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Busy Status Bar

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1366 points aleksi | 3 comments | 14 Oct 24 15:19 UTC | HN request time: 0.216s | source
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blutack ◴[14 Oct 24 17:02 UTC] No.41839455[source]▶
If you're looking for something with an addressable LED matrix in a clock style form factor, the Ulanzi TC001 [0] for ~$50 is worth having a look at.

Doesn't quite have the same aesthetic but inside it's just an ESP32 (flashed via the USB-C port) and there's various mature open source firmware replacements. I use awtrix[1] on mine and it's very easy to tie in HomeAssistant for doorbell notifications and that sort of thing. I did also knock up a Pomodoro app for it.

0: https://www.ulanzi.com/products/ulanzi-pixel-smart-clock-288...

1: https://github.com/Blueforcer/awtrix3

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1. m4r71n ◴[14 Oct 24 19:53 UTC] No.41841221[source]▶
This looks great! I've considered building a simple device with an LED matrix that looks similar to this, but could never figure out what gives the LEDs the muted look. All of the devices mentioned here (Tidbyt Gen2, Lamarca, Ulanzi, even the busy.bar) have it. Is the back-pannel just an LED matrix with a custom acrylic in front of it? How do they ensure the light from individual LEDs doesn't bleed into its neighbor?
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2. egeozcan ◴[14 Oct 24 22:16 UTC] No.41842659[source]▶
> custom acrylic

While I'm not an expert, my own experimentation suggests this is correct

3. blutack ◴[14 Oct 24 22:35 UTC] No.41842886[source]▶
I wouldn't swear to it but from mine it looks like there's a grid of light guides between the led PCB and the front screen to prevent any cross bleed. The front screen is translucent but not transparent (think heavy tinted window) acrylic which gives it the muted look.

It's pretty good hardware wise, it would be hard to knock up DIY for $50 even just in BOM.

Edit: teardown in German https://youtu.be/-Dn3A5V8ZPo @ 04:30