o27-SoundEffects

The o27-soundEffects bit was a component of the Avengers Hero Inventor Kit. It allowed users to trigger sound clips from the onboard button, or from other bits in the littleBits portfolio (buttons, switches, sensors, etc). The soundEffects bit came pre-loaded with 80 sound effects, and also provided room for users to upload their own sound files for playback.

The design was heavily based on the w32-soundEffects bit, built around the same silabs EFM8 8051 MCU. However the speaker enclosure and amplifier were optimized and acoustically tuned for the sound effects in the pack (as well as increasing the maximum SPL).

A novel system was created whereby the bit could accept either analog or UART signals on it’s input bitsnap. By default it would be triggered by rising edges of the analog signal, but if UART frames in the correct format were sent, they would be parsed instead. The UART frames used a similar protocol to that of the w32-controlHub, and allowed the user to upload new sound effects.