“The 12 Days AFTER Christmas” Giveaway: Day 21 – A DIY delight: USB Drive enclosure and Tools
This contest is closed. Congrats to faithful Macenstein reader Connor.
On the Twenty First Day After Christmas, Macenstein gave to you (or, more accurately, gave you a chance to win…) an OWC Express USB drive enclosure and a NewerTech 11-Piece Portable Toolkit to help you build it!
Yes, there’s nothing quite like the geeky satisfaction that comes from building your own stuff. Sure, it usually doesn’t work as well, isn’t as sturdy, and ultimately often costs you more than the store-bought version, but building your own gear makes you appear smart to your friends, and you can’t put a price on that!
So to that end we have two geeky items up for grabs today to help you get started on your way to DIY geekdom. First up we have the OWC Express 2.5″ Portable USB 2.0 Enclosure for SATA NoteBook HDs, an easy DIY project that will help you add portable, USB-powered storage to your Mac.
Add a 2.5″ drive from an upgrade or build your own with a new drive. Pocket-sized USB bus powered ventilated enclosure for 2.5″ drives. Offering the ultimate combination of style and value in portable data storage and backup.
Of course, no TRUE Do-It-Yourselfer would be caught dead without a spudger, and we’ve got you covered there too! Behold the The Newer Technology 11-Piece Portable Toolkit
Toolkit Contains:
Straight Blade 1.8mm
Straight Blade 3.0mm
Phillips #00
Phillips #2
Torx T6
Torx T8
Torx T10
Scissor Clamp
Tweezers
(2) Nylon Pry Tools (aka “Spudgers”)*
To enter: There’s nothing quite like the satisfaction that comes from building your own stuff. So to enter, leave us a comment telling us “What’s the best thing you’ve ever made? (without help)” Did you build your own computer or hovercraft? Or is the best thing you ever made that slopey, misshapen coil pot in 1st grade for Mother’s Day? Winners will be picked randomly 7 days later and notified (kind of like in The Ring, only with less killing… we hope). Open to ALL readers WORLD-WIDE. Good luck, and thanks for reading Macenstein! (Oh, and be sure to enter ALL our “12 Days AFTER Christmas” Giveaways!)
Please note: Comments may take a while to show up, please do not double-post. Thanks!
a wood framed mirror
pizza
A stand for my MacBook Pro
A Hitler troll figure in Fimo clay
I made a few art pieces using sound in college that I was especially proud of.
my masters thesis
I built a LEGAL copy of the “Fastra 2” with legaly provided BIOS.
My power computer I built back in the day. It was one sweat machine!
It’s my diploma project during studies of architecture!
My hardwired home network running Ethernet, cable and phone into every room of the house.
A few years back, I built a Linux router (built the computer and compiled/configured all of the software from scratch).
2 children. Oh wait, I guess I did have some help with that.
i found an old motorola v300 phone all smashed up so i thought it would be fun to fix it i bought the an all new case,screen,keypad,battery,antenna, ect. and used the mobo from the old smashed phone and reassembeled everything. all by my self and it worked
I could go all sentimental and say my two sons, but you specify “without help” and I think my wife would argue that she had no small part in the process and likely had the worse end of the deal. Best Apple-related thing I ever made was the PowerBook G4 I frankensteined together out of a dead laptop with working screen and a crapload of parts from eBay. It’s still working, four years later, too. Started life as a 400MHz and came out of the operation a 550MHz next model up. Still don’t think it knows what hit it.
A 10 in. Newtonian telescope. I ground and corrected the mirror, designed and built a massive steel fork mount, and machined large setting circles.
Photos
An R-strap for my camera.
When I was a wee lad I used to be in the cub scouts. They had this thing called the pinewood derby where you had to cut out a block out wood and make it into a race car. I had mine all tricked out with red white and blue with some stars and added some pennies on the bottom for xtra weight. Who won that year? You guess it! Yours truly!
Dinner 😉
my podcasts 🙂
photos of my wife and son
I invented computerized home automation using the X10 control chip in a PC board I designed for the Apple II. It was fun and it was cool.
a small house made of ice cream stick for my girlfriend mini figurines.
a desk
pictures of my girlfriend 😉
An awesome tree-house.
I made an altoids iPod charger!!
A hackintosh. Later, I worked for some time and purchased my very first MacBook. The happiest day of my life, without a doubt… 😀
A legend of zelda shield
A heart-shaped mahogany box for my wife’s engagement ring.
I built some kick arse things in the kitchen. In the tech world, i’m currently making a USB hub from a VHS, nothing spectacular, but fun.
a greek salad
I built an electric guitar out of an Altoids tin
A deathray
Cheesecake
A Badass Treehouse
hungarian goulash with dumplings.
Hey, who won RapidWeaver from Day 5 way back when? And what happened to Day 22, things skipped from day 21 (this post) to day 23 (pixelmator)….
I built the racks in my studio. They are gorgeous!
lego head costume
the best thing that i have made would have to be some ikea bookshelves and a frankensteined working Mac Classic – made from other donor macs.
An alternate universe, which of course none of you haven’t seen yet hahaha
An electric guitar.
a relay that connects a pc’s parallel port with a power outlet. good for starting that coffee machine via terminal.
Customized my own cyborg-guitar
The Tardis 🙂
i made my own set of speakers from old toys, they rock
either my hovercraft or a potato gun
Ceramic bust of Tygra….awesome.
A miniature chariot.
A muzzle silencer for an air rifle using a Sprite can, copper tube, cotton balls and hot glue. Worked great, lots of stealthy kills.