techbeck Posted July 12, 2013 Share Posted July 12, 2013 Hello, and welcome back to today?s episode of ?Why? LOL BECAUSE WE CAN.? Tired of your dumb old microwave that just shoots friggin? radio waves at food to cook it? Stupid thing probably can?t even play animated GIFs or send Snapchats or download the Fergie. What?s the point? In the coolest mod I?ve seen in ages, developer Nathan Broadbent has hacked away at his microwave to add stuff that any self-respecting microwave manufacturer of the year 2013 should have probably added themselves. Voice commands! Barcodes that pre-set cooking times! A SELF SETTING CLOCK. Meet the Raspberry Picrowave. As you might?ve gathered from the name, it?s a Microwave mashed up with a Raspberry Pi, the $25 micro-computer adored by modders, hackers, and geeks ?round the world Here?s what it can do so far: Clock sets/updates itself across the Internet A barcode scanner pulls cooking instructions from an online database. Such a database didn?t actually exist, so he?s building one himself, adding directions as he goes. Voice Commands, like ?Microwave, Twenty seconds, Low.? (Alas, Nathan says his kitchen?s acoustics screw this up a bit.) Custom sound effects (because beeps are for chumps). You can control the microwave from your phone. The only uses I can think of for this are: when you know you?ll want microwaved popcorn later and can preload a bag, or when you want to convince your friends that you?re the biggest geek on the planet because you have a microwave that you can control with your phone. It tweets when it?s done cooking, because of course it does. If nothing else, man oh man do I want that self-setting clock. My (two-year old) microwave uses the most ridiculous and impossibly obfuscated series of button presses for clock setting, so a power outage at my house generally means at least three months of the microwave swearing that it?s blink-thirty. Stuffing a Pi into your microwave is cool and all, but the scale of the project gets a whole lot more impressive once he starts getting into the deeper details, from wiring the Pi into the microwave?s power supply, to designing a new control panel, to etching and producing a custom PCB that fits in the place of the original. http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=e2YtARzJTys#at=157 Thought this was kinda cool Hum, FiB3R and Dick Montage 3 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
neufuse Veteran Posted July 12, 2013 Veteran Share Posted July 12, 2013 yeah, and for anyone who's followed the directions on microwave items.... you know they are never right... either too long or not long enough.... times change by environment, how well the microwave works, etc... ozgeek and BajiRav 2 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Copernic Reporter Posted July 12, 2013 Reporter Share Posted July 12, 2013 Where is this one??? Crisp, Hum, Sadelwo and 3 others 6 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ILikeTobacco Posted July 12, 2013 Share Posted July 12, 2013 yeah, and for anyone who's followed the directions on microwave items.... you know they are never right... either too long or not long enough.... times change by environment, how well the microwave works, etc... Did you watch the video? Just after 1:00 it addresses your concern. You program the time yourself. It is not fully automatic. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arceles Posted July 12, 2013 Share Posted July 12, 2013 Wow... I'm sold. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SidVicious Posted July 12, 2013 Share Posted July 12, 2013 Now use the microwave to send messages to the past. Nagisan and Hum 2 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
xendrome Posted July 12, 2013 Share Posted July 12, 2013 Seems like someone trying to find a solution to a problem that doesn't exist, and it ends up just over complicating a simple device. Put item in, press buttons, get item out, eat. That's what 99.999% of us do with our Microwaves. Does it REALLY need all of this? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ILikeTobacco Posted July 12, 2013 Share Posted July 12, 2013 Seems like someone trying to find a solution to a problem that doesn't exist, and it ends up just over complicating a simple device. Put item in, press buttons, get item out, eat. That's what 99.999% of us do with our Microwaves. Does it REALLY need all of this? Yes. Every time the power goes out from a thunderstorm, the clock resets. So annoying having to reset it and I am too OCD not to have the right time on it. :D spikey_richie and Sadelwo 2 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Klownicle Posted July 12, 2013 Share Posted July 12, 2013 Makes humans more lazy, it will be an instant seller. Novel idea about the barcode scanner - auto set settings. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Thayios Subscriber² Posted July 12, 2013 Subscriber² Share Posted July 12, 2013 It would be really cool if all the MFG of frozen food started to use a bar code kind of like the Tassimo or Keurig - the microwave would pickup the label and know exactly how long and could even display directions at intervals (like those peel back the plastic stir and put back for x amount of minutes). Really would simplify the process even more Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hum Posted July 12, 2013 Share Posted July 12, 2013 When it's done popping, it tells you, "Hey, lazy --- get off your ass, the popcorn is done !" :D Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fish Posted July 12, 2013 Share Posted July 12, 2013 Seems like someone trying to find a solution to a problem that doesn't exist, and it ends up just over complicating a simple device. Put item in, press buttons, get item out, eat. That's what 99.999% of us do with our Microwaves. Does it REALLY need all of this? That's kind of the point though. Not because it's particularly useful, but just because he can. :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ahhell Posted July 12, 2013 Share Posted July 12, 2013 I like the from The Fifth Element better. Chicken. Goood. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Torolol Posted July 12, 2013 Share Posted July 12, 2013 it just need to add toaster devices support for completeness. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FiB3R Posted July 12, 2013 Share Posted July 12, 2013 "download the Fergie"? :huh: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Crisp Posted July 12, 2013 Share Posted July 12, 2013 But will it play Cry... You wouldn't download a hamburgler. FiB3R 1 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
f0rk_b0mb Posted July 12, 2013 Share Posted July 12, 2013 I want one! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hum Posted July 12, 2013 Share Posted July 12, 2013 "download the Fergie"? :huh: http://www.emusic.com/album/fergie/the-dutchess/12234782/ FiB3R 1 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
neufuse Veteran Posted July 12, 2013 Veteran Share Posted July 12, 2013 Did you watch the video? Just after 1:00 it addresses your concern. You program the time yourself. It is not fully automatic. no, because I couldn't view the video earlier Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nagisan Posted July 12, 2013 Share Posted July 12, 2013 Now use the microwave to send messages to the past. But then he would have to deal with SERN..... SidVicious 1 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
primexx Posted July 12, 2013 Share Posted July 12, 2013 would have been better to just set a desired uniform temperature and a sensor to detect it in the food. microwave as long as it takes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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