[CS-FSLUG] Hacker...Me

[Jim Isbell, W5JAI]

Many years ago when I first started in computers..about 1958 was the
beginning for me.  Back in the early 70s, the term "Hacker" was a badge of
excellence.  Then someone hijacked the term and made it into a criminal
activity.  As proof of its origions, "Hacker" has no meaning in its current
usage.  In its original usage it reffered to people that "Hacked" the copper
traces on the PC boards in order to make the circuit do something extra,
like go faster, or add more memory than was designed in.  The early
"Hackers" like myself were usually working on the TRS80 model 1 or others of
its contemporaries.  I remember hacking a TRS 80 so that I could add a 5
Mbyte Hard drive ($400 for 5 Mbytes and I thought it was a bargain and that
I would NEVER be able to fill it up),  I also upped the memory from 8K to
64K bytes!!!  And now we can buy 1.5TeraBytes of HD for $100.  What a deal.

But the point of this post is to ask if "Hacking" still goes on?  Is it
still profitable to hack a motherboard or is it just cheaper to buy a new
one?

The reason I ask is that I have two projects in mind and am wondering if
they are possible.

1a) I purchased an old tower desktop at the thrift store for $4 the other
day (Intel Pentium III, speed unknown, memory unknown) that I am using for a
"Server" for my telephone system, a MagicJack.  It isnt running Linux
because MagicJack doesnt support Linux...unfortunately...so its running XP
see more about this below.  It doesn't have a keyboard or monitor connected
and just sits in the bottom of a closet where it is connected to the home
LAN and to my in house telephone circuit.  I want to speed it up....without
paying a bunch for it.  Can they be hacked these days to double or quadruple
the clock by just moving a few traces on the circuit board?  The computer
will have no other function than to be the "server" for the telephone
system.

1b) Also involved with this project is trying to figure out how to use my
desktop running Freespire 2.0 Linux to connect to the telephone server on
the LAN so that I can use my keyboard and monitor to operate the XP computer
by remote.  Maybe not possible as I have never been able to get the Linux
computer to interface with my wife's XP PC either.  Maybe there is some
software that will pull the two together???

2) The second project is to hack a Magellen GPS with a 3.5 inch screen so
that I can insert TV from a rear facing camera on the back of the car for a
rear view mirror. I dont have room for TWP 3.5" screens and I want to remove
the outside rear view mirrors to increase my mileage.  I can buy a complete
system, but it costs $120 and it would give me two 3.5" screens to watch.
At my age I dont need the extra distractions and the cockpit of the Insight
is close anyway.

Maybe neither of these projects is possible, but if they are and there are
people doing it I would like to find them.


Jim Isbell
"If you are not living on the edge, well then,
you are just taking up too much space."
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