Tired of that TV blaring in a public place? Turn it off…

A friend of mine has recently told me about his annoying neighbor who insists on having a television on his back porch. At night, this guy watches the TV with the volume blasting thus ruining the quiet evening for all of the other neighbors. This “ultra” TV-B-Gone is the answer.

Using a normal TV-B-Gone for the control electronics, 20 high-powered LEDs are added to boost the output power of the device allowing you to switch a TV off from up to 90 feet away. The Ultra TV-B-Gone is born! (For those who don’t know, the TV-B-Gone is a small, keychain sided device that transmits the “turn off” codes for nearly every brand of television out there.)

I was even thinking that my friend could mount one of those infrared LED illuminators (typically used in security camera applications) and connect that to a TV-B-Gone via a driver circuit. That might be a bit much, though, as it might disable the TVs of any neighbor without their drapes closed 😉

I really enjoy “hacks” like this to improve upon an existing device simply and effectively. Anyone know of any other unusually cool projects like this?