As technology (seemingly) marches ever forward, makers are thirsty to get their hands on the latest gadgets and gear. But you don’t always need “new” to have fun. Whether it’s rosy nostalgia or a healthy respect for what engineers of old (or the late 1900s as the kids say) were able to achieve with limited resources, there’s whole megabytes to love and learn about the technology of yesterday. In this retro-themed issue of
Make:
we show you how to play your favorite old-school video games by building your own DIY arcade game, from a full-size cabinet to a tiny programmable microcade. Next, 35 years later the Nintendo Game Boy is still going strong! Cat Graffam tells how she and many others fell in love with the Game Boy Camera and developed a playable art gallery to showcase photos from the community, while Nikola Whallon walks through adding the Pro-Sound Mod to your Game Boy to add more professional sound to your chiptune jams. Then, 18-year-old Daniel Bunting talks about his process for cutting custom small-batch records using polycarbonate discs. Brian Johnson reports on the serendipitous discovery of a cache of 1980s era hardware that jump-started a community around the long defunct NABU computer system. And finally, read a love letter to PC sound cards, and how maker Ian Scott has worked to recreate the unique “tracker” sound with a Raspberry Pi Pico. Plus, 45+ projects including:
Build or 3D print a camera lucida that lets you draw accurately by tracing real life
Install a microcontroller-powered scale on your espresso machine to pull the perfect shot every time
Track your furry, four-legged friends using GPS and your own LoRa network
Add polyphonic sound to your projects the easy way with WVR, a no-code, Wi-Fi audio board
Make a thermal printing photo booth robot out of a vintage TLR camera
Columnist Charles Platt pays tribute after the recent passing of seminal author Don Lancaster, who explained the mysteries of logic chips for generations of DIY hobbyists
Pro tips for making the most of your laser projects with LightBurn software
Build fun, simple stomp rockets using PVC pipe and soda bottles
And more!