It’s always time for Pong.

Erf. Site still under construction. I’m missing awesome CSS+JS-generated shadows around the images. Grrr.

Hey, click the images - they grow!

CAUTION: Bad English and Heady Language alert!

So that Pong Clock is finally available to order. So what do you get for your $240? A custom circuit board, 5×7 (from the looks of it) screen, and the ability to play it.

How about… no. Don’t get me wrong, I love the idea, I love the fact that the whole piece is a custom work. But surely we can make one of our own!

Luckily, the software is available as a screen saver that you can download free of charge, albeit with a copyright on the bottom.

So, first take a Pismo PowerBook and get it into working condition! Ditch the battery and the optical drive - leave those bays open for airflow.

Did that? Okay, on to the real work. You may need this.

pong1

Take the screen off and remove the casing, but keep the thin metal frame around it and the hinges. Disconnect the cabling going from the display to the powerbook, and unwrap the display cable (orange) from the hinge to get the most length out of it. Also unplug the white & black power cable from the board it is attached to. Remove this long thin circuit board - this is the power inverter board. Put it aside for later.

Re-attach the display, but backwards. Run the orange display cable back to the motherboard and plug it in, taping it to the back of the LCD. We have display action! Now you need to fiddle - as you can see from the photo, I was lazy and just slapped the inverter board to the back of the LCD. Make sure to get it and the power cable from the display just hidden enough by the LCD panel, then tape it to the panel.

The better way to do this would be to split the board in two, or better yet, extend those power cables - you can do that if you want. I’d be proud of you.

pong2
You should have an AirPort card installed. Of course, now it has no antenna. It is a sad neutered wireless device. But no worries, we’ll reposition the antenna assembly - just like a sex change operation.

Take the antenna assembly (3 cables in a Y shape with a circuit board in the middle, with a thin metal antenna on one of the Y ends. It was in the display casing you removed. Pay attention!) Wrap all of the cabling around that thin metal antenna, making a nice tight little antenna package, with enough length to still plug into the AirPort card. It should look like a scary version of a transistor radio kit antenna assembly. Stick this wherever - as you can see in the photo, I’ve Velcroed (ah, verbs) this to the Pismo’s internal battery. Voila, a surprisngly strong AirPort antenna.

Remove the keyboard completely, we won’t be needing it where we’re going. From here on, you can do what you like to close it up, but I’ll tell you how I did it…

pong3

There are two holes on the top-right and -left sides of the metal frame attached to the LCD. I Dremeled (ah, more verbage) two screw holes in the plastics, so that I could keep this monstrosity closed up using two small screws that I repurposed from the LCD’s plastic casing. Done.

But look! There’s a nasty bit of inverter board sticking out of the bottom. Yikes. Plus the metal hinges look a bit… Brazil. So, I took the plastic hinge cover, cut out enough room for the corner of the inverter board, then covered that hole up with a Dremeled (cut, shaved and screw holes added) cover piece - I used a bit of the display casing for this. I think it gives it a nifty homebrew look.

pong4

The hardware is finished! Go ahead and hang it on your wall as you see fit.

Now for the software. Grab that Pong screensaver from the Pong Clock site linked above. Install it on a Windows PC. Go into the installation directory, and grab the pong_clock.swf file. Install this along with a copy of SAFlashPlayer - it is a Flash runtime that comes installed with the full version of Flash, but I’m pretty sure you can nab it from Macromedia’s site. Open the pong_clock.swf file with it, and run it in full screen mode.

pong5

And you are done, man! Enjoy the hypnotic, Pongy delights that only a hacked Pong Clock can offer. And what did you spend? Nothing, right? Maybe $3 on some epoxy to mount a hook or two to the back of the unit?

You’re welcome.

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Published:
01.23.06 / 8pm
Category:
Technology, Design