astrid.tech

My personal corner of the internet devoted to tech shenanigans and other stuff

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Gaming on an Android VM on Linux

So you can do the gacha grind on your computer instead of your phone

I wanted to run Android games (specifically Arknights) on my NixOS box, but Anbox seems to be broken on NixOS. So, I figured out a way to make it work in Libvirt. Other people wanted to do it too, so here's a guide. Assumptions about you You know how to navigate an Android… read more

libvirt Linux virtualization gaming Android

Using PRs in Nixpkgs before they actually land in Nixpkgs

A guide on using overlays to enable your impatience

Nixpkgs is a very rich package repository, but sometimes it doesn't have the package that you want. However, if you're lucky, someone else might be working on adding it right this instant! You can check the current pending pull requests to confirm this. There's a good chance… read more

nixos fediverse

A GPU Passthrough Setup for NixOS (with VR passthrough too!)

I'm doing VR on Windows on QEMU on NixOS because kernel anti-cheat is poison

This week, I built a new gaming PC and got GPU passthrough set up on it! In this article I'll talk about how I got it working, and stuff I learned about virtualization along the way. ![Neofetches for Kali on WSL on Windows on QEMU in Libvirt on NixOS showing all my… read more

gaming nixos virtual-reality vm vfio +1

Blink Mini RE, Part 4 -- Staring into the heart of the binary

With pretty graphs in coincidentally non-binary colors!

Because I had the privilege of obtaining factory-fresh ROMs from the cameras ( as covered in the last episode ), I realized that I could use those to perform some deeper analysis of the ROM's structure. So, that's what this post will set out to do. This post was made in a Jupyter… read more

/projects/blink-re reverse-engineering Python Jupyter Numpy +1

Blink Mini RE, Part 3 -- Staring into the eye of the binary

If we stare at a binary for long enough, we will intimidate it into giving us its little secrets

This is a continuation of the last post, where I desoldered and dumped the ROM . In this post, I will discuss some of my initial findings from the firmware. I'll write about more juicy findings in the next post because this one is getting quite long, and the next one deserves a… read more

/projects/blink-mini-re reverse-engineering ghidra Python Jupyter

Blink Mini RE, Part 2 -- Desoldering and dumping the ROM

I desoldered and resoldered a chip without legs, so I'm officially an expert on all things electronics

![The Blink Mini board, focused on the ROM.](https://astrid.tech/\_/2022/07/07/0/focus-rom.jpg)This is a continuation from the post where I disassembled the lil guy . Last time, I couldn't do anything about this chip because I was waiting for my SPI flash programmer kit to… read more

/projects/blink-mini-re Electrical Engineering ghidra reverse-engineering soldering +1

Disassembling an Amazon Blink Mini camera

I used Ghidra twice, so that means I'm officially an expert in reverse engineering

Strap in kids, this post is about me physically hacking apart Amazon's Blink Mini to get access to its firmware! No firmware was harmed or modified in the making of this post... yet. Big thanks to Ada and Erin for helping me figure this stuff out! Background I attended the… read more

/projects/blink-mini-re Electrical Engineering teardown incompetency cybersecurity +2

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