflect Free. While you can go with pay for disk imaging titles like Symantec's Ghost or Acronis True Image, or try your hand at an open source disk imaging tools I find that Macrium Reflect Free offers the best balance between price, ease of use and functionality.

Watch the show to see how Roger uses Macrium to create a custom backup disk!

Before you rebuild your Windows box, you might want to recover data, diagnose issues or reformat and repartition a new hard drive. A "Rescue CD" will be a huge help. Typically a collection of tools loaded onto a bootable CD/DVD or USB flash drive, a Rescue CD helps you troubleshoot your machine even if the hard drive isn't working.

There are tons of Rescue CDs available online. Roger's favorites include: The Ultimate Boot CD . The Ultimate Boot CD For Windows. The UltraBootCD The SystemRescueCd

All of them except the Ultimate Boot CD For Windows are ISO files you download and burn out using your favorite CD/DVD burner. Then set your machine to boot from the CD first and it will automatically boot into the rescue disk.

If you need to reinstall Windows either out of necessity or you just want to clear away the crud that's built over the months try slipstreaming your Windows installation. Slipstreaming means making a custom Windows install using all the latest updates, service packs and bug fixes into an install CD so you don't have to manually download them after running a regular install disk.

Slipstreaming doesn't require any additional software, but tools like nLite and AutoStreamer can make the process easier and, in some cases, more effective. For Vista users check out vLite. It's still in beta so bugs are still being worked out... but it's worked very well for us.

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From the inverter you plug into, to battery banks used to store energy, a Hamster Wheel Powerd PC has a lot in common with other alternative energy sources like Solar, Wind, Water or Bicycles!

Watch us build a human powered PC on this episode of Systm!

No. Seriously. David and Patrick borrowed the ten foot high hamster wheel that powers theThe Disgusting Spectacle (Thanks you to the ever charming Tracy and Don!), pulled a couple motors from David's stockpile, one of Patrick's inverters and his Giant Box of Wire, and got busy in the ridiculously cool NIMBY Space in West Oakland.

With a bit of running, a pair of DC motors generated 14V, pushing 6A when connected in parallel... and, yes, we managed to generate enough juice to charge the battery. At least in between having to stop running and catch our breath!

A more practical arrangement would be to power the inverter from deep storage batteries, using your alternative energy source to charge the batteries... generally speaking, you'd want a regulator in between the power source and the batteries, whether you're going solar, wind, water, bicycle or Hamster Wheel!

Where were we? NIMBY, in West Oakland, is "A place to create the impossible, the new, the ridiculous, the exiting and most importantly, the never seen before. It is the largest do-it-yourself industrial art space in the Bay Area." This is an incredible place to make art, from ceramics to neo, machining to textiles, steam engines to computer controllers. If you're in the Bay area, check it out!

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Build your very own high quality sealed subwoofer in just a fraction of the time it would take to build a traditional box. It's all about Sonotube, the toughest cardboard you'll ever meet!

Getting great a low frequency subwoofer usually involves a lot of cash, or spending a lot of time building up a box.

And even sealed boxes, the simplest subwoofer enclosures, can be a pain to build. So when we wanted to sample several box sizes fast, we picked up some Sonotube. It's a type of concrete form used to make columns... but with some plywood and a little routing, and a lot of glue, you can quickly sample several sizes of subwoofer enclosure.

It all started with Patrick's desire to get some decent low end bass in his truck... and a stop by the epic Pass DIY web pages, where he read about The Legend of EL PIPE-O, Nelson Pass' massive subwoofer experiment that sported 8 21-inch drivers and a pair of 12 foot hight Sonotube concrete forms.

Sonotube makes subwoofers quick and easy to build by eliminating a lot of saw cuts and joints. It's available in sizes from 2.25" to 36.90" and easy to cut to length... just head on over to the Enclosure Volume Calculator at HomeTheaterShack.com or the Subwoofer Enclosure Calculators at the12volt.com and play with the available sizes you want with various lengths until you get the volume of enclosure you're looking for. (Betwen .5 and 1.5 cubic feet in our case.)

Why sealed? In theory, tho they don't have the over the top boom of ported boxes, sealed subs have the most accurate audio response. They're also the easiest enclosures to design and build. Most important, HSU Research's ASW-1203 was designed for for a sealed box. That's Patrick's pick to go into his beloved truck.

Along with a subwoofer and Sonotube (sold by the foot at most hard core building supply places... ask them to cut it to the length you want if you don't have a tale saw at home) you'll need plywood or MDF for the end caps, glue, and at least a pair of clamps... tho a half dozen Jorgenson Pony pipe or Irwin Quick-Grip Bar Clamps can make the glue up go a lot faster!

You can use just about anything to cut out the hole for the Sonotube... but a router with a circle guide or a jigsaw will work a lot faster than any kind of hand tool.

To finish your subwoofer off, you'll need some polyfill pillow stuffing from the local crafts store, a terminal plate to attach your speaker cables too and some wire and connectors to attach the sub to the terminals.

Happy bass!

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Is your rig the fastest it can be? Join us as the folks from Extremetech.com show us the best tips, tools and techniques for benchmarking your PC!

From how fast the CPU crunches numbers to the number of pixels the GPU can push in a second benchmarking is a time honored way of representing PC performance. It's these numbers that PC enthusiasts use both as bragging points and as way to measure gains from upgrading or tweaking components or software.

We talked to master benchmarkers Jason Cross and Loyd Case over at ExtremeTech.com on the proper way to benchmark your PC including the rights tools like 3D Mark and PC Mark, and dispel a few common benchmarking myths.

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The most disgusting PC hack ever! We build a computer inside an aquarium, and then fill it full of mineral oil, to see if full-on liquid immersion cooling will work better than air or water cooling. Watch as we take PC modification to the next level and put a PC in an aquarium, complete with a ship wreck and fake plants.

We've done some serious air cooling and water cooling of PCs... but we've never immersed one in oil.

So we jumped at the chance to drop one of our PC into Puget Systems Aquarium Module, build out a nifty looking aquatic PC, and see for ourselves what it does for CPU cooling.

The results? Better than we expected, but not nearly as good as we could get if we added in a pump and radiator!

If you can, buy your mineral oil in bulk from a vet or farm co-op... anyplace that sells supplies for horses. In the city we spent over $100 buying 42 16oz bottles, about twice what it would have cost in gallon bottles. Owch!

Want the ultimate cooling solution? If you've got the cash, check out 3M's Flourinert... just make sure you build a sealed case, or your investment will vanish over time!

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UPS Hack! Take the tiny battery out of your Uninteruptible Power Supply and replace it with a car battery: you get to run your UPS for a lot longer, and potentially melt your face!

Uninterruptible power supplies are a great for maintaining power to a PC during a black out or brown out.

Unfortunately most UPS's pack tiny batteries that last just a few minutes before they drain. That's great for saving out files and shutting down. It's not so good for working on and on while the power is out.

Quite a few of you have written in about using a car battery with your UPS... we don't recommend it, but we walk you thru the project in this episode!

And, yes, we do have a Disco Ball ready to run on emergency power.... tho we really want to swap in a pair of deep cycle batteries before we leave the disco ball spinning all weekend.

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Luke, Darth and Obi-Wan's Lightsabers were pieced out of junk piles. David shows you how to build exact replicas and an original design from The Custom Saber Shop. Then he picks a fight with Patrick.

Star Wars movie props and replicas are expensive memorabilia. Original pieces command a princely sum and replicas can cost anywhere from a $100 to a $1000 or more. For items like lightsabers, however, you can assemble your own replica using the exact same parts as the Star Wars prop makers. All you need is some time, an eBay account and a trip to the local hardware. Now if you want your lightsaber to be a bit more elegant and customizable check out The Custom Lightsaber Shop. Their Java tool will allow you to select and customize your lightsaber in almost any way imaginable.

If you wish to forgo the lightsaber in favor of something a bit more clumsy you can also build yourself a replica Stormtrooper or Han Solo's blaster. Since all those specific props were based on actual deactivated firearms you'll need to rummage through sites like Replica Weaponry.com and Aurora History Boutique to find decommissioned and replica firearms to base your blaster build on.

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PCMag's HDTV expert, Robert Heron, teaches us top notch HDTV calibration tricks using tools anybody can afford!

HDTV is supposed to be your window into the high fidelity video, but if you haven't calibrated your TV, chances are you're looking at a mess. It's just the way most HDTV's come out of the box: too bright, over saturated, overscan issues. Fortunately, with just a few minutes and the right disk, you can make major improvements in your HDTV's picture quality.

And if you already own a THX certified movie with THX Optimizer, you can do it for free!

Our favorite HDTV expert, PC Magazine's, Robert Heron holds certificates from the Imaging Science Foundation and THX, and personally calibrates every HDTV he reviews.

Before you run into the living room to start tweaking, you'll need a few things. Any DVD or Blu-ray disk with the THX Optimizer will give you the tools to make some major improvements on your set.

For under $20, you can take the next step in calibrating your HDTV by picking up a copy of Joe Kane's Digital Video Essentials: HD Basics, which includes special color filters you need to fine tune your HDTV. (You can also pick up a pair of THX Optimizer Glasses at their online store.)

Robert also talks about when you might want to call in a professional, and just what they do for the cash you're shelling out. If you want to have professional do an even more in-depth calibration make sure they're ISF certified.

Want to see how good a job your TV or Blu-ray or DVD player does with scaling video? Then check out HQV Benchmark discs!

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Want access to your files stored at home? How about hosting a home web server? Static IPs are expensive, if you can even get one. We set up Dynamic DNS instead!

'Back in the day' if you wanted to run a web server, email server, or FTP server from home you needed a static IP... and they often added quite a bit to the monthly bill from your ISP.

Dynamic DNS, however, lets you use a DHCP assigned address -the kind you probably have at home- just like a static IP address. That means if you have a broadband connection and sign up for a free account at DynDNS you can run a website or FTP server straight from your home.

We show you how to set it up on this episode of Systm, along with a quick and easy way to share files you and your friends can access through any browser: HFS, the HTTP File Server!

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Security, safety, ease of repair, USB Flash Drives are more than just storage, they're a great way to run your safe copy Linux or Windows on -any- machine that can boot from USB!

USB flash drives are the unofficial replacement for the floppy disk. From sharing files to running applications, anything you could do with a floppy you can do with a USB flash drive... including booting an entire OS.

And with sizes ranging anywhere from 1GB to 32GB you can still have massive amounts of storage on the same thumbdrive in case you want to run it off a machine you can't save or don't want to save data to.

We take you through the process of booting Linux or Windows from a thumbdrive from start to finish in this week's episode.

Before you begin you'll need two very important things. A PC with a BIOS that will let you boot from a USB flash drive and a USB flash drive you can boot from. Not all USB flash drives are equal so there's a bit of trial and error and testing you'll need to do to see if a USB flash drive is bootable unless you can find a reseller that explicitly sells them as such.

Some other pieces of software you'll need are BartPE if you want to do a WinXP PE boot or WinPE 2.0 if you want to do Vista build. WinPE 2.0 is part of the Windows Automated Installation Kit.

If you're wanting Linux boot, which is actually easier to do, check out Pendrivelinux. Probably one of the best resources on creating bootable USB flash Linux installs. For Ubuntu fans, build 8.10 now has a utility to create a bootable Ubuntu flash drive as part of the LiveCD distro.

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Now that you've got your movies encoded, we show you how to distribute them over your home network.

We recently showed you how to rip all of your DVD movies onto your PC or Mac in Part 1 of this project. Now that you've finally got all your media stored in a convenient digital format, what now? The obvious next step is stream media to your various set top media playback devices. What isn't obvious is the how.

Especially if you have an Xbox 360 or PS3! Thankfully, TVersity. an amazing free app lets you stream almost every known media format to just about any device out there. It runs on Windows, serves up more than music, photos and videos, and can even handle RSS feeds for your favorite podcasts and video shows.

If you're running an Apple TV, on Windows or Mac, iTunes makes things super simple.

Matter of fact, if you're running a Windows Media Extender, Vista's Media Center makes sharing your media almost as painless.

Got a Mac notebook, or Apple TV? Think that Front Row could use help? Something, maybe, that ties in your friends, tolerates differing encoding formats and supports web based video sites like Hulu and Netflix? You'll love Boxee. It's free if you sign up for an invite, and it is in 'alpha' so it might crash now and then, tho we've found very stable!

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Set up a personal media server, it's easy, and you'll have access to your favorite tunes and movies no matter where you go!

If you want to serve up video, music, and photos our favorite tool is Orb. You'll need a PC to run it, but you can stream to just about anything, even cell phones! If you just interested in streaming out music, check out Simplify Media. It works on Mac and Linux boxes along with Windows PCs.

With both applications you'll want some sort of broadband connection. Video will be better served with a larger upload capacity than either photos or music but even with 700k DSL upload video watching is perfectly acceptable.

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In today's episode, we're going to help you build three USB battery power supplies so you never run out of power for your favorite gadgets!

We've played around with USB power supplies before: back in Voltage Regulators: Breadboarding a DIY USB Power Supply we built one around a $1.59 7805 from Radio Shack.

How about something even simpler, like hacking a trio of batteries onto a cut off USB Extention cable?

In this episode David Calkins shows you his version of a 7805 power supply, the USB Extention Cable power supply, and walks us through building one of Lady Ada's most excellent MintyBoost battery packs, which features a LT1302 Micropower High Output Current Step-Up Adjustable and Fixed 5V DC/DC Converter

All of 'em deliver USB power... the difference between them?

Lady Ada's MintyBoost offers the most efficient use of the battery, since the 7805 tends to turn a lot of your battery power into heat!

The USB cable hack, while quick and dirty, doesn't offer a regulate supply. That means as the batteries run down, your voltage will dip. Some USB powered devices won't like this. (It won't hurt them... they just won't charge.)

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More storage and a performance boost? Upgrade your hard drive without having to re-install anything!

We demoed this on a pair of notebooks, but the basic software and techniques will work on desktops, too!

for more info on the software we used check out Disk Copy for PC users. If you want a more open source solution check out FOG and Clonezilla. If you want the comfort of off the shelf tools check out Norton's Ghost and Acronis True Image.

For OS X users the best solutions are the free Carbon Copy Cloner and trial ware but free to use SuperDuper!.

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Want to play your video collection on any media extender, console or Apple TV? Step one is to get your movies off of the DVDs and onto your hard drive! Part 1 of our DIY Video Jukebox Series

For Mac owners checkout HandBrake.

For PC owners your choices are bit more varied. Along with the PC version of HandBrake, you can also use the AutoGK. It's a GUI front end for a several different open source video transcoding tools that let you harness their power without the tedious need to jump from one app to another each time. AutoGK is great especially for fans of DivX and Xvid encoding. Finally there's AutoMKV. Like AutoGK, AutoMKV is a GUI front end for various tools that are used. The benefit of AutoMKV is it's higher level of tweakability and output format diversity.

And if you run into unexpected problems VideoHelp.com offers a wealth of resources and advice for any video encoding, transcoding or formatting issue.

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Forget about paying for a new camera: this simple firmware hack gives Canon PowerShot cameras a real kick the pants!

Your Canon's PowerShot isn't cutting the mustard? You want to upgrade to a more expensive camera? Looking for RAW, ISO modes, motion sensing, shutter speed selections and more?

STOP!

Before you spend any money on a new camera, try upgrading the firmware on your PowerShot using the CHDK firmware.

This open source project brings your camera a host of new options including increased shutter speed selections, ISO modes, RAW write modes, live histograms, and video record options.

Plus with the addition of scripts functions like motion sensitive photography or HDR time lapse can be performed.

The best thing is the firmware is not permanent. If you don't like it, you can go back to running your camera stock without any worries of left over code or potential damage.

CHDK is the best way to get the most out of your PowerShot camera for -free- whether it's the budget A line or the advanced G series, watch this show to learn how to try it out today!

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Death to fruitcakes! We show you how to burn them in the fireplace, blast them into outer space on a toy rocket, or turn them into a functional doorstop or arty stained glass. Spare your friends and family the shame of regifting, and the calories too.

One great idea Kirsten Sanford had was to use plastic resin to turn them into pieces of art or something practical... like a doorstop. One great place to get the materials you'll need is TAP Plastics. Not only do they material handy they got staff on hand ready to answer most questions about pouring, molds and plastic.

Now if you're looking to boost one high in the sky you'll want to pick some model rocket motors. Ideally D sized are best since most fruit cakes are a bit on the dense and heavy side. Plus there usually the largest ones available at your local hobby store. Also invest in a proper rocket launcher pad and lots of packing tape! The tape you'll need to keep the cake from separating in flight. Finally find out what the locals laws are about model rocket launches and give yourself plenty of space!

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Learn to solder by building yourself the most excellent Chu Moy headphone amp. It sounds great but cheap enough to give away as holiday stocking stuffers.

Thankfully Tangentsoft.net has some incredibly detailed instructions for building the Chu Moy amp. Now one thing you'll need to be aware of are the

OPA2134 OpAmps. There great but if want them you'll need to order them online at DigiKey and Mouser. For resistors, LEDs, and headphone jacks you can pick those up at Radio Shack.

Happy soldering!!!

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Watch us hack a Nintendo 64 into a portable gaming system complete with screen, speakers and battery power: Full Nintendo anywhere you go!

So watch this episode closely as we turn a stock Nintendo 64 into a portable!

For helpful guides and tutorials from other experience makers, check out game console mod master Ben Heck's N64 forum.

And don't forget to print out this wiring diagram before you start.

If you're a bit unsure about building a proper power regulator using the TI part you can check out some samples here!

For other clever hacks, check out additional episodes of SYSTM.

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Ready to build your first robot? A sumo robot is a great place to start, and we've got the complete how to from David Calkins!

Sumo Robots are a much better place to start... and the competition is still vicious!

These small but powerful wheeled robots operate autonomously, and will challenge both your engineering and programming skills... tho they require no degree or experience. Getting into robotics isn't, believe it or not, rocket science... it does require a small investment in parts and a lot in time.

Join our very own David Calkins, who's an internationally known robotics authority when he's not hosting Systm, walks you thru building a sumo robot, large and small, that are -perfect- for competing in events like RoboGames.

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Inspired by EA's Dead Space, we build our very own set of gravity boots, then have David try to walk upside in a warehouse.

Then try to walk upside down. Sounds like a cakewalk... right?

We had access to a warehouse, a forklift, and giant steel plates. We ordered a pair of electromagnets with a breakaway force of 650 pounds each. We figured out how to attach 'em to David's feet.

David programmed a controller to make sure he couldn't release both feet from the plate at the same time. (Safety First!)

It was when David was hanging upside down, his feet 4 meters in the air under a 1200 pound steel plate that things got... interesting.

Did we drop him on his head, or was he able to violate the laws o' gravity and walk on the ceiling?

Watch the video to find out!

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More on Router Firmware, EL, Wiring Robots, Wardriving, Data Sanitizing... and your ideas for future episodes: growing pot, building lightsaber replicas and DIY headphone amps!

Wardriving seems to be a favorite of viewer Justin. He's been sending, no, flooding, our email servers with requests to do an "...episode of Systm on Wardriving", so Patrick has Wardriving in 60 Seconds for Justin. ;

Patrick just wishes he'd remember to suggest InSSIDer instead of NetStumbler for Wardriving on Windows... it's mucho more functional on Vista and offers some nifty features.

Patrick out in Wisconsin wants us to build a Cantenna... nothing wrong with that, but we recommends he check out EP 45: Practically Free WiFi Antennas... where we went over 3 low cost but better than stock DIY options for boosting Wi-Fi reception.

Nick was so enamored with our build a combat robot episode a few months back he wants a wiring diagram for that very design. Thankfully Dave is here to share his wisdom on the whole thing and why it's a lot simpler than you might think.

Michael had question about an alternative method to erasing your hard drive that we didn't cover in Episode 74. Is it a sure fire winner or does it a few flaws that could potentially leave him susceptible to data thieves?

Danny had a question about the noise generated by the electroluminescence sheet we used in Episode 70 and Andrew had a related question about how to go about installing an EL sheet into the back of Macbook.

Of course in every batch of email we get there are always a few that could be considered eccentric or even "odd". But since we're all about equal opportunity we decided to put in a few of the more colorful email requests we received.

Brandon is quite excited about having us dedicate a show to growing pot... in a DIY hydroponics setup... in a secret 'geek friendly' hidden room behind a false bookshelf... wired with all the connectivity any geek might need while hiding out. Pat and Dave are amused and explain what may or may not keep them from attempting it in the near future.

Finally, Thomas wants us to show him how to build... a lightsaber. Not some cheap knock-off that looks like a lightsaber but a real honest to gosh replica of a the prop lightsabers used in the Star Wars movies.

Coincidentally, Dave just happens to be one of the world's biggest Star Wars fans and freaks on the planet. How freaky? Let's see: Homemade Storm trooper armor? Check. Hand built life-size R2D2? Double-check (he has 2). Replica lightsabers? Big check... he has a complete set based on the same parts the original prop makers built for the original Star Wars.

If you guys are interested... this is one we'll do soon!

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Dave and Pat break down the basics of RFID technology and show you how to put it to use by building an RFID beer safe!

Today on Systm we will be looking at how RFID technology works and demonstrate one possible use for around the home by building our very own RFID-enabled beer safe. It's just the thing to keep your brew safe from thirsty and inconsiderate roommates, friends or even in-laws!

Of course you can't walk into any Radio Shack or electronics store and buy RFID gear off the shelf. You'll probably have to get most of the gear online and two of the best places to do that are APSX and Trossen Robotics. Both offer Parallax's BASIC Stamp programming board that David uses in this episode. The kits will run around $100 but provide pretty much everything you need to get started. You'll also find RFID readers, servos, and tags you'll need to complete this project. Jameco is also an excellent source. If you're not sure how to program the board, don't worry - the manuals that ship with the kit are pretty straight forward. Plus Trossen Robotics provides excellent support if you have any issues with the gear.

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Make your own Brain in a Jar and a Giant Robot Spider - guaranteed to creep out your friends and frighten your neighbors!

First, we'll add a adding a special touch of strange to any indoor or outdoor décor when we build A Brain In A Jar. It's fun, easy to build and safe enough to build that your kids will have a blast helping you put it together. Best of all, the parts are easily and cheaply purchased or re-purposed items you probably have in your kitchen or garage. If you spend big money on the brain you might spend $50. Sure, you could build a similar product that's sold as a kit. (If you don't mind spending a lot more money.) We say do some scrounging and go DIY: it's a lot more fun!

Looking for something a bit bigger to frighten the local trick or treaters? You'll love one of our local San Francisco robotics mavins,

Nick Donaldson. He gave us some insight on how he created a huge hairy robotic spider, mummy and flying bat to terrify our local trick or treaters!

It's a spooktacular episode of Systm that you don't want to miss.

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Selling your old computerr? Donating it to charity? Learn how to permanently wipe your hard drives, with and without a blow torch!

Donating it to charity?

Worried about somebody finding your naughty photos or financial info?

Worried about getting sued 'cause your small business didn't take 'reasonable measures' to dispose of sensitive data?

Then you'll love this episode of Systm, where we get serious about wiping hard drives.

Or, to use more technical lingo, "purging or sanitizing your hard drive.

In part one, Roger Chang (in for David Calkins) walks you thru our favorite tools for wiping drives: Darik's Boot 'n Nuke...

Boot 'n Nuke covers the drive sanitization needs for 99% of you out there.

Part two is for the folks out there that absolutely, positively want to make sure nobody can get the data back off that drive, you need to think physical destruction of the drive... or at least the platters inside that drive.

Tons of commercial drive disposal companies will shred or degauss that drive for you and give you a certificate... it's the easiest thing to to, especially if you have a lot of drives to dispose of.

Want something a little more DIY? The watchwords are disintegrate, incinerate, pulverize, shred, or melt.

Thermite is fun, but the thick black smoke (not to mention the ridiculously high temps of burning Thermite) can easily lead to a visit from the fire deparment...

... we suggest your grab the proper sized precision Torx driver and remove the platters.

Then do what we did: grind off the surface, or melt the disks!

We like how Barry used a propane forge... we used a $50 BerzOMatic cutting torch kit... they're cheap and easy to find.

Where was David Calkins this week? At the Austin Maker Faire Austin running the Texas Cup... your basic combat robot mayhem!

More links:

Here's a good read on Guidelines for DoD-level secure erasure

DoD 5220.22-M

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Use a free download to turn a laser level and a netcam into a highly accurate 3D scanner... all you need is a corner and a printer to make it all work!

Ben Eadie has helped design, build and film three world record holding Human Powered Vehicles. He lives in 3D mechanical CAD programs, and one of his favorite tools for getting objects into his fave modeling tool, SolidWorks, is his home built laser scanner.

He shows us how to build one on this episode of Systm.

The key? A nifty chunk of software called DAVID Laserscanner, the basic version is free, a few minutes with printer, and a corner that has a 90° angle.

Nothing is cooler than taking stuff you already have and cobbling into a very functional tool.

Thanks to Ben for joining us on this episode!

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Synthesizers are cool, but the theremin is the original electronic instrument. We show you how to build one, and a master theremin player shows you what you can do with it.

Most if not all professionally used Theremins are produced by the Moog company. However, a number of companies Moog included build Theremin kits that you can assemble at home using copious amounts of solder and a soldering iron. For our purposes we went with the cheaper and less musical inclined PAiA Theremax kit. If you intend on following something approaching a career based on Theremin playing you're better off spending the additional cash on Moog's offerings.

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Your router gets a major upgrade with the free Tomato Firmware: monitor bandwidth consumption, boost your WiFi signal, make major QoS tweaks, track the results with shiny graphics... and more!

I'd like to give you a project suggestion for Systm: show us the proper method for upgrading an older wireless router with ddwrt firmware.

Frank in Tulsa

Great idea, especially since Patrick's long suffering Linksys WRT54G has been a touch flakey after the last firmware upgrade.

We just want to make one change: DD-WRT is great, but we're more into the Tomato Firmware upgrade... it's a tad less polished looking, but has slightly better quality of service contol than DD-WRT, allows boosting your your WiFi output, and has amazing bandwidth monitoring tools, which are great to keep in mind in wake of the new Comcast cap!

It runs on Linksys' WRT54G/GL/GS, Buffalo WHR-G54S/WHR-HP-G54 and other Broadcom-based routers, and, as Wikipedia puts it, is "based on the GPL sourcecode released by Linksys, but includes proprietary binary modules from the chipset manufacturer Broadcom. Portions of the code are licensed under the GNU General Public License, but the source code for the user interface is under a more restrictive license which forbids use without the author's permission." Which is to say, it's Open Source.

You can download the Tomato firmware at polarcloud.com/tomato.

The Tomato Firmware Wiki is incredibly helpful.

Here's the Tomato FAQ if you're curious.

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Lighting a tech project with Electroluminescent material can look super professional, but it's easy to damage it or shock yourself. Learn how to safely add EL to any tech project in this episode of Systm!

In this episode of Systm, Dr. Kiki and David Calkins give you all the info you need to safely add EL to any project.

Wondering where to buy EL material? It's easy to purchase online from sites like Electro Luminescence Inc. but it's not super cheap. Think around $60 for an A4 sized sheet and toss in another $10 - $30 for a power inverter.

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What does origami have to do with technology?

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1080p projectors still cost mounds of cash: in the long awaited conclusion of our Home Theater Month, David and Patrick build one up from a Lumenlab DIY Projector Kit.

The build, however, was tough.

First off, the kit we chose, Lumenlab's 120V S15 Mega-Kit is less a kit than a collection of parts you're not likely to find locally. It includes a pair of Fresnel lenses, the 400W 6500K bulb (and the ballast to power it) and the triplet lens use, ultimately, to focus the video on your wall.

That's all good. You then have to make a heap of design decisions based around the image size and distance you want to project (unless you decide to build a fox with a variable focal length), punch them into the (incredibly useful) FocalCalc II calculator, and get your favorite tool for measuring millimeters, 'cause precision is key for making this project work!

The other key is finding an LCD flat panel monitor you can scavenge that will work with a projector... many won't. If you can find a monitor listed in the LumenLab LCD Monitor Database you'll save yourself a ton of time (and cash) cracking open monitors that won't work!

We ended up buying a 15.4 inch WUXGA (1900x1200) panel and HDMI controller kit from Manhattan LCD: the bundled controller gave us HDMI input and HDCP compatibility so we can play Blu-ray discs, along with 1080p resolutions... sweet!

Before you try out this project for yourself, download the DIY Projector Guide and spend some quality time in the Projector Builder section of the Lumenlab Forums

It's a doable project but it takes some time and dedication... and patience, even without the comedy of errors we had!

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Learn how this high school student did the Segway one better... by building his own self balancing scooter!

It works... and chances are you can build one, too.

It wouldn't hurt to have access to a place like Menlo Park, CA's fabulous Tech Shop, a DIY haven of of expertise and space to make. Think 'co-op' for people that like to build. In exchange for a modest monthly fee, Daniel had access to tons of tools he might not have been able to a afford.

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Using the power of digital photos, common web tools and photo sharing sites we show you how Cassidy Curtis is documenting the changes to living breathing cities that's accessible to almost everyone with the click of a mouse.

Now one doesn't need to be a huge corporation like Google to accomplish a similar task. In fact Cassidy Curtis through his site Graffiti Archaeology is doing just that. Recording and documenting the every changing landscape of graffiti within the cities or New York, LA, London and San Francisco.

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DVR, HD Tuner, Blu-ray and more... Our fave HDTV expert, PCMag.com's Robert Heron, joins us with a host of tricks for turning Vista's Windows Media Center into a great Home Theater PC

You're gonna love this episode! Our fave HDTV expert, Robert Heron, from PCMag.com and DL.TV, joins Patrick with a host of expert ideas tips and tricks for turning your Windows Media Center into the ultimate media PC.

BTW, our new fave tool for playing Blu-ray movies in Windows Media Center is AcrSoft's TotalMedia Theater or TotalMedia Extreme...

Vista centric? Sure! It comes standard with Windows Vista Home Premium and Ultimate does a solid job playing DVDs, recording TV and handling your favorite audio and video files.

Looking to integrate Blu-ray playback into your WMC machine? Check out TotalMedia Theatre, $90, which not only plays well with the WMC interface, but still plays HD-DVD disks. It's definitely a more convenient than our former fave, CyberLink's PowerDVD 8 Ultra, $99.95, which bumps you out of the WMC GUI.

Vista... not so much? We also give you a list of WMC alternatives on the show... so you can turn just about any XP or Vista PC into an amazing Home Theater PC.

On the commercial front:

• SageTV
• SnapStream BeyondTV

Free and Open Source:

• tversity
• MediaPortal

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Don't have a lot of money for a new Home Theater PC? No problem. Mythbox is open source, free and runs great on a cheap PC. It's perfect for a HTPC if you're on a budget!

If it's new to you, check out the Wikipedia description of MythTV... it's a "Unix application which turns a computer with the necessary hardware into a network streaming digital video recorder, a digital multimedia home entertainment system, or Home Theater Personal Computer. MythTV is free software licensed under the GPL. It can be considered as a free and open source alternative to Tivo or Windows Media Center."

So for our Home Theater month, we drug our resident MythTV mavin, Brendan White, out of the IT department and in front of a camera to walk us thru configuring a MythTV machine, from CPU to tuner cards.

You can use it as a DVR, watch DVDs, and, of course, enjoy videos downloaded off the web -without- the hassle of file conversion or worrying if your player supports that particular codec.

Brendan's favorite way to build a MythTV box is using the Mythbuntu distro... an Ubuntu OS install customized for MythTV.

The MythTV Wiki has a ton of useful info on hardware.

The MythTV on Ubuntu Wiki can help you sort out any OS issues.

Looking for DVB drivers? Check out LinuxTV.org!

Thanks to Brendan for taking the time to walk us through this!

Wondering where the DIY projector episode of Systm is? It's coming... we've just had quite the comedy of errors getting it built. Our apologies on the delay!

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Dolby’s wizards reveal the three key tips to getting the best multichannel audio out of your home theater

That was the most repeated question when we asked you to submit your surround sound questions for the crew at Dolby.

It turns out that distance isn't nearly as critical as the angle at which they point toward the listener!

Dolby was generous enough to share some more tips for maxing out the performance of your multichannel audio system... watch the show to find out what they are, along with what the extra speakers do in a 7.1 system... and a nifty way to use houseplants to soup up your surround sound system!

Dolby's got a great Speaker Setup Guide... and if you're trying to figure out the difference between all the 'flavors' of surround sound, the Tech Overview is quite informative, from the original analog Dolby Surround found on VHS tapes to the latest lossless technology found on Blu-ray disks, Dolby TrueHD.

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With the sudden interest in hands-free operation of cellphones while driving Pat though it would be cool to take it one step further and use a speakerphone instead. Speakerphones are louder, easier to understand and sport that retro-Charlie's Angel cool geek chic that no in-ear handsfree system can match.

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Master Robot Builder David Calkins reveals the basics of putting together and programming your very own android. Plus find out what happens when we combine Patrick and non-dairy creamer.

Now if you want to get in on the robot action yourself, check out the RoboGames's special humanoid robot offer for Systm viewers here.

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If you're just itching for an excuse to reuse that retired desktop PC or laptop sitting in your closet there here's your chance. Today we'll be looking at the basics of installing FreeNAS, an open-source DIY NAS. So instead of spending money on off the shelf options why not save yourself some cash and make use of the stuff you already have and get a super customizable network storage device to boot.

All you need to build your own is a copy of the FreeNAS installer, and a PC. It doesn't take much of a PC: just 96MB of RAM a NIC, and a CD-ROM to install from along with a hard drive, and you're ready to go. Tho you'll probably want at least one fat new hard drive to stash your stuff on!

FYI: FreeNAS isn't the only option if you're intent on rolling your own NAS. Other options include Openfiler a great alternative to FreeNAS.

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