Modern Day Equivalent of Byte/Compute! Magazine? 327
MochaMan writes "I grew up in the '80s on a steady diet of Byte and Compute! magazines, banging in page after page of code line by line, and figuring out how sound, graphics, and input devices worked along the way. Since then, the personal computer market has obviously moved away from hobbyists intent on coding and understanding their machines down to the hardware, but I imagine there must still be a market for similar do-it-yourself articles. Perhaps the collective minds of Slashdot can divine some online sources of fun and educational mini-projects like 'write your own assembler' or 'roll your own bootloader.'"
The Internet is this magazine. (Score:5, Insightful)
The Internet is this magazine.
Re:Maximum PC (Score:5, Insightful)
Maximum PC is to 80s Byte/Computer as microwaved Ramen Noodles are to a Home-Cooked, Four Course Meal.
Re:The Internet is this magazine. (Score:3, Insightful)
Pretty much. In addition to Compute's Gazette I also read RUN (for C64) and AmigaWorld (sister magazine). They were great for learning programming & hardware, but have no place in today's world that is aimed at the simplified "turn key; start engine" mindset.
Similarly the science fiction magazines I used to read also faded away. Asimov's and Analog are still here but rapidly dwindling in circulation. I guess just as you can't go back to the 1920s when you'd read dime-store comics, and eat penny candy, you can't go back to the 1980s either. The past is the past.
Re:I maintain something close to that (Score:0, Insightful)
Arrgh fixed link
Hackipedia.org [hackipedia.org]
Re:Make Magazine (Score:4, Insightful)
Make is to DIY what Wired is to technology ...
Re:Dude, you're reading it. (Score:1, Insightful)
Magazines (Score:3, Insightful)
In the U.S. there are three general electronics magazines:
Circuit Cellar
Nuts & Volts
Elektor
Of these, Circuit Cellar is the more advanced and covers topics that are probably over the head of most beginners, but it's still worth a read in any case.
Elektor will be familiar to European readers as it's been published in multiple language versions over there for decades. The U.S. edition dates from the beginning of 2009 and contains the same editorial content as the UK edition. The construction articles in Elektor are quite well done and are look very professional. Elektor recently bought Circuit Cellar, but haven't changed the focus of that magazine (yet). Whether they do in the future remains to be seen.
Nuts & Volts is geared more toward hobbyists and beginners, but it's still good for all levels (at least some of it). It has several long-running columns devoted to the Arduino, the PICAXE, and (starting recently) the Parallax Propeller.
Another good option is Everyday Practical Electronics, which is published in the UK and sold by major U.S. chain bookstores.
Although not strictly devoted to electronics, Servo Magazine (published by the same people who publish Nuts & Volts) does cover the electronics aspects of robotics. There is some overlap with Nuts & Volts, but not a lot.
Re:Make (Score:5, Insightful)
This is really disappointing to me as well. I've been a subscriber since its inception, but I'm about to let it drop. I know which end of a soldering gun to hold. I don't have a desire to add a toggle switch to a toy to impress hipsters.
Where are the articles like:
- Build a high quality mass spectrometer (http://old.4hv.org/index.php?board=4;action=display;threadid=1268)
- Convert a cheap Chinese milling machine to CNC (http://www.hossmachine.info/)
- Build a Tesla Turbine and reap geothermal energy.
It went from being "Make useful stuff" to "Make crap to impress dumb people"
Re:Maximum PC (Score:2, Insightful)
Maximum PC is a great magazine.
No it's not.
Really sorry you think so.
Re:Circuit Cellar (Score:3, Insightful)
Another 2600 fan here, but their focus is primary on the legal and pseudo-legal entanglements of modern technology. Sure, they print a handful of hopelessly outdated how-tos on wifi sniffing and general BOFH pleasantries, but the bulk of it is now a socio-political journal. Not so much a tech zine anymore...