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Add colorful effects to your 1980s boombox with Arduino and LEDs

Arduino TeamJanuary 5th, 2018

While ’80s-style boomboxes have their own unique character, per hacker “Dancorp’s” excellent mod, it’s clear that they could be improved dramatically with programmable LEDs.

This build uses a capacitive filtering arrangement to feed line out signals from the boombox into an Arduino Uno, which then controls three LED strips.

Two of these strips are arranged around the speaker cones, emitting beautiful LED effects to go along with the music playing, while the third can be used to light up the built-in VU meters.

A schematic along with Arduino code are available on Dancorp’s write-up. It looks like a fairly accessible project, especially given the extra space available in electronics from that era.

Boards:Uno
Categories:ArduinoFeatured

3 Responses to “Add colorful effects to your 1980s boombox with Arduino and LEDs”

  1. liuny Says:

    i like the colourfulness

  2. AKJ Says:

    Nice. It is unbelievable how much the boombox would have costed with this.

  3. William Regehr Says:

    Arduino Blog

    […]Please take a second and visit our photograph gallery or check out our client testimonials to listen to what our clients are saying.[…]

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