Pocket Speakers

Hey all, this is one of my first instructables so please critique but be nice!

Anyways, recently I've found I have a need for some portable speakers, but I don't use an Ipod so I needed something that could be used by any mp3 player. So I came up with my own design and built it, since I was surprised at how well this turned out, I decided to post it. This instructable requires parts not necessarily found all over the place or at home, but I'm sure you can improvise. this project is actually quite simple and requires beginner level soldering and drilling.

**Warning, this instuctable suggests using relatively dangerous hand tools, don't be stupid, be smart and be safe.**

**EDIT** some people may comment on this but the comparison in the title is based on the many crappy ipod speakers out there. Also the picture below is not a set of ipod speakers, just a pair i had kicking around, which also happen to suck.

Step 1: Materials

Materials:
- One metal mint box, this one conveniently had this plastic cover over the mints, kinda fancy in my opinion. $4 (including the mints, though in reflection, they weren't that great XP.)
- One headphone jack 3.5mm, free, I cut it off a really old pair I think I may have gotten free from an airline one trip.) **note if you are doing dual speakers and would like your stereo feature (though it won't really matter too much) get a 3.5mm jack with stereo (you can tell because it has three sections on the metal bit). But like I said it doesn't really matter too much so feel free to get mono, but I will assume stereo.
- Finally most importantly, a pair of (or at least one if you can't get your hands on two) laptop speakers. Now these were free since I ripped them out of a really old CTX Ezbook 700 series (discontinued but still kicking around places) This one was running Windows 98, (not anymore! >D)

Tools:
- Drill, I used hand held but I'm sure you would get better results from a drill press. 1/16 drill bit
- Dremel with a sanding bit or similar machine
- Soldering iron with solder
- Exacto knife if your's has this nice plastic cover like mine
- Electrical tape, to me it's more of a tool, for this project you only need a bit.

I can't say too much on cost since I scrounged up most of the stuff, really all I bought were the mints and actually for the mints. I had the speakers on hand and picked this case out as the best and in the end it worked out great. I'm not totally sure where you can even get this mints since I found them in a candy shop in Whistler, Canada on a trip.

Here's their website though which I googled and found them to be from Denmark
http://www.x-it-dk.com/index.html

Comments

[hoppe_groda]

when i cut my cable up, it had four unisolated wires in it , one green, a red and two copper colored ones, how should they run????

[ivanjacob]

red is right green is left the 2 copper ones are -

[wangtrevor]

... that mean u have 2 speaker sides green and copper1 for left or right earbud and red and copper for the other

[MazdaSpeedProduction]

Thats excattly mine! I'm confused!

[wangtrevor]

... that mean u have 2 speaker sides green and copper1 for left or right earbud and red and copper for the other

[Gonazar]

The red and green should be the positive leads for each speaker/ear-bud, i'm not quite sure what the convention is for left and right though, you can play around with it, but in my case it didn't matter cause i could switch them anyways. The copper wires are ground and connect to the negative lead. Unless your speaker specifies which is negative and/or positive, it shouldn't matter how you hook it up, just maker sure you have the left and right (green and red) going to different speakers. If your hooking speakers directly into a 3.5 mm jack, they have 3 solder points on the inside, 2 coming out of the middle and one on the outside. The two on the inside are left and right, the outside is ground. so you would connect both copper/ground/negative wires to that point.

[guitarfan]

 could i use this with my guitar?

[dguillinta]

Purchase an adapter, they have them at most stores. It fits over the 3.5mm and makes it the size of an amp plug thingy.

[Gonazar]

I don't own a guitar so i wouldn't know. I assume you need some sort of amplifier though first. Search instructables and look around, there are several of these, here's something i found after looking for mini amps. http://www.instructables.com/answers/how-to-make-a-mini-guitar-amp/

[xxxcrossxxx]

currently the speaker is running on the power supplied by the ipod, can anyone suggest how can i supply power externally
pls help

[TSC]

nice!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Da Nugesta]

the speakers you ended up using weren't from the dollar store speakers!

[crackjr]

dude that is very cool I put mine in a coffin shaped smoke case

[Aznhick]

About your inward facing speakers where you listen with the case open, the plastic piece could be used to hold the music player in place if its one of those small ones. I have an idea with my ipod shuffle for this (i got one for free off some free offer somewhere).

[daelans]

my sister got the original shuffle. she was throwin it away sos i take it and i gutted it :p and its insides were old (duh, no seprise there) and it was to ... shuffley for the project i had in minde. (btw microsoft zune is beter then the apple ipod but the samsung... is best in terms of quality. it went through my washing machine x2 (lol, washer and dryer twice, lmfao) then got taken apart haphazardly put togethor and still work. albeit with constant battery drain even when off)

[Gonazar]

yeah that could probably work if it's thin enough, there's only about a 1/4 inch of space and it down on the sides too.

[carlos-felo]

Ha! It's good!

[cd41]

thats cool you gave mne a good idea for speaker now if only i could find that old radio

[gamer]

Yea! Finally another X-It mint tin project, so far there are 3! haha Very nice, but the speakers you used look like earbuds :S Odd.... Anyways... Nice! -gamer

[rimar2000]

Being together the loudspeakers, the stereophonic effect is lost.

[Gonazar]

I agree however, if you have songs like I do that have sections played only on one side of a set of speakers and you have mono, that section will be lost. It's like when the guitar solo is only on the left earbud and since you're sharing with a friend you only have the right.