Do you know that the thermostat on the wall of your workplace in all probability does not do something? Some studies point out that as many as 90% of employee-accessible thermostats exist purely as placebos. The thought is that the act of adjusting the thermostat will make you’re feeling higher, but it surely will not add to the corporate’s vitality invoice. Elevator “shut doorways” buttons aren’t usually useful both, however pushing them makes you’re feeling such as you’re attaining one thing. The notorious turbo clock pace gauges of the Nineteen Nineties labored below an analogous precept and Joshua Woehlke made his personal.
The late ’80s and early ’90s noticed a dramatic bounce in laptop processor clock speeds, which unearthed a fairly substantial drawback. Previous to that, the main target was often on rising a pc’s reminiscence and that labored simply fantastic. However clock pace will increase triggered software program and video games to run unpredictably, as a result of builders usually coded issues like motion to be timed by the execution pace. So doubling the clock pace would possibly make a online game character run twice as quick. To maintain that software program operating correctly, many computer systems of the ’90s included a “turbo” button that may inform the processor to modify between its native pace and a few slower pace appropriate for that previous software program.
However customers would not all the time discover that pace distinction and could not ensure that their turbo buttons have been working. So producers started together with gauges that displayed the present clock pace. However like your workplace’s thermostat, these weren’t useful. They did not present the precise clock pace. As a substitute, the readout would simply change between two predetermined numbers. Within the identify of authenticity, Woehlke replicated a pretend turbo gauge like that for his classic ATX PC case.
Just like the gauges of the ’90s, this does not must know the processor clock pace; it simply must know if the turbo operate is lively. This specific ATX case has a standing gentle for the turbo operate, so Woehlke selected to make use of an Arduino Mega board to watch the state of that LED. The Mega is overkill for this mission, however Woehlke had it laying round. The Arduino controls a small OLED display that reveals one among two preset clock speeds relying on the state of the LED. And as a remaining homage to retrocomputing, that OLED switches to a starfield screensaver 10 seconds after the consumer pushes the turbo button.
