Looks like the boys over at xda have some new hacking goodness coming your way, and this time it’s against the carrier for the HTC Evo 4G, Sprint. You see, if you go over your allotted amount of data in a given month, Sprint will give you a little slap on the hand by throttling your data. This means that your data speeds will drop dramatically, leaving you scratching your head and throwing your phone.

However, xda user BThomas22x has found a weakness in the Evo file system, allowing your device to not succumb to Sprint’s data throttles and caps. The hack does require your device to be rooted, but is as simple as putting a file on your sd card and flashing it through recovery. If it doesn’t work that way, however, there is an alternate, more complicated method. It should be noted that this hack will not do anything to your current internet or data speeds, but will simply destroy any data throttles that Sprint tries to put on your device. If you’re ready to don your geek hat and give it a shot, check out the mod thread here, and be sure to let us know how it goes and what you think in the comments!

HTC Evo 4G hack aims to get around Sprint data throttling and caps, maximize data speeds

View full post on Android News, Rumours, and Updates

It’s impossible not to respect the guys at XDA-Developers. They are so good at taking their favorite mobile platforms and getting much, much more out of them. Apps, hacks, tweaks, roots, and roms — these guys make it happen. And their newest development is no less impressive: A new hack for Apps2SD that greatly improves performance. Read More…

New Hack for Desire for Apps2SD Shows Remarkable Results in Speed Benchmarks

View full post on Android News, Rumours, and Updates

Black Friday? Pssh. More like Tablet Friday. Today, some very interesting pieces of information have come out of Notion Ink’s new website thanks to the easter eggs they’ve been putting up. Firstly, a daily binary counter in the upper-right corner of the site has been counting down, and through countless man hours of scientific experiments and deductive reasoning, we’ve been able to peg December 9th as a special day for the Adam tablet. Announcement? Pre-orders? We don’t know, but we’ll be watching closely come that time.

Another hint was found in the site’s source code. The Notion Ink team silently slipped this message into the markup:

“For any sneaky fellows looking through the code, here’s a tidbit for you, there’s a very awesome hidden sensor we’re going to be revealing soon  .”

I’ve never been one to get excited for sensors on a smartphone or tablet device, but Notion Ink seems to have gotten me. I want to know what it is and I want to know now. Unfortunately, it looks like we’ll have to wait to hear more on that unless someone is able to find out ahead of Notion Ink’s timeline. Finally, what looks to be a model number of some sort has appeared below the binary countdown. It reads “-D5720A80″. Actually, I haven’t the slightest idea of what it could be. It’s rather long-winded for a model number, and it’s not often you see a model number with letters sitting between the integers.

Thinking back to my programming days, I realized it looks a lot like Hex code, and a quick spin of a hexadecimal converter brought about the following number: 3,581,020,800. A quick trip to Wolfram|Alpha lets me know that 3,581,020,800 miliseconds is equivalent to 41.44700, or 41 when rounded down. I then thought back to the daily countdown timer and figured out that January 4th is 41 days from now. What else is on January 4th, you say? Of course, it’s CES.

Other theories have popped up, but this just makes too much sense. I could be wrong (especially considering the hex code would have to change very often to support a countdown theory unless it’s programmed to update once per day), but there’s really nothing else to go on. Just circle January 4th and December 9th on your calendars and be on the lookout. We’ll be keeping a close eye on the site from now on to see if anything changes (if that Hex number isn’t any different tomorrow, then we can rule out the countdown theory for sure.)

I almost forgot there were some other tablets to talk about! Woow’s bringing out their 10-inch tablet that has Tegra 2 packed in, 1GB of RAM, 16GB of internal storage, 3G, WiFi, Bluetooth, and more according to the source who leaked information on it. We’re sure we’ll here more about it as CES nears.

Finally, the Advent Vega has been hacked and a ROM has been made to include the full suite of Google apps to help round out the experience. MoDaCo’s Paul O’Brien was our benefactor – as he often is – and he even has an add-on which will speed the thing up even more. If you were able to get your hands on one of these tablets (they sold out like hot cakes on a cold Sunday morning), then you might want to take a look at this thread.

View full post on Android Phone Fans

Is it the eleventh hour and you still have no costume for the kiddos? No worries! Those brown bags from the grocery store come in handy for all kinds of things, but this time of year they’re the go-to material for last-minute Halloween costumes. You can have any of these costumes ready to wear in less than 24 hours, but some will take no more than an hour or two.

First, you’ll need to know how to create a paper bag vest. With the opening of the bag facing you, cut up the middle of the bag and over the fold at the bag’s bottom. Cut a 6-8” hole in the bottom of the bag for the neck. Cut 4-6” holes in each side for the armholes. Carefully turn the vest inside out so that the store logo is on the inside, and you’re ready for transformation. If you plan to paint the bag, you’ll want to do that the day before you plan to decorate it.

Here are ten quick and easy paper bag costumes to get you started:

1. Fisherman: Trim the vest so that the front edges are rounded (see photo). Glue on an assortment of old fishing gear, like lures, bobbers, and flies.

• Wear with: Jeans, a flannel shirt, and a funky hat.
• Accessorize: Carry a fishing pole.

2. Cowboy: Fringe the bottom of the vest and glue on “pockets” cut from a second paper bag.

• Wear with: Jeans, a flannel shirt, a bandana, and a straw hat.
• Accessorize: Tie on a rope.

3. Robot: Paint the paper bag vest silver and add a control panel with miscellaneous parts from the toolbox like washers and springs or old computer components.

• Wear with: Grey sweats and a grey sweatshirt.
• Accessorize: Make a robot head out of a small square box that fits over your child’s head.

[Read Kris Bordessa's article, with seven more amazing costumes from paper bags, at GeekMom!]

View full post on GeekDad

Android Hackers unite! We have a cheap way for you to charge your Android device (possibly any device) with a plastic hand cranked flashlight!

Now, I know this may be a tall order for some of us, but it does require that we use “manual power” to crank out those volts of electricity. It’s not like we’re asking anyone to run the IronMan or anything here. Just a few turns of the arm, which pales in comparison to the amount of energy used to say….scoop a bowl of your favorite ice cream, or go wii bowling, or…you get the idea.

Read more…

Hack Alert – Crank Charge your Android!

View full post on Google Android News Android Forums

Cthulhu Dice by Steve Jackson Games

Perhaps unsurprisingly (considering that I’m a fellow with a d20 permanently inked onto his bicep), I have a lot of dice around the house. From an early age my son has been enamored by their various shapes, sizes and hues, and at five I finally feel that he’s reached an age where I can really introduce him to dice gaming. The problem, of course, is that most dice games are a bit too complex for a kindergartner. To remedy this I created a simplified version of Steve Jackson Games’ Cthulhu Dice using our own “house rules.”

For those unfamiliar, Cthulhu Dice is a game where players take on the roles of cultists serving the Great Old One in an attempt to drive each other mad. (Y’know – like they do.) Using nothing more than flat marbles as sanity tokens and a custom D12 to handle the give and take as sanity pass between players and the titular cephalopod, it’s not particularly complex on its own. Still, I realized it could be easily streamlined for the younger set.

First off, the back story needed some clever amending. I explained to my boy that Cthulhu was a very hungry monster that liked to eat marbles. To this end I actually brought a plush Cthulhu to the table so that he could more clearly visualize who was vying for his tokens. I also eliminated the game’s original choose a target/attack/counter-attack gameplay by making it a strictly two-player experience. Further, I simplified the dice mechanic itself a bit.

As in standard Cthulhu Dice, both players begin sitting on opposite sides of the play surface with 3 marbles each. The Cthulhu plushy occupies the center of the table in an attempt to gobble up as many of both players’ marbles as possible. These players take turns rolling the die with the following effects:

	Crazy Question Mark (AKA: Yellow Sign) – The other player gives one marble to Hungry Cthulhu.
	Caterpillar (AKA: tentacle) – The other player gives one marble to you.
	Star (AKA: Elder Sign) – You may take one marble from Hungry Cthulhu’s stash. If he doesn’t have any marbles then you get nothing.
	Cthulhu: Both players lose a marble to Hungry Cthulhu.
	The Eye: Everyone is safe, and no marbles change hands.

Play continues until one character loses all his marbles to his opponent and/or Hungry Cthulhu, and the winner gets to roll first in the next game. The great thing about Cthulhu Dice in general is there’s practically no setup, and you can take it anywhere. Sure, you might not have a plush Elder God with you at a restaurant while you’re waiting on your appetizers, but after a couple of rounds your tyke should understand the concept even without this additional visual cue.

This game helps teach little ones about random probability (thanks to use of a die), as well as core mathematics skills like counting and the relationship between number and quantity. It also affords kids who are far too young to sit in on your regular Catan or D&D sessions a chance to get in a little play time in a real die-based game. Best of all Cthulhu Dice is an easily affordable title that many of us already have in our libraries.

But can you even put a price on introducing your kids to the Dread Sleeper?

View full post on GeekDad

Images Courtesy of I-Wei from Crabfu Artworks

Ever want to take a picture of that cool insect you found on your last nature hike but all you had was your iPhone? Well I-Wei, a friend of GeekDad and the great mind behind Crabfu Artworks has a hack for you. By attaching an inexpensive field microscope to his iPhone case he was able to take pictures of the tiny world around us. Check out his video and pictures at The Crabfu Artworks Blog.

I’ve always been a big fan of I-Wei’s steam powered machines so make sure you check out Crabfu Steam Works for some awesome toys.

If you do make an iPhone scope remember to post your pictures to the GeekDad Flickr Group

View full post on GeekDad

The upcoming Black Hat security conference in Las Vegas, July 28-29, offers an annual parade of security researchers revealing new ways to break various elements of the Internet. But, says Forbes.com, few of the talks have titles quite as alarming as one on this year’s schedule: “How to Hack Millions of Routers.”

Craig Heffner, a researcher with Maryland-based security consultancy Seismic, plans to release a software tool at the conference later this month that he says could be used on about half the existing models of home routers, including most Linksys, Dell, and Verizon Fios or DSL versions.

Users who connect to the Internet through those devices and are tricked into visiting a page that an attacker has set up with Heffner’s exploit could have their router hijacked and used to steal information or redirect the user’s browsing.

Applied Signal Technology, a market leader in intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance solutions for the U.S. Department of Defense and Intelligence Community, acquired Seismic this April.

The most exploited vulnerabilities tend to be Adobe Reader and Internet Explorer, but a rising target for exploits is Java, according to a report by M86 Security Labs. Of the 15 most exploited vulnerabilities during the first half of this year, four involved Adobe Reader and five in Internet Explorer, the lab wrote in its latest security report.

The latest report which covers the first half of 2010, highlights the evolution of obfuscation through combined attacks. This threat trend is the latest to emerge as cybercriminals seek new ways to limit the effectiveness of many proactive security controls.

View full post on dailywireless.org

Researchers have demonstrated structural cracks in GSM mobile networks that make it easy to find the number of most US-based cellphone users and to track virtually any GSM-enabled handset across the globe, reports The Register.

“There are a lot of fragile eggs in the telecom industry and they can be broken,” Don Bailey, a security consultant with iSec Partners, said in an interview with CNET. “We assume the telecom industry protects our privacy. But we’ve been able to crack the eggs and piece them together.”

The hack builds off research by Tobias Engel who in late 2008 showed how to track the whereabouts of cellphones by tapping into mobile network databases. At the Source Conference in Boston Wednesday, independent researcher Nick DePetrillo and Don Bailey of iSec Partners demonstrated how to use similar techniques to track an individual’s location even when his number isn’t known and to glean other details most users presume are untraceable.

“The scary thing is that you can give me a random cellphone number and I can tell you, usually, who owns it,” DePetrillo told The Register. “So if I want to find Brad Pitt’s number I can dump all the cellular phone caller ID information out of California and hunt for his number.”

The information disclosure hack works by tricking the GSM caller ID system into assembling what amounts to a white pages directory of virtually every cellphone number. To do that, DePetrillo and Bailey set up a voice over IP account that included caller ID. They then called the account over and over using huge blocks of spoofed numbers and logged the caller ID output of each one using an Asterisk server.

The cataloged lookup information allowed them to discover individuals associated with the numbers and vice versa. It also revealed large pools of numbers that belonged to private companies and government agencies.

The researchers did not release the tools they created and have alerted major GSM carriers in the U.S. about their findings.

View full post on dailywireless.org