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Ask HN: Any hardware startups here?

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Re: Ask HN: Any hardware startups here?

#641

We’re here to make ethically-made tech sexy so it becomes the Newnorm (yup that’s the brand name). We just launched our first product ‘Sound’ last week: a pair of earbuds, headphones, and speakers in one modular system. Check it out here newnorm.tech/sound and pre-order it if high-end wireless audio is your cup of tea! If not, we’ll have many configs and allow Nike-style customization next year so keep an eye on us.…

Those headphones look like the most uncomfortable things on the planet.

Are they supposed to be over-ear or on-ear?

Re: Ask HN: Any hardware startups here?

#642

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another consideration is that a lot of hardware startups focus on industrial applications with customers that don't operate out of tech hubs. There are tons of small companies making hardware for oil & gas applications, but you'll mostly find them in areas where their customers are located (e.g. Texas, Alberta) and/or LCOL cities where you can find cheap real estate. This also applies to other industries like agricul…

Where do you find these companies? I imagine crunchbase isn’t the best spot

Unfortunately I don't think there's a good way to find these companies unless you happen to live near them or work in the industry they sell to.

In my experience, they normally get started and funded by local people in their industry and they sell back to local customers (at least initially) from their network, so there's very little in the way of advertising, especially at a national level. Also, they often hire from their network for early positions and local colleges/universities as they grow, so you might not even see them on job boards.

If you're looking for companies that are a bit more established, you could try industry trade shows.

Re: Ask HN: Any hardware startups here?

#643

Hand-blown titanium crystal glassware for whisk(e)y and spirits. Produced in Europe by a glass factory that has been operating since the late 1700's. PG's mantra "do things that don't scale" has been a great inspiration. I wanted something comparable to high-end wine stemware and it shockingly did not exist, so I designed it during COVID. This is my first physical goods venture and my goodness, it comes with a lot of…

Hello. These look great. But a few things that I'd like: 1) The glass does not specify a volume. 2) I'd love a wine-glass, highball and old fashioned style as well.\ 3) The Whisky & Spirits Tumbler does say 'lead free crystal' but doesn't specify it's titanium glassware. Is that correct? Cheers!

Re: Ask HN: Any hardware startups here?

#644

I'm currently working on an Audio/Midi Recorder/Arranger for musicians/songwriters. Admittedly it's not a Startup, I rather aim to make it a SMB some day. And yes, hardware is hard. Especially for me as a Software Engineer by trade. Track8 started when I wanted to learn Rust 3 years ago. It somehow evolved into a product. https://www.thingstone.com/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k8u0Z55G2-0

I saw your design and it's fascinating. The whole concept of writing without distractions is really awesome. Good luck!

Re: Ask HN: Any hardware startups here?

#645
post #572

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When buying used car seats, remember to check the "use before" date that is marked on it. They only claim to achieve the designed strength/protection for a number of years. At least in Europe.

I thought that was an American thing since I couldn't find it on our car seat

So ours has a manufacture date and I know people look at it and if it's older than 3-4 years they won't buy it off you, but as far as I can see that advice isn't anywhere in the manual of the seat. Maybe some seats "expire" in some way, but it sounds like an urban myth.

Re: Ask HN: Any hardware startups here?

#646

I'm working on the world's brightest lamp: https://presale.getbrighter.co/ There has been a lot of writing about the benefits of bright light in your house and how to set up your own rig (e.g. https://www.benkuhn.net/lux/ ), but nobody has built a mass market consumer product (one that's easy to set up, has all the right features (dimmable, adjustable color temp, high CRI), and looks aesthetic). Feel free to contact…

Uh. 50,000 Lumens? That's a lotta lumens. Which is awesome. But that's also gonna be running at Imalent MS18 flashlights (which to be fair peak at 100,000 lumens) get well over 120 degrees C in temperature.

Your design seems to have cooling fins. But If it's radiating noticeable amount of heat, I'll only be running it in winter.

Re: Ask HN: Any hardware startups here?

#647
post #503

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m having a hard time understanding the seasonal energy storage component. Can you dive into this a bit more? I wasn’t able to find much on your website. I work in the energy industry and this is one of the largest issues that utilities (and plenty of others) face (and even go as far as installing thermostats that they can control in their customers’ homes). I’m wondering if there’s anything that can be done to adva…

We are building more than a heat pump, it is a novel stirling architecture, that is, a machine that converts electricity to heat, and heat to electricity. The idea is summarized on this picture https://imgur.com/a/f5T1NYi and is as follow: - solar/wind energy would be converted to heat using our engine and stored into a thermal storage unit (molten salts or sand). This would provide up to 30-40 hours of energy for da…

My dude, never has this image been more relevant https://datavizblog.files.wordpress.com/2013/05/map-full-siz...

Re: Ask HN: Any hardware startups here?

#648

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks, though, for taking a look! I used to know some of the Cybex people (it was a European company), and they congratulated us on beating their best safety scores at the time. Now Cybex is owned by an Asian conglomerate (Goodbaby). The Kioma difference in materials quality and performance is both quantifiable and qualitative. We have to charge a price that covers our work in design and production costs. But I comp…

Is there a standard safety test for this stuff? When I did some research a couple of years ago (my daughter is 1.5 years old now) I found some test by an european institution that had the Axkid One+ on top, so I bought that one.

The US standard is FMVSS 213. In Europe, seat manufacturers currently must comply with standards UN R44/04 or UN R129 (i-Size).

Re: Ask HN: Any hardware startups here?

#649
We're working on a modeling and simulation tool for engineers who design and test embedded systems and next-gen hardware. We help companies shorten their development cycle, reduce costs, and launch faster using model-based design.

It is kind of unfortunate but hardware design tools haven't seen the same level of cambrian explosion that cloud and AI tools have over the past several years. We hope to change that so engineers can design embedded software, simulate algorithms, simplify verification and validation, and use models as digital twins seamlessly.

If you would like to see what we do, check us out at: https://www.collimator.ai/

Re: Ask HN: Any hardware startups here?

#650
post #576

Not a start-up but a non-profit. I'm the vice chair at Libre Space Foundation ( https://libre.space).We create open-source space technologies. Some of our projects: - SatNOGS rotator: an azimuth/elevation rotator for directional antennas. - UPSat: 1st cubesat build under open source hardware licenses that got in orbit (design deprecated) - SatNOGS-COMM: next gen communications module for CubeSats - QUBIK: even smalle…

I'm loving your scope, any plans to (say) add support for 'at home' garden shed cameras to add to the global fireballs network ? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desert_Fireball_Network https://fireballs.ndc.nasa.gov/ https://adsabs.harvard.edu/full/2005SASS...24...11K

Not currently, but maybe in the future.:)
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