jwz: 11-Mar-2015 (Wed)

USB Killer

"I burnt down everything I could. Then I ordered boards from China and made a combat model."

The basic idea of the USB drive is quite simple. When we connect it up to the USB port, an inverting DC/DC converter runs and charges capacitors to -110V. When the voltage is reached, the DC/DC is switched off. At the same time, the filed transistor opens. It is used to apply the -110V to signal lines of the USB interface. When the voltage on capacitors increases to -7V, the transistor closes and the DC/DC starts. The loop runs till everything possible is broken down.

Previously, previously, previously, previously, previously, previously.

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Tags: computers, doomed, mad science, pranks, security

Current Music: Fujiya & Miyagi -- Daggers ♬

jwz mixtape 150

8 years ago

Please enjoy jwz mixtape 150.

And today in "Youtube sucks" news --

Remember a while ago I complained that Youtube seemed to have removed the feature where you can set the start and end times of videos in a playlist, thwarting my ability to make my playlists skip over end credits and other noise? Well, the Shriekback fellows screwed up and left 4 minutes of black at the end of their video -- and I can't tell the playlist to omit it. So, you know, hit "Next" when that happens. Blah. (Oh, nevermind, I moved it to the end, even though it doesn't fit best there.)

Thanks, Youtube, you just get better every day in every way.

The missing feature is still documented even though the interface no longer exists, and by using the API, I was able to set the end time of that track to 04:11, but the player still ignores it.