Hey Everyone!

So I've had an idea about playing sound off of the TI-84 Plus CE for a while now. I thought, "Why use the USB port when you can use the calculator's screen?". Using various snap circuits I've had for years, I rigged up a photo resistor to the top right corner of my calculator. Whenever a white square is displayed in the said corner, a loop of sounds is played from an external speaker.

Here's a demonstration of it with a program I wrote in ICE:



In theory, you could make a more advanced version of this using an arduino or raspberry pi, allowing more sounds to be played from certain light patterns. There may also be a way to manipulate the charge indicator on the side of the calculator to create this same effect.

Anyways, I just thought it would be cool to show you all this little project.

Take Care!

-OldNewTimer
Awesome idea
Maybe use photo-resistors with color filters to change pitches somehow?
This is really cool.

EDIT: Maybe you could use 3 photo-resistors one with R, G, B filters each, have a program that depending on button pressed will fill screen with r, g, b, rg, gb, br, rgb, or nothing. That's 8 notes, enough for a simple scale maybe? Detect whether each color is displayed with the resistors and choose something to play based off of that?

Just need to learn enough Arduino to do this now...
Minxrod wrote:
Maybe use photo-resistors with color filters to change pitches somehow?
This is really cool.

EDIT: Maybe you could use 3 photo-resistors one with R, G, B filters each, have a program that depending on button pressed will fill screen with r, g, b, rg, gb, br, rgb, or nothing. That's 8 notes, enough for a simple scale maybe? Detect whether each color is displayed with the resistors and choose something to play based off of that?

Just need to learn enough Arduino to do this now...


Same with me here, I am very new to this and used what I knew to create a rudimentary design. I'd have to get some more electronic parts to make a better one.

The whole color thing is a good idea though Very Happy
This is epic.
Great job! I need to do that Razz

lol, snap circuits... I'd try that, but my (messy, disorganized and breaks nearly everything, and is 11) brother won't let me (a 16 year old who is WAY more organized, and actually has EE experience (basic, although something Razz)) touch it.

[edit]: Was the sounds also from a Snap Circuits piece? I'd like to see the whole circuitry and the program!
SM84CE wrote:
Great job! I need to do that Razz

0x5, snap circuits... I'd try that, but my (messy, disorganized and breaks nearly everything, and is 11) brother won't let me (a 16 year old who is WAY more organized, and actually has EE experience (basic, although something Razz)) touch it.

[edit]: Was the sounds also from a Snap Circuits piece? I'd like to see the whole circuitry and the program!


It was. The kit I got had some pre-programmed sounds that certain circuits could make (It had some sort of space-ish name). Sadly, I can't show it because I took it apart. To make matters worse, all of my snap circuits are in storage (I'm moving short-distance to a new house pretty soon). I plan to buy some arduinos and other stuff and make a second version of this project. Hopefully I can get it so that you can synthesize music directly on your CE, or implement it into games.

EDIT: Based on what i've researched. A design I've brainstormed (Offbrand Amazon arduino, 3 photoresistors, speaker, 3-D printed/custom case) may cost well under $15. Not the cheapest, but it's amazing to think that we could make a device that played music for all CEs (And CSEs I guess).
Hey guys,

To follow up on my last post, I've come up with a diagram of how the sound player would function:



Currently, I have it so that 4 photoresistors and a speaker are connected to the device. With 4 resistors, I have 16 different combinations to work with (16 different notes or something).

I am inexperienced with arduinos and just circuits in general, so please let me know if I messed up on anything to do with it. I hope to get parts and build it soon.
This is a nifty little idea Smile
I guess nothing is stopping you from plopping another photo resistor to another area on the screen and making some wonky dual-channel tunes.
If you're going to the extent of going through an arduino, with a bit of work, you could even have an extra photo resistor serve as an offset for the scale on the first one. Assuming you can get 8 notes with filters, you could play with the brightness itself. With that extra measurement, you could easily split up the brightness levels in 8, which coupled with the 8 notes from the actual colors, gives you 256 notes, which gives you a very good range to play most songs.
It would be even better if you could split the brightness into 12 (or 6). Then you have 8 (or 4) complete octaves to work with.

I want my calc to play to Soviet national anthem. Razz (not because I like the soviets, it's just a good song. Those Russians know how to make REAL music)
I figured out a better way with my snap circuits that only uses one photo resistor, here is the video:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ZgyJMCcrcxGNEiRdPsy5ZmVT2hHZgivQ/view?usp=sharing
I used TheLastMillenial's Advanced Brightness Utility to change the screen brightness.
you may have to download the video if it doesn't work (it didn't load online for me).
Now all you have to do is write a program that will change the brightness in a pattern that makes a song!
Wow that's incredible! Great job john35588!
I'm super pleased you found my program useful! As for making full songs, there are rudimentary instructions in the readme.txt on how you can use the subprograms for your own needs. I'm super hyped to see if someone can make their own song! (I'm definitely going to try it out this weekend!)

I may also make a music-maker for the calc and computer!

EDIT: I tried to recreate this, where did you put the battery on your snap circuits?
Turns out you were using a B6 to power it. I don't have a B6 so I thought you were using a U4 Razz
Fortunately you were using the 3v side so a single B1 worked just as well!
Now to get some tones logged tomorrow! (I would do it tonight but my parents told me to "stop making that obnoxious noise!") Laughing
lol, tlm, post the src when you're done, I want to do this too, and try to expand on it over summer break (June)...
I DID IT! I MADE A (barely recognizable) SONG ON MY CALCULATOR!

Warning, the shrill sound may be hard on the ears Wink

can you guess the tune? Probably not...

It's part of the KSP theme song. Very Happy
Let me know what you think of this... interesting-at-best song!
For anyone who found this page while looking to play music, I made a sound library that interfaces with an Arduino over USB. This library allows playing any frequency as a square wave and doesn't require any snap circuits (though I did use a speaker to test). I posted a topic here that will give some more information about it.
OldNewTimer wrote:
Hey Everyone!

So I've had an idea about playing sound off of the TI-84 Plus CE for a while now. I thought, "Why use the USB port when you can use the calculator's screen?". Using various snap circuits I've had for years, I rigged up a photo resistor to the top right corner of my calculator. Whenever a white square is displayed in the said corner, a loop of sounds is played from an external speaker.

Here's a demonstration of it with a program I wrote in ICE:



In theory, you could make a more advanced version of this using an arduino or raspberry pi, allowing more sounds to be played from certain light patterns. There may also be a way to manipulate the charge indicator on the side of the calculator to create this same effect.

Anyways, I just thought it would be cool to show you all this little project.

Take Care!

-OldNewTimer


I could show the piece used for the sounds later
OldNewTimer wrote:
Hey guys,

To follow up on my last post, I've come up with a diagram of how the sound player would function:



Currently, I have it so that 4 photoresistors and a speaker are connected to the device. With 4 resistors, I have 16 different combinations to work with (16 different notes or something).

I am inexperienced with arduinos and just circuits in general, so please let me know if I messed up on anything to do with it. I hope to get parts and build it soon.


snap circuits has an arduino kit called “snapino” Wink
  
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