Hard Drive Speaker

In this instructable we will make a speaker out of a hard drive.

Step 1 Items Needed

Items needed for this project :
1. Hard Disk Drive
2. Soldering Iron
3. Wire Cutter
4. T9 Torx Screw Driver

Comments

[frostybob]

Hey guys did as per instructable and nothing happens. Tried it on two HDD and still nothing on either. HELP???? and sorry.... It is possible I broke something because the reading things on the end looked pretty munted

[Ace Winget]

I just use a small flat head and you can get those torx screws to loosen. If you have a drill the you could always just drill those out. I found an image of a hard drive dis-assembly here that I found really cool and helpful. Thanks sybyabraham great info!

[_Scratch_]

Korn in the vid! lol

[_Scratch_]

Also, can anyone give me an explanation on how this works?

[Jords001]

Very cool. Has anybody tried this as a microphone? Just curious what the quality would be like.

[cody777]

doesnt work well

[ametz]

I do not have a torx screwdriver or a drill press. I have all of the outside screws off by using a wrench, but the hidden screws are impossible to get to without the screwdriver. what can I do?

[cody777]

if you have a dremel you can cut a slit into the screw and use a flat-head, i do it a lot

[apb2390]

I'd say it's very hard to do that, but you can get a T9 Torx screwdriver set for 8.95 USD at a large hardware store.

[Pyrice4]

You can follow these two all the way through the ribbon wire into the back of the main PCB so you dont have to take the arm off.

[Moglizorz]

Yea, that's what I'm doing now. Seems alot easier soldering to the existing PCB (especially on this old 90's hard drive I'm using where the components are massive) than doing this delicate stuff.

[Joxson]

It´s not a speaker in there. I made one for myself today. It works great!!!! Can I make so the volume is higher? Sorry for my English!

[mettaurlover]

my suggestion: make multiples, and then solder the like ends to make the proper amount, solder wires onto those ends, and plug it in. more speakers=more sound.

[Joxson]

Sorry for so late but a fun thing.

I wanted volume so I pushed in 130 Watt in it! HAHAHA, it starded to smoke^^
But the volume was high.

The harddrive speakers can stand aboud 110 Watt:D

[mettaurlover]

...

[bioerror]

what u do is get 2 ppl, 1 person holds the HDD down and the other uses 2 pliers and grabs the metal on either side of the magnet and pulls up with all their might!

[anonymousrandomguy]

Korn (Y)

[dakiller546]

mine only has three terminals :( witch do i use

[thestyrofoampeanut]

 yes it will work
one is a ground and danymw just has a different hard drive
test out each terminal with test leads
youll find the two that work

[danymw]

 it won't work

[danymw]

are you sure? i allmost smashed my fingers with it,and broked the hdd...when connecting the wires.i'll get another one

[Mr.Grinch]

I had issues with mine also, did yours twist off, or slide off? it took me five minutes to realize that my WD drive magnet twists off, and my Seagate... doesn't

[danymw]

 i opened up about 10 hdd,all damaged or low memory space, but they were all different. rarely,the magnet just comes out,but usually you have to use a screw driver to remove the top magnet (after removing the screws). if you twist it, you'll hit the head or even the plates and damage the hdd,which i did once, and it's not good. 
good luck

[ametz]

It wont come up... help??

[Mr.Grinch]

I had the same issue with the arm, I think he forgot to mention that there is another screw on top, where you removed the screw to get the cover off. Mine happened to be an hexagonal screw that had another screw in it

[zack247]

you may need a flat screwdriver to unscrew it

[ShotPain]

 i was hoping you could make a turntable out of a HDD :D

[Helder4u]

I would not try to connect to the motor drive.. but only to the arm assembly.
That should take care of burning amplifiers and sound inconsistencies.

[beauwalker23]

congratulations on making it on N4G.com!

http://www.n4g.com/industrynews/News-318009.aspx

[sybyabraham]

WOW!! That's amazing! :D

[zack247]

i have a problem: did you connect the wires to the reader head, or the coil thing? (i know i sound stupid)

[monorail]

I made one of these just now and theres sound coming out, however the read-write head itself is not moving at all as seen in the video in this instructable. I have connected it with a speaker wire to my laptop and didn't do the spindle motor hack part. Is this why the head isn't moving?

[mae-kitty]

 Remember. Not all hard drives are the same. ATA and IDE and Parallel Drives can all be different. Not all that you see this person doing can be of use to you. But it gives you an idea of what to expect and look for.

[pyrorower]

Damn, now I wish I hadn't maimed my old hard drive. Nice song choice btw.
I better start keeping an eye out for computers on the side of the road now :P

[Trevor114]

here is my issue i don't want to hook it up to my amp because it reads 16 resistance on a meter thing and a speaker runs a 8 resistance it will blow my amp up what do i do

[matador29b]

actually, it won't blow.  Higher resistance is better than lower.  If your amp outputs, say 50 watts, at 8 ohms, you are sending 2.5 amps to the speakers, but at 16 ohms you are sending 1.75 amps.
A lower resistance will be a problem. 
(the ideal amplifier has very high gain, very low input impedance and very high output impedance)
I think my concept is accurate, can someone confirm?

[champ523]

how to run it dude

[theteengeek]

dude my amp almost caught on fire. What did i do wrong?

[anitokyomics]

First things first... Wattage and load... Good thing I have 2 amps with me here to work. The first one did. When I checked, it had a limit. So, prolly the HDD itself is wattage dependable. man.

[champ523]

dude can you send me email on [e-mail] please