Show HN: Design/build of some parametric speaker cabinets with OpenSCAD

I am an (amateur) developer so when I needed to create some simple 3D objects to print them afterward OpenSCAD looked like a dream come true ("object as code" :)).

I tried three times (over two years) to use it but it was absurdly difficult to build a piece, with something that looked like "callbacks from hell" in JS (boxed in boxes in boxes of code. I had to keep track of the position all the time and there are no constraints.

Compared to that I tried Onshape (the free version which is almost the full one but all models are public) and it took me an afternoon to create my pieces. It was really simple, on a generic laptop without any power (a Lenovo P14s)

I noped out of Fusion360 due to the intrusive (and dark-pattern) onboarding. Having to create an account is going to be a deal-killer for me for what should be standalone software. It feels like they may well pull the rug out from under the community at some point.

I never could "get" SketchUp. (Didn't they also kind of become more of a walled-garden after Google or whoever sold them off?)

Went with FreeCAD instead. I'm pretty sure it is grossly inferior to Fusion (the Mac version crashes on me periodically) but is free as in Blender. It has worked for the simple things I have been sending to the 3D printer.

If you like those, take a look at OnShape. Completely free and browser based. I had a great time designing some wainscotting with it.

You should have a look at CadQuery It is a pyhton library witch uses opencascade. 3d models as code, pyhton and since it is opencascade you get relative and feature based positioning.

A basic speaker can't do a lot to improve "room acoustics" [1], particularly below the Schroeder frequency where room modes greatly affect the bass response. From my experience, it's the bass that needs fixing in room, because even a "perfect speaker" will get boomy/muddy at some frequencies (ie. reflections overlapping constructively), and thin/null at others (ie. reflections overlapping destructively). And if you aren't going to worry about "fixing the room", then there are already companies/products like Kali Audio IN-5 speakers [2] that have squeezed in some good performance and tech (eg. active DSP with coaxial driver) in to an affordable package.

There are ways to improve the bass situation, and one is by implementing "directional bass", aka a Cardioid array. This could be achieved with multiple individual speakers (add-on/upgrade existing system), or could be integrated in to 1 "speaker". Examples of the latter have been around for a few years - see Dutch & Dutch 8c or Kii Three. They are relatively expensive (which you could consider an early adopter tax), but affordable competition is starting to mature with speakers such as Mesanovic CDM65 [3].

There is another way to improve things too, and that is via "Active Room Treatment" [4] as Dirac calls it. Basically it uses excess capability in various speakers to "clean up" the audio of other speakers in the system by outputting "cancellation waves" (to cancel the problems). The results appear amazing, but they are taking their sweet time getting it released on to affordable equipment.

There's also "spatial audio" like Dolby Atmos that should/could work around room problems in a similar way to Dirac ART. So good speakers (like already exist) + ART + Atmos + AI "upscaled" 2 channel source music could be the final frontier? But that's just for "mechanical" sound reproduction. Maybe in the future I can just transmit the song straight in to my brain, bypassing my ears and the need for speakers entirely?!

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Room_acoustics [2] https://www.kaliaudio.com/independence [3] https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/m... [4] https://www.dirac.com/live/dirac-live-active-room-treatment/