title: Convert a hex string in ASCII to the same hex values using Perl
body: <p>I have a hexadecimal value as an ASCII string in Perl:</p>
  
  <p><code>42dc3f74212c4e74bab2</code> &lt;-- This is a string, but this is also the actual hexadecimal value I need</p>
  
  <p>I need to convert that to hex, and by converting I mean \x42\xdc\x3f, etc.</p>
  
  <p><code>$auth_key = pack("h*", $key);</code> #It kind of works, but it gives me a low nibble, so I end up with <code>24 cd f3</code>, etc.</p>
  
  <p>How can I convert this string into hexadecimal of the same values!</p>
  
  <p>I'm trying to feed this into a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_Datagram_Protocol" rel="nofollow">UDP</a> socket if that helps.</p>