I'm new to the forums here - I've known about Arduino for a while, just never really needed to make anything. Always thought it was a neat device, though.
Anyway - I'm looking to make something now, and I'm wondering if Arduino is right for what I want to do.
*I wanted to post some links, but the forum says I need to make one post first - sorry about that..
Basically, I want to make something like the Wrap It Up box from the Dave Chappelle skit for a friend (who's getting married).
I was googling around and saw a post from the forum (post title: Arduino + MP3 player) here where someone was talking about using the Vinculum module, and posted some code in the playground on interfacing with it.
So my question is - is this (Arduino + VMusic) the right kind of thing to do for such a device? Would this be an overly complicated endeavor to have one button (re)start and stop a single mp3 file from another module, or would there be an easier/cheaper way to go about doing something like this?
I wonder if you could find a simpler approach. The light up sign you could do with a led flashlight. The sound could be one of those voice memo thingies - i don't know about the volume but the arduino would have to be amplified too.
You might also think about just some kind of buzzer and the light-up sign.
I confess I didn't have the sound on for the video so i don't really know what you're going for there.
The Webster's people called: they want to use your box as an illustration for the definition of "overkill" ;D
I'm with Bill on this: just pick up a cheap MP3 player (even a used one from a thrift store or a flea market, unless you want to make the player itself a nice gift), and wire it to the button with something like a couple of 555s to control the "on" time and the flashing of the LEDs.
By all means, get an Arduino or two to start experimenting with: you'll probably come up with lots of ideas to have fun with. But don't waste one on this, unless your main goal is to learn about controlling a USB device, rather than making a gag gift that you could do with a few dollars worth of Radio Shack parts.
bill - When its on it plays some music. It's a spoof on how Actors get played off by the orchestra when their speeches run too long on award shows.
Ran - Lol - yeah, I thought that might be the case, which is why I wanted to see if this sounded silly to do this way or not. What do you mean by using 'a couple of 555s'? I was thinking about getting some kind of mp3 player before and connecting the button on the box to the play button on the player, but I also need to make sure it restarts the song every time as well.
And yeah, the reason Arduinos were in the forefront of my mind was that I was also thinking about using one as excuse for another project... so I probably will get one anyway. I'm much more of a software guy than hardware, though, but I'm sure I'll figure it out.