Larry's Blog

A VOICE RECORDING CHIP

Well here it is! My setup for experimenting and building a project for the ISD2560 voice recorder chip.

You can see the cleaned up counter-top where I have assembled modules for the ISD2560 voice recorder chip itself, a PICmicrocontroller which talks to it, a
microphone card and an assembly for the loudspeaker output.

My main project is a device that will count up numbers and say the count out loud. "ninet million, two hundred thiry four thousand, two hundred twenty two"
"nine million, two hundred thirty four thousand, two hundred twenty three" etc., etc. Capacity is 99,999,999.

But what about the voice recording chip? Well it has a capacity of 60 seconds of recording. The main capability of the chip is that the digitally recorded sound messages are ADDRESSABLE. I can record multiple messages, like "one"
"seventeen" "thousand" and the by a variety of means, I can play indiviual
messages in any order I want. I also program my PIC microcontroller chip to send control signals to the sound chip. Sound like fun? Well, it is rather challenging to do, but I am enjoying every moment of it.

I've Cleaned Up My Shop

Take a look! For a while I couldn't find my way around my shop!
My white counter-top was covered with resistors, batteries, capacitors, IC's , wire, connectors, breadboards, PC boards, relays potentiometers,screwdrivers, pliers, wire strippers, scissors, electric tape, stands of solder, machine screws and nuts, pieces of metal of all shapes, relays and switches. Well, look what has happened!

When you are in the heat of a project, you don't want to waste time cleaning up, so you just push stuff aside. But finally you get to a point where you can't even move around in your shop, there's so much stuff on the floor. Then you have to make a tactical retreat and put everything back where they belong. That's where I am now and it's really helping me with my project.