More Hardware Music


today and tomorrow found a few more projects using computer hardware to create music like our earlier Radiohead post. Above is a rendition of The Imperial March using a 3.5 inch floppy drive. Two more projects are embedded below.


harddisko is a collection of defective hard drives from various manufacturers, repair shops, and institutions. The drives are all wired to separate power circuits. As each one powers up, it runs its own unique sounding self test.

Lastly, is the BeggingBot. Using multiple floppy drives and hard drives it performs music. It then asks for donations via the CD tray.

7 thoughts on “More Hardware Music

  1. Most FDD hacks directly interface with the stepper motors of the drives and use a microcontroller to shoot a PWM signal to get the head to move. the shorter the pulses, the higher the note, I believe..

    Really cool hack, I would have expected them to do something like that for the 2nd vid, although timing the self-test failures is pretty nifty too.

Leave a Reply

Please be kind and respectful to help make the comments section excellent. (Comment Policy)

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.