Samwise Makers' News
Tuesday, August 4, 2026
Sketching Temporary Circuits With A Light-Triggered Floquet Topological Insulator
Researchers at ETH Zurich have demonstrated a novel technique for sketching temporary conductive circuits using femtosecond laser pulses on a tin telluride (SnTe) semiconductor. The light triggers a Floquet topological insulator state, causing band inversion that creates conductive edge states — essentially drawing circuits in mid-air that vanish when the laser stops. Published in Nature Physics by Chassot et al., the work could enable reconfigurable electronics without physical wiring. Unlike permanent etching, these photoinduced states are fully reversible, opening possibilities for programmable RF shields, dynamic sensors, and temporary interconnects in experimental hardware.
The 16K Display That Ate Las Vegas
The Las Vegas Sphere’s interior display is pushing display engineering to its limits. The venue’s 160,000-square-foot concave screen uses 64,000 custom SACO LED tiles to achieve a native 16K resolution, driven by 7thSense Delta Media Servers over SMPTE ST 2110 IP video infrastructure. Content plays back at 60 fps in 12-bit 4:4:4 colour, demanding roughly 400 GB/s of sustained storage throughput. The result is a wraparound image so large that standard 4K cameras must be repositioned mid-shoot to prevent lens-edge distortion — a brand new production challenge for a brand new kind of venue.
Easy Theremin Uses ESP32
Building a theremin no longer requires hunting down vacuum tubes or vintage coils. This ESP32-based build uses two capacitive-touch antennae — one for pitch, one for volume — feeding directly into the chip’s onboard DAC for audio output. No external audio codec is needed. The project fits on a compact PCB and takes advantage of the ESP32’s touch peripheral, which measures capacitance changes as hands approach the antennae. The firmware maps capacitance deltas to frequency and amplitude, producing a classic theremin sound with remarkably little hardware. Full schematics and code are available for makers to replicate.
Hacknect: A Wireless Automation Platform Inside a USB Cable
Hacknect squeezes an ESP32-S3 wireless automation platform inside a standard USB-A connector shell — the same size as a thumb drive. Once plugged in, it presents as a USB HID device capable of Wi-Fi-triggered keystroke injection, scriptable button sequences, and browser-based dashboard control over any network. Onboard microSD stores payloads locally, and a self-destruct mode can wipe stored scripts on command. Currently live on Kickstarter from $76, the campaign targets network pentesters, home automation hackers, and anyone who needs programmable USB-HID without soldering a custom board. Shipping is expected Q4 2026.
Sources: Hackster.io
myCobot 280 X Edition (10th Anniversary)
Elephant Robotics is marking its 10th anniversary with a special edition of its popular myCobot 280 desktop 6-axis collaborative robot arm. The X Edition features a limited-color body finish, an anniversary badge, and a unique commemorative serial number — making it both a functional tool and a collector’s piece for robotics enthusiasts. The 280-mm reach arm retains all standard myCobot capabilities: ROS2 compatibility, drag-and-teach programming, and a wide ecosystem of end effectors. Only a limited quantity will be produced, and units are available now through Elephant Robotics’ website and authorized distributors.
Sources: Hackster.io
Autodesk Fusion on Linux: Five Workarounds That Actually Run It
Autodesk Fusion doesn’t officially support Linux, but All3DP has catalogued five working approaches for makers who live on Arch or Ubuntu. The options range from running Fusion inside a Windows VM (VirtualBox or VMware) to streaming via GeForce Now, trying WINE through the Bottles front-end, using the browser-based Fusion Lite for basic modelling, or simply dual-booting Windows on a separate partition. Each method comes with trade-offs around GPU pass-through, latency, feature limits, and stability. The guide rates GeForce Now as the most reliable for full-featured CAD without a Windows licence.
BG2B Is the Lowest-Power Bluetooth LE SoC from Silicon Labs So Far
Silicon Labs has announced the BG2B, claiming the title of lowest-power Bluetooth LE SoC in its lineup. The chip pairs an Arm Cortex-M33 core running at up to 80 MHz with Bluetooth 6.0 LE, entering a 1.1 µA sleep current in EM2 standby mode. It supports the new Channel Sounding feature for precise ranging, includes CAN-FD for industrial connectivity, and carries Secure Vault High certification for hardware-level security. Target applications include asset tracking tags, industrial wireless nodes, and medical wearables where battery life measured in years is a hard requirement.
Sources: CNX Software
ChronoWatch X2040 – A DIY Watch With RP2040, 3D Printed Case, Custom Firmware
ChronoWatch X2040 is a fully open DIY smartwatch built around the Waveshare RP2040-Touch-LCD-1.28, a compact module with a 1.28-inch circular display and onboard touchscreen controller, available for $23–$29. The 3D-printed case was designed in Tinkercad, making it approachable for beginners, while the firmware is written in C/C++ using the RP2040 SDK for full performance. A 950 mAh LiPo cell provides multi-day runtime. The project is fully documented with STL files, schematics, and source code, offering makers a practical hands-on platform for experimenting with wearable displays and low-power embedded firmware design.
Sources: CNX Software
28.9M-Parameter LLM Runs Locally on ESP32-S3 at 9 Tokens/s
The slvDev esp32-ai project demonstrates that a 28.9-million-parameter language model can run on an ESP32-S3 at a usable 9 tokens per second. The model uses Google’s Per-Layer Embeddings quantization, compressing weights to just 14.9 MB in 4-bit format — small enough to fit in the 16 MB flash of an ~$8 development board. No cloud connection required. While output quality doesn’t match larger models, the project proves that meaningful on-device inference is within reach of commodity microcontrollers. The full source code and model weights are published on GitHub for developers wanting to experiment with edge AI on constrained hardware.
Sources: CNX Software
Top Crowdfunding
Kickstarter / Indiegogo
1. Hacknect — ESP32-S3 automation inside a USB-A cable (Kickstarter, from $76)
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GitHub Trending
Makers & Hardware
1. slvDev/esp32-ai — 28.9M-param LLM on ESP32-S3 ★
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Curated by JD · samwise.agency
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