The X-Labs team at the University of South Florida had themselves a whale of a time recently, burning through some serious amounts of electricity in order to play the Mario theme on an enormous Tesla coil.
The 10 foot electrical arcs were tuned so the noise generated by the power output approximated musical notes, with the university’s aptly named “Big Tesla Coil” then churning out a passable version of Mario’s key refrain. It even looks like an enormous, mechanical mushroom, but we think that’s just a coincidence. [YouTube via Ubergizmo]













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How much energy did they waste?
Not much, its just high voltage and very low amps, when using electric arcs to make sound the amps are irelavant
Waste? Money well spent.
Now do the A-Team theme tune.
As much as it pains me to admit I watched it, this would be the real deal version of the scene in The Sorcerers Apprentice. The Ride of the Valkyries next please.
2 Points.
1. Where is there any information about the electricity used?
2. Waste (in this case) is a subjective term. I consider the electricity used to present and broadcast most Television wasted. I would rather watch hours of this than one second of the X factor.
Needs more polyphony!
Needs more Dr.Who!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sjtzib0G9Rs
I give you more Dr. Who but this time with plums that need transporting via wheelbarrow.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdrqdW4Miao&feature=youtube_gdata_player