Furby hacking?

[Alice]

My foster mom has this furby sitting on the shelf outside my room. She wont let me play with it for fear that I might try to modify it. i left it at that for a while, but recently, a friend of mine offered to give me one in hopes that I could teach it dirty words. I did a bit of research and found that there is an upgrade so that a furby may be reprogrammed. I think the site is old, and it says it's sold out. Does anyone know where I could find such a "furby upgrade kit"? Or perhaps how to make one? Thanks in advance.

PS: I know some of you guys have furbys. Take a pic or two so we can all have a laugh at your expense!

 

[Tatuya]

Unfortunately, my furby fell off of a bed and hit the ground quite hard. What was teh result? A Furby that seemed to speak an alien language in a very deep and unwelcoming voice, so I pitched it. Had this happened this year I would have defiently tried to reprogram the thing but alas, Furby's came out so long ago. Anyways, go for it I'd love to see a cussing Furby video .

 

[w00p]

Just make sure your mom doesn't find out.
Or atleast tell her you're pulling a joke on another furby, and that hers is intact. Otherwise, unwanted suprises and misunderstandings may occur...

Ooh, you could try to give the furby a different look, fitting with the cussing.

 

[Alice]

Maybe I'll put it in her room when I'm finished, just to mess with her. But until then, I need the info.

 

[n17ikh]

I've taken apart a few furbies back in the day to see how they work, and "hacking" one would be fairly simple. There is only one motor that works everything via a complicated camshaft arrangement. There are a few sensors coming off the camshaft for motor position, a few tact switches for the mouth/stomach/back, a light-level sensor, a speaker, a microphone, and an optical encoder for motor speed sensing. There is a main computer board with all the chips on it. If you were to find a custom microcontroller and program it in concert with a cheap voice reproduction chip, it would be relatively simple to wire up the motor and sensors to the microcontroller with the exception of the optical sensor, but there are ways of working without it or kludging in your own sensor. As for directly reprogramming the Furby without intensive surgery, it's impossible to change anything burned on the ROM, you would have to desolder the ROM and replace it with another custom ROM with data programmed in the correct format on it. Difficult to say the least. I would be willing to bet the furby-reprogramming kits simply replace the mainboard with a custom-printed PCB and a programmed microcontroller that does everything the mainboard did. You would have to be a fairly talented hardware hacker to pull it off without the kit, but it would be a worthy project to undertake.

-n17ikh

 

[Stedeman]

I figured I would give you a hand looking for the hack, but so far all I have come across is this furby electrification

I have removed the link I posted so people focus on the questions Alice needs answered (end result will be better ). just Google it if you want it.

I will keep on looking I have a good feeling it will be entertaining

Update:
The site your talking about (If it's the same one I found) actually has full schematics that a high school electronics major should be able to put together for you. http://www.appspec.net/products/UpgradeKits/FurbyUpgrade/schematics.html

 

[Alice]

Ooh... Schematics! I could put one of those together, perhaps. As soon as I install acrobat, I'll take a look at them. Thank you very much, everyone.

 

[SniperXX]

I kept trying to make my sisters say crap and stuff but I cant remember if it ever did. lol.

I wanna see a hardcore cussing ferby, lol. Ferby w/ and attitiude!

 

[CPFitz14]

My little brothers furby went into the trash after it started talking in some sort of alien language after the batteries had been left out for several months. Creepy.

 

[Diggrr]

The thing learns to talk through hearing, don't it?....Why not just make a .wav file and play it looping in winamp. Leave the "victim" sitting next to the speaker all day.

 

[fuzzba11]

I figured I would give you a hand looking for the hack, but so far all I have come across is this furby electrification http://www.voltnet.com/humor/furby/index.shtml
I will keep on looking I have a good feeling it will be entertaining

Update:
The site your talking about (If it's the same one I found) actually has full schematics that a high school electronics major should be able to put together for you. http://www.appspec.net/products/UpgradeKits/FurbyUpgrade/schematics.html

ROFL at the voltnet video, that was a great find. Hillarious!

 

[Sjaak]

wow that furby video made me ROFL

great one

somebody should take a Tux doll, mount the Furby hardware in it, and program it to say 'Linux rocks'

 

[DerekDRP]

alice try www.hlj.com they may have the kit

 

[PCGUY112887]

I shot my furby... you would be amazed at the armor on the older original furby's. Of course I was useing high powered pellet rifles.... me and a few friends started unloading rounds like crazy on him. He was yelling whial we did it. The armor stood up untill we used 2 rifles and 2 simi auto pistols on it.. then we finally made a large hole through him. I USED to have the video but my friend recorded over it with Girls Gone Wild
It was SOO FUNNY!

 

[daniel_dynasty]

off topic:
check out the hdd test on http://www.voltnet.com/humor/stress.shtml# thermal integrity test LOL man the cyclinder heads (platters) dont burn??? i jus see em sitting there unharmed except for the data of course

 

[Como]

my girlfriend modded a furby to look like one of the ICP guys. i'd love to see it curse

 

[SniperXX]

The thing learns to talk through hearing, don't it?....Why not just make a .wav file and play it looping in winamp. Leave the "victim" sitting next to the speaker all day.

That should work. I got my sisters to say crap, but it only did it every now and then. It was freakin hiliarous, our mom was all "greeaaatt" (in sarcastic tone), ROFL. Looping the audio may work perfectly, I would try that before you mod it.

 

[Alice]

I could try looping the audio, but I think I'd rather completely reprogram it. Does anyone still have one that they would like to post pics of (or better yet send to me for *testing* purposes)?

Maybe I could even upgrade the animatroncs and add some armor to it... then program it to do some very interesting things.

 

[StreetPharmacy]

How 'bout you get a furby to say, every so often...

"I know where you sleep..."

now that would definately get me to hire an exorcist.

 

[Sjaak]

you should build a pc inside a furby using old laptop parts