Add sound to anything

Tool:
Greeting Card Sound Player Module

Transcript:
It’s time for another Cool Tool review. This is a greeting card sound module. There are a bunch of dirt cheap ones out there, but this fancy one cost me $9 on Amazon. It’s a straightforward way to add sound to your project.

Sometimes, you’re making a thing, and you want it to make a sound when it’s pressed, or turned or opened. And you’d think that would be an easy thing to do, but it can get surprisingly complicated and expensive to pull off.

One way to keep it simple is this pre-wired sound player module. It comes with a speaker and a button already wired up, plus wires to connect up jack for a 5v power adapter. Or, you can also do what I did and wire up a 3.7 volt rechargeable LiPo battery or 18650 battery to the 3.7v connections here.

Now, there are a lot of cheap, voice recorder modules out there, and I plan on doing a separate video on why those are great, but what I like most about this board is that you have a micro USB connection where you can load up your own MP3 file.

The board shows up on your computer like a thumb drive. Mine came with a little song already loaded on it. Delete the demo file and load up your own, and you now have a button-triggered sound effect that you can fit into your project.

You only get 4MB of room on here, though. So if you want a long sound, like a song, you’ll need to lower the bitrate way down in a program like Audacity. I’ve done it, though, and it works.

Another upshot of the USB port is that you can use it to recharge the battery you have wired up to the 3.7v side. So if you keep this USB port exposed on your project, or extend it to the outside with a panel mount extension cable, you can both recharge your project and reload your sound file.

What I also like about this solution is that it’s easy to hack what’s here. If you want to change the speaker, you just cut the old one off and use the same wires to connect a bigger one. If you want to use an arcade button or tilt switch instead of the included one? Just chop it and replace it. You don’t have to read a schematic or decipher the circuit board labels, just upgrade what’s already wired up.

That said, if you are down for some more intense hacking, a photo on Amazon which I’ll also post on Maker Project Lab, shows all the different modes and options.

You can wire in a photoresistor to make this light sensitive. You can short out some of these resistors over here for different playback modes. You can adjust the volume with this tiny potentiometer. There’s a lot you can do.

My plan is to use this to add a custom horn sound for my go kart, but there are a lot of possibilities here, and I’ll probably order another one up just to have on hand.

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[kyalgamingvlogs]

This was finally what I was looking for after hours and hours of searching thank you. I am trying to build my own custom full size xbox fridge and have it play the xbox sound when opened like the real one this won't be easy but this video certainly helped.

[oskartv]

Is it possible to make it play multiple sound files, like a different one each time you press the button? Thanks

[circamagic]

Lovely! I have a huge nostalgic place in my heart for old flower shop laser door chimes.Have been wanting to learn the basics of making such things.

[PantherTheCat]

Followed from maker update and ordered one of these. Adding sound to “anything” is a nice trick to have up my sleeve.

[zanderzoo]

Is it possible to add multiple audio files and shuffle through to choose which one to play?

[tuggy]

Absolutely amazing, I bought a little Chinese toy gun and I’m looking forward to programming it to make some other more funny sounds. It’s also my first time doing anything like this and this can be a cool learning experience!

[roshii]

This was extremely helpful! Addressed exactly what I wanted to know (arcade button). Thank you!

[nonexistenty]

I am extremely grateful for this video Sir.

I was looking for something exactly like this. 🙂🙏🏻

Thank you 🙂🙏🏻

[jensbasement]

This is so helpful! Never thought I'd find something but here it is thankyou

[donberiman]

Keep up the good work I'm trying to use something for a clock

[digimaks]

Pretty simply and intuitive! This seems liek something I might need!

[kennethreese]

Thank you so much for this video, i have been doing this with much more expensive systems!

[pacificcoastminiatures]

Great idea! Plan to add some ambient sounds to my model railroad, so considering this. Will just have to see what 4MB will give me, ideally would like to loop the sound so not sure if that's doable.

[AM-obyi]

Is there a way to add multiple sounds and be able to change them( switch to the next sound)?

[logannonemaker]

Thinking about adding sound to my Lego Infinity gauntlet, just installed a light kit for it today and I think it'd be epic if I wired the sound to the light switch

[chrisrichardson]

This would be an amazing upgrade to my Knight Rider talking KITT!!!

[crescentq]

Wow a video thats easy to understand and strait to the point, rare. Thanks for the info!

[johnkoester]

What about a custom pull string voicebox for a sheriff woody doll

[TheWarbonnet]

This just opens a whole Pandora’s box for me lol

[samanthaminor]

I deleted the item that was on it and it still plays it. Is there something I am doing wrong?