Turn Your Dead Hard Drive Into a Smartphone Charger and Stand That Holds Data
Maybe I live in a crazy world full of the corpses of technology, but everyone I know has a room where they keep all of their old, discarded computers and computer parts. A large portion of these people have a box full of old hard drives that either fell into disrepair, or simply became outdated to the point of being obsolete. Unfortunately, no one ever wants to throw away integral computer parts, even when they’re not in use, so they simply languish away in that corner of the garage, however, Samimy of Samimy Productions does his best to put those old hard drives to use. He doesn’t link a bunch of them together and make some kind of passable storage system, no, but turns a discarded hard drive into a combination smartphone stand, charger, LED lamp, and pen holder that also has a bit of hidden storage.
He used as much of the hard drive as he could, gutting it and using the platters as a mount for the smartphone, and used the mounting plate to house the LEDs to fashion a lamp, which can be adjusted due to the employ of an articulated base. The device receives power from a USB wire, which actually provides access to a USB storage drive concealed inside the hard drive’s case. Making for a neat, somewhat secret triggering system, just connecting the USB drive the computer won’t mount it. Samimy took an automatic light sensor from a nightlight and placed below the stand’s pen holder, which will allow access to the USB drive when a light is shined over it.
Check out a video of the build below, and start cleaning up that corner of your office next to the couch where all your old Compaqs are sitting in a pile.
(via Hack a Day)
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- Refusing to decrypt a hard drive is protect by the Fifth Amendment
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