Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Around 2006, Ray apparently decided to revive his creation and start selling them through his former website, zetalink.biz, as kits for hobbyists.  Unfortunately, he did not actually ship all of his orders and appears to have scammed several members of the nixie community out of several hundred of dollars each.  On list of people who never received a unit were Peter Hand and Jeff Thomas.

Pete had purchased one of Ray’s kits to give it as a gift for his daughter.  After waiting for a year and a half, it became apparent that he was not going to get the device and so he decided to engineer his own version.  In fact, he made two versions – a B7971 version (that also supports the planar neon ZM1350 tubes) as well as a smaller VFD version (see more here.)

In the last year, Jeff modified Pete’s design (with his permission) and added features like a GPS time base and a nice enclosure (designed by Jürgen Grau).  Now, 38 years after the original Four Letter Word machine was released, you can buy a complete device, including tubes, from a reputable seller.

Read more:

http://www.tubeclockdb.com/nixie-clocks/314-the-gps-flw.html

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Here is a video review of the NixeKits.eu IN16 clock.  See the full review here and buy the clock here.

[Show as slideshow]

Full review here: http://www.tubeclockdb.com/

Click here to view the embedded video.

Here is just a quick video I made of my new Turbo Hobby IV-18 clock.  3 Word review: I like it.  I should have a more in depth review soon, but in the mean time, see what he has for sale here: http://shop.ebay.com/turbo_hobby/m.html

Jürgen Grau is the deigned behind this device  and he sells this clock as both a kit and fully assembled. The kit costs €149 and the fully assembled costs €179 (Currently: $190/$230)  Jürgen is very accessible and is fluent in German and English.

Now, on to the clock!  Stylistically, I like it.  The photos on NixieKits.eu do not do this device justice.  The LED’s are much more vibrant than I expected and the colorful effect that they create manages to look nice without looking gaudy.  There is a knob in the back which allows you to turn the brightness of the LED’s up and down (and completely off.)  The colors slowly cross fade and and produce a pleasing effect on the front of the case.  I didn’t think I use this feature much because I generally prefer simple designs – but the colors are mesmerizing.  I actually leave the LED’s on all of the time, something I would not have expected.

Be sure to watch the video after the jump.

Click here to view the embedded video.

It also functions as a clock featuring both 12 and 24 hour modes.  Once per minute, instead of displaying a word, it shows the time in HHMM format.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Tubes: IN-12 Nixie tubes, 18 mm digit height, decimal points with flashing LEDs.
Background lighting: brightness adjustable.
Alarm: adjustable time, snooze and tone.
Time format: 12- or 24 hour mode.
Display: time / alarm / date / or alternating time – date.
Effects: scrolling date, display fading, digit cycling in different styles.
Power: 12VDC 350mA max.
DC Power consumption: ca. 3VA (full tubes and background LED brightness).
Timekeeping: more than 1h with 1F SuperCap in the event of mains failure.
Time accuracy: internal 4 MHz crystal, adjustable with buttons for minimal deviation.
Dimension (w x h x d): app. 200 x 50 x 80 mm (incl. tubes)
Weight: app. 450 g

Click here to view the embedded video.

By Art Lebedev – $n/a

http://www.artlebedev.com/everything/segmentus/

From the guy who brought us the Verbarius clock comes the Segmentus.  (Is anyone else noticing a naming pattern here?) This concept clock was built to address the challenge of creating a digital clock with hands.  While clocks have addressed this challenge before, this one brings the usual Art Lebedev polish to the final product.  The only thing I want to know is how noisy would this be to operate?  With dozens of little motors and mechanical parts,  this might not be a clock that you would keep in your bedroom.

Click here to view the embedded video.

by Phosphor Watches $185.00 USD

http://www.phosphorwatches.com/

My primary interest is still, and always will be, collecting Nixie Clocks.    However, I just found what is probably the first practical and mass produced e-ink watch.  I’ve you’ve never seen an e-ink display, they are quite a bit different than the LCD monitor you’re using to read this.  Instead of having the light be emitted from the display, light is reflected off of it like newspaper or any other printed medium.  However, they have an amazing contrast ratio between black and white giving them a distinct advantage in legibility and making reading them on a sunny day easy.

They have three basic formats: traditional called Ana-Digi, square called Digital Hour, and my personal favorite is a full calendar called (shockingly) Digital Calendar.  All watches are offered with a metal, leather or polyurethane wristband.

These things are beautiful.  I want one.  I have to imagine that these will become the e-ink equivalent of the Synchronar (world’s first LED watch…)

I won’t bore you with any more text.  Here are the other photos:

PHOSPHOR e-ink watch (Digital Hour)

PHOSPHOR e-ink watch (Ana-Digi)

about e-ink technology:

Electronic ink is a proprietary material that is processed into a film for integration into electronic displays. Revolutionary in concept, electronic ink is a fusion of chemistry, physics and electronics to create this new material. The principal components of electronic ink are millions of tiny microcapsules, about the diameter of a human hair. In one incarnation, each microcapsule contains positively charged white particles and negatively charged black particles suspended in a clear fluid. When a negative electric field is applied, the white particles move to the top of the microcapsule where they become visible to the user. This makes the surface appear white at that spot. At the same time, an opposite electric field pulls the black particles to the bottom of the microcapsules where they are hidden. By reversing this process, the black particles appear at the top of the capsule, which now makes the surface appear dark at that spot.

e-ink Technology Cross Section

To form an E Ink electronic display, the ink is printed onto a sheet of plastic film that is laminated to a layer of circuitry. The circuitry forms a pattern of pixels that can then be controlled by a display driver. These microcapsules are suspended in a liquid “carrier medium” allowing them to be printed using existing screen printing processes onto virtually any surface, including glass, plastic, fabric and even paper. Ultimately electronic ink will permit most any surface to become a display, bringing information out of the confines of traditional devices and into the world around us.

From PHOSPHOR Watches

http://www.phosphorwatches.com/v/site_pages/einktechnology.asp

Art Technology Limited
Unit 11, 7th Floor, Grand City Plaza No.1
Sai Lau Kok Road, Tsuen Wan
New Territories, Hong Kong
T: +852.2553.2662
F: +852.2580.1661

Featured:

• Jeff Thomas / Nixichron Nixie Clock
• Jon Ellis / Nimimini Numitron Clock
• Konstantin Bodrenkov / IV-11 clock VFD Clock

Click here to view the embedded video.

by Kosbo.com

$Price Unknown / request only

I just found this clock while doing a Google Image search for something completely unrelated.  It appears to be by eBay seller Sparkeltube.  It is a 6 discrete digit VFD based clock.  It has two alarm and a built in buzzer.  But let’s face it – you’re buying this for the display   I love this thing – I want one!

More photos and website description after the jump

FTA

• Unique and new VFD Clock on the market !
• Fully assembled and tested VFD Clock
• Six BIG 20mm high digits (IV-11 VFD Tubes)
• Displays Time , Date and 2 Alarm clock sets
• Accurate & calibrated time clock source from internal crystal
• Integrated 2 Alarm Clocks
• Easy control with only 2 buttons
• Uses standard 12V wall plug Power Supply
• Precision Seconds setup
• Internal buzzer for Alarm1 and Alarm2
• High efficiency integrated on board DC-DC converter

Photos:

Links:

• IV-11 Clock: http://kosbo.com/iv11clock/
• Kosbo Store: http://www.kosbo.com/index.php?option=com_virtuemart&Itemid=18&vmcchk=1&Itemid=18
• More Kosbo Clocks: http://www.kosbo.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=category&layout=blog&id=39&Itemid=53

This is another gimmick clock but it is well executed and it looks nice.  Each HH MM SS display is separated in to its own cube with the controls on the HH.  They are teathered with a small wire and the whole device is powered via a mains transformer.

More…

FTA

A customer sent us an email once and she said, ‘ThinkGeek? Why can’t you make us an alarm clock that has a techie feel but is also stylish?’ We pondered the question, drafted some blueprints, built a prototype from pop tarts and LED arrays, and, voila – the Matrix Cube Clock was born. Ask, and you shall receive. Connected by thin ribbon cables, each clock module can be stacked vertically, horizontally or in a pyramid, depending on your mood and the alignment of Jupiter and Saturn’s moons.

Dimensions: Each cube is approximately 3.5″ square. 12 or 24 hour format available! Even includes a snooze button. Woohoo!

Buy it now at ThinkGeek.com

ThinkGeek just recently released a clock that is a little unusual.  Instead of focusing on weird LED displays or retro nixie tubes, they built a clock on a long-dead technology: flip clocks.  I could try and explain them but I think Wikipedia does a better job.  Read the description and see the videos after the jump.

Flip Clocks from Wikipedia:

An electric motor turns two wheels continuously: the faster at a rate of 1 revolution per hour, the slower at a rate of 1 revolution per 24 hours. The wheels move continuously, not in steps.

The faster wheel has connected to it a ring of 60 flat plastic “leaves”. On the “leaves” are printed numerals so that, when you hold two adjacent “leaves” apart like an open book, the two open “leaves” spell out a numeral, and flipping a “leaf” increases the number shown by 1 unit. The “book” is opened vertically, and its pages form a ring. This ring is put into position and rotated so that one page falls each minute, showing a new number for the minutes. “Leaves” 45 through 59 have a small tooth on them. The purpose of this tooth is explained later.

The slower wheel has connected to it a similar ring of “leaves”, but there are only 48 “leaves” on this ring. These “leaves” have hour numbers printed on them. There are two of each hour, like this: 12am, 12am, 1am, 1am, 2am, 2am, … 11pm, 11pm. One leaf falls each half-hour, at approximately 25 and 55 minutes after the hour. A different design features 60 “leaves” with the numbers 1 to 12 repeated in fives, each leaf falling after 12 minutes. The disadvantage of this is that there is no way to show “AM” or “PM” information.

The teeth on the minute leaves are used as follows: at 45 minutes after the hour, the tooth pushes a lever which will catch any falling hour leaf. The lever holds the old hour leaf in place until it is time for the new hour to start.

FTA:

Some measure time with a pendulum. Others measure it with springs. Still others rely on crystals. We monkeys prefer monitoring the subtle oscillations of cesium atoms in a vacuum. Pick your own way – make it yours. See, Time is a constant companion and should be feared and respected.

Even Gollum knew all about Time. It can slay kings, ruin towns and beat high mountains down. Time can let you know when you need to catch the train, or when the latest episode of The Guild is online. Still, time is an abstract concept. Most animals don’t understand why their instincts tell them to start swimming upstream to spawn, but we higher-apes need our day violently split into 86,400 seconds just so we can get things done. We turned time into an absolute – something to be measured, labeled and tamed.

This clock is unique in that its mechanism is exposed for all to see. Notice how the plates rotate against a bent metal finger that releases them only when it is the next plate’s turn to fall. Watch the curious dance – the harmony of motors and gears. See, originally this clock had a case covering it, but through a happy accident, it was forgotten. It looks even cooler the way it is, so there you have it.

Details

• Battery powered alarm “flip” style clock
• 24 hour alarm
• Remarkably precise, though seconds are for display purposes only
• Requires 2 “C” cell batteries (not included)
• 17.5cm x 6cm x 9cm

Click here to view the embedded video.

Buy it now from ThinkGeek.com

via eBay

Follow up to Numimini – Preview

I just made a quick video demo of the software included bu Jon to program the clock.  Check it out.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Gallery

I will be the first to admit that this clock is ugly.  The only thing that saves this clock is the well executed LED display.  It is unclear between the photos on DealExtreme.com whether this clock is orange or red, but I have seen videos and photos of both.

One word of caution:  This clock does not run on 110v.  This poses two distinct problems.  The first one is that you will need to find a power converter for it.  Not a big deal but it is a pain.  Second, if it derives its clock from the mains line, it will be expecting a 50Hz reference and in the US, it will be getting a 60Hz reference instead.  I don’t know if it uses the mains line for reference or has its own internal oscillator.

From DealExtreme:

Dimensions: 11.42 in x 3.86 in x 1.34 in
Weight: 29.45 oz

Click here to view the embedded video.

Buy it here: DealExtreme.com

I found this clock while searching for clocks to feature and reminds me a lot of the Verbarius clock.  It is a large VFD display that spells out the time and appears to be able to display other information.  Sadly, it seems that only four of these clocks were ever made.  Go check out Clock-It now, he has some good stuff there.Samsung VFD display in grey metallic finish case

This clock was made in conjunction with a friend, Andrew Jardine, who also introduced me to PIC programming, which opened up a whole new world to me. At last I can make my electronic dreams come true… maybe.

Not much to say about the case, it is a minimal shape made from thick polycarbonate to house the displays and my driver board that sits on the back of it. As the display itself runs off 5v and has all the necessary components to make the display work, all I needed to do was feed it serial data and off it went.

The aim of this clock is to display words much as a person speaks when you ask them the time. About six o’clock, nearly half past six, that kind of thing. So it approximates to the nearest ten minutes and gives an appropriate response.

In addition there are a few other modes. A static rather than scrolling clock, one that dissolves snowflakes into the characters.

I have made four of these clocks. Andrew has one, two have been sold and I kept one.

I have a small quantity of the displays left and Iintend to expand the repertoire of words with an EEPROM.

Originally from Clock-It

p.s. I want one!

I found one of these clocks on eBay a while ago and shamelessly stole the images from it, from Wikipedia and from one other source (below.)  They are old VFD Matrix displays that have become somewhat of a collector item.  Since Wikipedia has a good description I will let them describe it:

Electronics 7 are industrial clocks with luminescent indicators where each figure was formed by four or eleven 7-segment lamps. For each indicator there was a board decoding the binary code sent by the main board. There were also models based on light-emitting diodes . The basic shortcoming of the clocks was that the segments of the display were gradually burnt out, and there was a significant difference in a luminescence between more often and less often displayed segments. It usually happened after ten or more years of continuous work. All the street and wall clocks were based on the kit by Saratov factory “Reflector” and even now are used in many administrative and industrial premises in Russia. The clocks were made on the basis of vacuum-fluorescent indicators manufactured in Russia.

via Wikipedia and via technabob.com

Featured works

• Nixichron / Jeff Thomas
• Numimini / Jon Ellis
• Epoch Clock / Think Geek

More photos after the break

Watchmaking

http://www.csparks.com/watchmaking/

HOROZIMA-Horology Reference Journal

http://www.horozima.com

THE WATCHISMO TIMES

http://watchismo.blogspot.com

Montres/Watches

http://montresuisses.blogspot.com

Omega Collectors

http://omega-constellation-collectors.blogspot.com

: : e-kycz.com : :

http://e-kycz.com/blog

Sphere By Milan

http://spherebymilan.blogspot.com

Do you want me to add your site?  Leave a message in the comments with the URL.

I like this device.  Not only is it a cool use of a great use of cyan VFD displays, but it is small and at $125, it is worth every cent.

First and foremost, it is a 4-letter-word device.  Normally, these are made with tubes such as the B7971 or similar Panaplex displays (think of a flat version of a nixie tube).  Instead, the inventor opted to go with a VFD.  I’ve never seen a FLW this small and I’ve never seen one with display type.  Basically, it is a device that spells out words, usually in English, that are exactly four letters long.   Nice work! Second, this device acts as a clock.  It might not be as polished as say, the Nocrotec, but this device does have a charm to it. I really hope the seller decides to make more of these.  At $125, it is a great deal.

Gallery and seller’s description after the jump

The Super Electrofluorescent Profanity Machine, or Four Letter Word (for short), is a bit of electronics cobbled together out of vintage Cold War-era Soviet vacuum fluorescent tubes and custom driver circuitry. It was designed and built by me. The device does two things: the first (mundane but utilitarian) thing that it does is tell you the time. It’s an accurate clock whose numbers glow brightly enough to dimly illuminate a dark room, serving as an effective night-light. It probably won’t wake you up, unless you can’t sleep in the presence of dim green lights. The second (less mundane and utilitarian) thing that it does is generate random four letter words, which it displays for you at a rate of one per second. Every English word consisting of exactly four letters is possible, and the device is programmed to predispose the generation of words that you can pronounce, as opposed to incomprehensible trash. As the name of the device implies, even the more profane of English words is possible (though not necessarily probable). The effect is strangely hypnotic – the short length of time that this device spent on my desk at work was deliriously unproductive. The main board has three buttons, one for switching the device between word-mode and time-mode, and two for setting the time. Included is a header to break the buttons out, in case you want to enclose its bare sexy boards inside a case that frustrates attempts to set the clock.

http://www.etsy.com/

This is an interesting one.  There is nothing technically interesting about the clock but the two features that make it stand out are the amber colored display and the clear housing.   It has a pretty simple design – it is just a brick but for $20, you can’t go wrong.

The only problem is that it is no longer for sale.  I originally found this one on the Urban Outfitters website but they no longer have it in stock and Kikkerland does not seem to have it on their site.  Oh well :-/

More photos after the jump

* 6″w, 3″h, 2.5″d
* Plastic, electronics

http://www.urbanoutfitters.com/urban/catalog/productdetail.jsp;jsessionid=8A9E8304D1D6EFDEB495389D7D3CEBF6.app13-node1?itemdescription=true&itemCount=60&id=14149967&parentid=A_FURN_WHATSNEW&sortProperties=&navCount=3&navAction=poppush&color=00

As best as I can tell, I believe this is just a concept clock.  The claim to fame is that the clock has enough decimal points in the seconds position to count in the millionths of a second.  I doubt the internal oscellator is that accurate – but I don’t think I would be able to notice if it was off by a little bit.

Video and gallery after the jump

Click here to view the embedded video.

via Gadget4all.com

Does anyone know more about this click?  I can’t tell if I love the design or if I hate it.  The photo above doesn’t look very flattering but the angle view in the gallery blow looks kind of neat.  At $60, it is overpriced for what it is but it may be a neat addition to some collections.

The once concern that I have has to do with all of the non-used pixels.  For example, there are dots in the middle of letters, above the hours / minutes separater that will never illuminate.  Do those elements look any different?

Gallery and description after the jump

From the website:

Product Specifications:

$59.00 – http://www.gadget4all.com/prod_detail.php?prod_id=00480

via eBay

Okay, I just ordered this clock and should have it in about a week.  Below is the photo Jon sent me of my actual unit and the description was lifted from the eBay auction description.  The highlights are:

Numitron based display.  Numitrons are display tubes that are fundamentally different than Nixie tubes of VFD tubes.  The display is formed using the standard 7-segment pattern but the elements are actually little filaments like one would find in a flashlight or other incandescent bulb.  They are low voltage / low current devices that had a short lived popularity until they were replaced by LED displays.

The Numimini is computer programmable.  You can change the display patterns and types via USB and the included software.

Full description from the auction after the jump.

I will post a follow up review after I receive it and have had some time to play with it

Click here to view the embedded video.

Numimini is a clock. It’s a clock that uses an obsolete display technology to create a unique item for your desk, mantelpiece or bedside table. But that’s a bit of an understatement, so read on…

What’s a Numimini?

Start by taking a look at the photos in the listing. Numimini uses four genuine Russian filament or numitron tubes to display the time – two for the hours and two for the minutes. The tubes are mounted on a little raised platform of shiny dark laser-cut acrylic which stands on four short legs. Between the digit pairs are a couple of tiny LEDs which act as a separator (and much more too, as you’ll see below…). The whole thing is crisp, modern and compact – just the thing for sitting on your desk, next to your monitor. Actually, it’s a great idea to put Numimini near your computer, because it’s designed to plug into a USB port…

And more of that later too, but for now, you’ll get the best impression of Numimini by watching it in action. Check out the YouTube video below. If the embedded video doesn’t work, go search YouTube for ‘Numimini’ – there’s only one such clock, so you’ll have no trouble finding it. Enjoy…

The video doesn’t really do the clock justice, particularly from a colour balance perspective. The numitron glow is a rich organic orange, and the two LEDs in the middle of the display show the whole spectrum of colours from red through green to violet and white. But anyway, you get the picture - we can play a lot of games with numitron tubes and a couple of LEDs. There’s serious work going on under the hood to make this happen – sitting at the heart of the whole operation is a powerful PIC microcontroller from the 18Fx550 family. It’s packed with about 18K of firmware that handles everything from USB communications to some intricate timed juggling to create the visual effects. Oh yes, and it displays the time too. So although you spend most of your time looking at the lovely tubes and hardware, I spent most of mine writing software!

Numitron tubes

Numitrons are based on the same principle as the standard incandescant light bulb – current passing through a wire in a vacuum heats it up to make it glow. But numitrons take the idea and push it a lot further: a light bulb only has one filament, and numitrons generally have seven or more which are independently controllable. Seven filaments arranged in the classic seven segment configuration allows us to have a tube which can display all ten digits. And that’s the purpose of the numitron.

Numitrons were one of the successor technologies to the beautiful neon discharge nixie tubes, emerging into general use around 1970. The two tubes are not dissimilar in appearance at first glance – a glass tube with lots of wires coming out of it. But electrically they are completely different. Nixies require high voltages, typically around 180V, which was convenient enough in the valve era, but awkward for the modern transistor circuitry and logic chips that were beginning to dominate. In contrast, the numitron is a low voltage device, with less than 5V being required to illuminate the filaments. As a result, numitrons began to be incorporated into new equipment designs in place of nixies.

However, they only flourished briefly, because at the same time the LED and LCD display technologies were developing as serious alternatives. And they had significant advantages over numitrons – they used much less current and had no fragile glass envelopes. So, it was not long before numitrons were rendered obsolete for most mainstream applications. As a result of this transient usage, numitrons were not manufactured in huge volume, and that means that the tubes are generally rare today – there are many fewer numitron types available now than there are nixies. The only place they seem to have survived in any numbers was in the Soviet Union, and that’s fading into history now too.

There are only two Russian numitron types that are still readily available from surplus sellers in the ex-Soviet Union. These are generally known in the West as IV-9 and IV-16 tubes. They are very similar devices – the only real differences are first that the IV-16 has a more compact shape; and second that the IV-9 has a decimal point indicator, whereas the IV-16 does not. Check out the photo for a side by side comparison. Of the two, the IV-16 is significantly rarer and more expensive.

Numimini can use both tube types, creating two different variants of the basic design. The IV-16 clock is slightly lower profile, and has a lighter look. The IV-9 version has some additional display options created by the presence of the decimal point indicator. But you have to look hard to tell them apart – both are beautiful little things. You can see that for yourself – the video clip on YouTube is of an IV-9 clock, and some photos in this listing are from an IV-16 unit. The tube type offered in this listing is specified below (but you may be able to change if it’s not the one you prefer – contact me to ask).

Features

Telling the time is of course just the start of it. You’re going to be looking for your clock to cope with switching in and out of daylight saving (summer) time as the months go by. Maybe you get the odd power cut? Wouldn’t it be nice if you didn’t have to go and reset the time on the clock yet again when the power comes back on?

Numimini can help you out with these, and more. Here’s a very brief overview of the main features, some of which are discussed more further down the listing:

•     Four genuine Russian IV-9 or IV-16 numitron tubes

•     Nearly 6 million overall display configurations, each individually selectable.

•     Automatic daylight saving (summer) time correction worldwide.

•     Ultra accurate clock chip, capable of 1 minute per year accuracy with optional software fine-tuning

•     Battery backed to keep time for months without external power.

•     Total control over display brightness with 16 fixed settings or automatic adjustment

•     Auto-dimming facility with ambient light sensor with software-adjustable sensitivity and response time

•     Power from any full-spec USB port or from a plug-in adapter (not included)

•     Nineteen different animations for the appearance or disappearance of digits

•     Two independently controllable colon dots which can convey information in ten different ways, with a full spectrum of colours displayable.

•     Unique combinatorial colour code option for seconds display

•     Five speeds for the digit display sequence – choose the one which suits you best.

•     Twelve or twenty-four hour display formats.

•     Two display styles for digits 6 and 9: modern or retro.

•     Option to suppress leading zeros on the hours display.

•     Optional user-defined daily blanking period to maximise tube life with four different blanking modes selectable

•     Control the clock from the USB port of your PC using a dedicated host application running under Windows XP.

•     No tricky installation: the host application is a single standalone .EXE file which uses the built-in Windows HID driver.

•     Official unique USB ID codes prevent clashes with other USB devices on your system

•     A demo mode to show off to your friends.

•     Complete programming interface documentation and example source code provided so you can implement your own host application.

•     Unique serial number and purchaser’s name burnt into the firmware and readable using the host application.

•     Complete documentation and assembly instructions – step by step guides, about 34,000 words!

•     Fully assembled and tested

•     All you need to add is the USB cable - that’s it! And I can even help with that if you like…

Configuring the clock

OK, so we have a clock which can tell the time, and has loads of features and display options. How do you get to play with them? Well, you need a computer, because Numimini is a USB device. Just plug the clock into a full-power USB port on your computer system (standard mini-USB cable not provided) and run the special host application program. This is a custom-written Windows application that allows you to control all of Numimini’s totally cool features. What’s more, there are no fiddly drivers to install because Numimini is a HID class device, which is something that all recent versions of Windows know how to talk to – support is built in. The application is just a simple .EXE file that you can run from the CD, the hard disk or a USB stick, yet it provides a fully-featured graphic interface to Numimini. No command line hackery to be bothered with on my clocks – just fire it up the PC program, pick the options you want and hit OK. Check out the screen shot.

At this point, Mac and Linux users are probably feeling a little left out, and I apologise to you. I only have access to Windows, so can’t offer a native version of the Numimini host application for your computer. However there’s a strong probability that the Windows application will run just fine on a decent Windows emulator (though I have not tried it). As an alternative, the CD that comes with Numimini has example source code and documentation of the programming interface for the clock. It’s a complete interface specification, with almost 40 commands controlling every aspect of the clock’s operation. If you have the requisite programming skills, it will not take you more than an evening to get something up and running. In fact, if you want to write a full host application and would be prepared to let me distribute it freely as part of the Numimini package, I will actively collaborate with you on the project.

Documentation

The documentation has turned out to be a major part of the whole project, just as for my earlier clock, Nixie7. The complete Numimini Owner’s Manual and Assembly Guide runs to over 50 A4 pages, around 24,000 words. Compare that with the single sheet of paper you get with some competing nixie clocks! It’s full of background information, discussions of the design, simple step by step guides for how to build the clock (did I mention that yet? Yes, Numimini is also available as a kit for those who like to build their own!), and all the detail you need for tweaking Numimini to get it just the way you want it. It’s also lavishly illustrated. The document is written in an easy to follow style, and broken up into sections so you can find your away around easily. The main chapters are:

1          Introduction

2          Numitron tubes and numitron clocks

3          Circuit description

4          Kit inventory

5          Assembling the clock

6          Clock operation

7          Maintenance and questions

8          Reference information

http://www.amug.org/~jthomas/clockpage.html

A few days ago Jeff Thomas emailed me with some photographs of a Pong style watch he was working on.  His modified an OLED photo key chain to display the time instead of small photos.  Like the other Pong Watch, his displays the time as the score.  In his words:

I tinkered with something similar a year ago, repurposing an OLED picture fob into a simple pong watch by directly pumping the display controller with an external PIC processor.
The program (PIC assembly) was forwarded to the OEM, with the hopes they’d release a new pong wristwatch as a variant on their picture fob using the internal MCU.
Those digital picture fobs are down to $5 now that the market is saturated with them, so I figured they would jump at the chance.
Unfortunately I never heard back from them.

Be sure to check out the rest of the photographs after the jump.

All photographs are owned by Jeff Thomas / used with permission here.