IKEA Frekvens LED box hack

Shout out to the amaaaaazing folks at Teenage Engineering who built this with Ikea, you can also 3D print accessories for the Ferkvens: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;teenage.engineering&#x2F;designs&#x2F;frekvens-hacks" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;teenage.engineering&#x2F;designs&#x2F;frekvens-hacks</a>

This is the same guy that installed Linux on his hard drive&#x27;s controller. A very interesting read:<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;spritesmods.com&#x2F;?art=hddhack" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;spritesmods.com&#x2F;?art=hddhack</a>

This isn&#x27;t the only project to hack the Frekvens. Here&#x27;s code + instructions (not mine) for hacking the box with an Arduino + AdaFruit GFX library: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;frumperino&#x2F;FrekvensPanel" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;frumperino&#x2F;FrekvensPanel</a><p>It seems fairly approachable if you don&#x27;t mind the disassembly &#x2F; reassembly required.

This is a very nice hack, and I enjoyed the writeup (minus the fact that the site isn&#x27;t easily readable on mobile).<p>As someone who does a lot of this stuff too, I&#x27;ve kind of realized that it&#x27;s hard to get an audience unless you&#x27;re making YouTube videos. I&#x27;ve heard of many &quot;YouTube makers&quot; but very rarely has someone sent me an article like this one.<p>Does anyone have first-hand experience with this? I don&#x27;t much like making videos, but if that&#x27;s what gets more people to see my stuff, maybe it&#x27;s worth it. Am I correct or do I just see the videos from creators because they managed to already get popular, and they just happen to be on YouTube?

Reminds me of when I went crazy with some Christmas lights: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;blog.jgc.org&#x2F;2011&#x2F;11&#x2F;turning-ge-color-effects-g-35-christmas.html" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;blog.jgc.org&#x2F;2011&#x2F;11&#x2F;turning-ge-color-effects-g-35-c...</a>

For the impatient, the final product is here: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;youtu.be&#x2F;UCPUPO21Cwk?t=17" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;youtu.be&#x2F;UCPUPO21Cwk?t=17</a> linked from the fifth page of the post: <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;spritesmods.com&#x2F;?art=frekvens&amp;page=5" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;spritesmods.com&#x2F;?art=frekvens&amp;page=5</a><p>It&#x27;s an eye that follows movement around, pretty cool.

Funny how abit of clever software can take full advantage of the hardware. The authors eye is way more impressing than the OEM&#x27;s.

Can anyone explain how PWM (pulse width modulation) uses more computational power than binary code modulation (or bit angle modulation)?

Feels like IKEA could capitalize on an opportunity here to provide a beginner friendly devkit to control the patterns. I love writing software but am less delighted by physical messing around :)

&gt; Ikea is an interesting store. Even if you go in having in mind you&#x27;re only going to buy that one thing that you actually need and this time you&#x27;re not going to be distracted by other crap, you tend to come out with about three times the amount of things you wanted to buy.<p>Yeah, there&#x27;s a lot to say about Ikea&#x27;s psychological warfare. They are really good (not to mean their products isn&#x27;t, you get my drift).

If you like Blinky toys, check out the magicShifter3000 which is a persistence-of-vision-based pocket computer with its own built-in web editor and other crazy features (lightshow, arpeggiator, etc.):<p><a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;magicshifter.net&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;magicshifter.net&#x2F;</a><p>Fully open source, available here:<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;magicshifter" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;magicshifter</a>

For a much more interesting (but similar) bit of kit, see the Pixoo (<a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.divoom.com&#x2F;product&#x2F;pixoo.html" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.divoom.com&#x2F;product&#x2F;pixoo.html</a>)

I would love to see this installed above a doorbell.<p>Blank until someone approaches, then the &quot;Eye&quot; appears with no sound, and follows the persons movement at the door.<p>Super creepy.

This will probably be the only Teenage Engineering device I can afford.<p>I just need to find a store that carries them.

I’m really annoyed this range isn’t getting a more global release. We won’t be seeing these in Australia.

I think the gamma on that code is off. Pixel values != linear luminance

looks like ikea carries over their minimalism to their PCB design, too.

Unreadable design on the website, but a cool project.

Having the ad so close to the “Previous” and “Next” buttons is a violation of AdSense terms of service because it strongly encourages accidental clicks, especially on mobile. But I suppose that’s the whole reason they broke their blog post up into multiple pages in the first place.

So this IKEA thing is a 16x16 LED box. (btw: Ikea is evil)<p>Related: LEDmePlay 32x32 LED box with some cool games:<p><a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.mithotronic.de&#x2F;ledmeplay.php" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.mithotronic.de&#x2F;ledmeplay.php</a><p>The actual 32x32 RGB panel (6mm pitch) is around $19 from AliExpress. There is even a handheld version with 4mm dot pitch.