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More Aesthetic Hard Drive Speaker

by leevonk on October 13, 2006

Table of Contents

intro: More Aesthetic Hard Drive Speaker . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

Video . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

step 1: Open the Hard Drive . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

step 2: Solder on wires . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

step 3: Play Music . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

Video . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

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http://www.instructables.com/id/More-Aesthetic-Hard-Drive-Speaker/
intro: More Aesthetic Hard Drive Speaker
A way to make a speaker out of a hard drive that actually looks really elegant. Video included.

I think the original 'hard drive speaker' idea came from Afrotech a couple years ago:
http://www.afrotechmods.com/cheap/hdspeakers/hdspeakers.htm

Video

step 1: Open the Hard Drive

If your hard drive is held together by torx screws instead of normal screws, and you don't have a torx wrench, use a drill press to drill into the screw heads (this is what I
had to do) until everything comes loose.

You'll end up seeing something like this.

Use a hacksaw to cut as far as you can between the hard drive arms and the platters. Then for the final bit of metal under the arms, use a dremel from the backside of the
case. Don't worry about cutting through the flexible cable going to the arms, you should be able to see where the arm voice coil (the coil of copper wire between the two
magnets at the arms base) is soldered to the which you're cutting.

http://www.instructables.com/id/More-Aesthetic-Hard-Drive-Speaker/
 Image Notes
1. arm
2. cut along here
3. platters
4. cut along here
5. top magnet (note for later)

step 2: Solder on wires

When you've cut the arms away from the platters, solder wires to the voice coil tips (where they were soldered to the cable which you just cut).

You might have to remove the top magnet to have easier access for soldering. To do this, drill out the screw heads keeping the magnet on from the other side of the
case. Even then, the top magnet is pretty damn hard to get off, you'll have to pry it off with a screwdriver.

Then you might find it easier to solder to the coil ends if you pull the ends off of wherever they were soldered, this way the ends are free and not so close together.

step 3: Play Music

Once you're wires are soldered to the voice coil, hook the wires to your audio amplifier (stereo, or whatever) and play some music. Use music with a lot of treble rather
than bass to test it.

It will only work if the thing is resting ontop of a good sounding surface, if you're holding it in your hand it won't work. This is like how the strings of a guitar won't make
much sound without the big flat guitar beneath them.

Video

http://www.instructables.com/id/More-Aesthetic-Hard-Drive-Speaker/
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Comments
29 comments Add Comment

Derin says: Jul 7, 2008. 8:47 AM REPLY

your gonna spend some time sawing,those HDD drives survive being dropped from five feet 10 times on a concrete floor(tested) while being opened up
and dont forget the "exposed to rain for a month in opened case"

leevonk says: Mar 24, 2009. 8:24 PM REPLY

takes about 5 minutes

http://www.instructables.com/id/More-Aesthetic-Hard-Drive-Speaker/
 Shoeless Boy says: Oct 22, 2007. 1:36 PM REPLY
Do you need the top magnet cause I have the same hard drive but I lost the top magnet?

tbakhsh says: Mar 24, 2009. 2:00 PM REPLY

no, actually most tutorials tell you to take it off.

aman09 says: Nov 16, 2008. 6:38 PM REPLY

So guys, I found a quick and easy way to improve the bass tones. Unfortuantely it makes the thing look super ugly. Regardless, the fix is to cut the top off a
pop can and then tape it anywhere on the arm.
If you don't mind it being ugly give this a try. It works.

abadfart says: Jul 27, 2008. 11:05 PM REPLY

nice i made one of thees for the Little Shop Of Physics

Kiteman says: Feb 20, 2008. 10:25 AM REPLY

I guess I could fix one to my shed wall ...

unspecified says: Dec 31, 2007. 4:11 AM REPLY

Is it really common in your area to own a drill press before torx screwdrivers?

leevonk says: Jan 22, 2008. 3:02 PM REPLY

torx are barely used for anything, I used my drill press at work.

Amadeos says: May 26, 2007. 9:00 AM REPLY

well, is it crap or good, I wish to build one.

leevonk says: May 26, 2007. 9:57 AM REPLY

it sounds good as long as the music is all in the higher frequencies with no base. the base sounds pretty bad.

Amadeos says: May 26, 2007. 10:04 AM REPLY

thanks

gamer says: May 6, 2007. 2:03 PM REPLY

that sounds like crap, but its so awsome, anyway, i really like how creative some people can be, great project.

ross123540 says: Nov 25, 2006. 5:14 PM REPLY

what song is that i want it, it sounds ace :-)

leevonk says: Dec 6, 2006. 1:20 PM REPLY

it's from a free computer game called 'cloud' you can download the music for free too from a website.

chalacuna says: Nov 13, 2006. 8:31 PM REPLY

chalacuna

mnn.. its really cool.. im amazed at this hdd speaker system i want try it myself. i have a couple of damaged speaker.

chalacuna

Ushanka says: Oct 13, 2006. 6:33 PM REPLY

I'd just like to comment on the excellent choice of music. <i>Cloud</i> is one of my favourite games.

http://www.instructables.com/id/More-Aesthetic-Hard-Drive-Speaker/
 orirawlings says: Oct 30, 2006. 4:55 PM REPLY
I agree, i absolutely love that game. very original.

Marley says: Oct 18, 2006. 2:51 PM REPLY

Wow. i was so impressed that i just had to do this myself, and it work great. Ingenious! how did you ever come up with this? how does it even work?

also, i have a suggestion on how to improve the design: instead of cutting the rest of the hard drive casing off, just remove the platters. then cut the top plate
in half, screw it on the hard drive, and you have an instant sound resonating box.

leevonk says: Oct 19, 2006. 8:26 AM REPLY

yeah, my hard drive was kept together by torx screws,I didn't have a torx wrench. I tried drilling the platters out but didn't work and I was getting
frustrated so I just hack sawed the bastard.
This isn't my original idea, I think the guy that made the first 'hard drive speaker' was afrotech:
http://www.afrotechmods.com/cheap/hdspeakers/hdspeakers.htm

closeenough says: Oct 13, 2006. 6:49 PM REPLY

The bass is distorted for two reasons. One is that bass will mean much larger movements of the head from the central neutral position. At large angular
deflections, voice coils like this are nonlinear. Sadly, the heads in a modern hard drive use one of the platters as a servo feedback mechanism, so you're a
bit stuck. You could fit a capacitive rotary sensor on the spindle and use it to drive an op-amp circuit that will servo the head for you, like some of the laser
galvanometer projects have used. (You can make this out of ordinary copper clad board.)

Secondly, because of these large angular deflections, the body of the drive is probably jumping around a bit. You could try using clamps to attach it to the
sounding board- I suggest that you could also drill pilot holes into the alloy drive body and use self-tapping wood screws to attach it.

This sort of mechanism might make a very good laser mirror controller, though there may be too much mass for that, and you'll need to drive a lot of current
in order to get it to respond quickly enough. :-)

yyttu says: Oct 13, 2006. 10:58 AM

(removed by author or community request)

leevonk says: Oct 13, 2006. 11:00 AM REPLY

the bass came out kind of distorted at normal volumes, I don't know how one could fix that.

Tool Using Animal says: Oct 13, 2006. 11:19 AM REPLY

That's sweet, you should mount it on a tone box, or an old ukelele ;-), maybe try one of those wood holders they make for kleenex, instant resonating
box.

rexcarrs says: Oct 13, 2006. 4:02 PM REPLY

wooden cigar box?

radiorental says: Oct 13, 2006. 11:14 AM REPLY

"I don't know how one could fix that."

use a proper speaker

jovino says: Oct 13, 2006. 5:44 PM REPLY

If you put a capacitor in-line, it will act as a high-pass circuit like in a cross-over. This will eliminate the low-end frequencies.

leevonk says: Oct 13, 2006. 11:33 AM REPLY

I actually made this for another purpose and then tested it out as a speaker too :)

Hyperviking says: Nov 8, 2006. 1:59 PM REPLY

Increasing the mass of the heads actually makes it sound better. It does however take a whole lot of power to get any sound out of these
things, closeenough is right.

I'm going to try and hang the speaker from the heads with a string attached to the center of the bottom of a cup, to see if it will resonate
better...

Also, I like the idea of re-attaching the other half of the box... though wiring could get complicated.

http://www.instructables.com/id/More-Aesthetic-Hard-Drive-Speaker/