Basics of adding a better speaker

Hardware
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1

Hi! I bought 10 of these Voice Assistant PEs last year and haven’t really found a use for them.

tl;dr, I need a better speaker, preferably one with USB-C power and a 3.5mm jack.

History

I already have a number of Echo Dots and Google Home Minis around the house, but I’d prefer to switch completely over to Home Assistant Voice.

The speaker in my Voice Assistant PE is horrible. It’s worse than my 2nd gen Echo Dots. It’s garbled and extremely hard to hear even at 100% volume.

Goal

I’d like to buy or print some sort of caddy that can sit the Voice Assistant PE and provide better sound. Even if it’s something as simple as a tiny speaker that the device can sit on top connected via 3.5mm with a USB-C passthrough, I just want something to make it at least on par with the volume of my Echo devices.

Is it possible a device like this exists?

Can I build one myself? I have 3D printers, but I’d need to figure out what amplifier boards to buy for the audio to power the speaker. I wish it was less complicated like some speaker device with a second USB-C port that powers the Voice PE.

2

Disclaimer: I have never played with the voice PE so far, but I tried my luck with several esp32-s3 + MAX98357A modules, with ‘suboptimal’ (volume and audio quality) results.

I do not think improving the situation will be easy (enough), it’s probably not ‘just’ matter of improving the speaker, the problem already starts with DAC and amp, as well as the performance headroom of the esp and also the dark magic analogue audio design (power delivery, noise, etc.). It just needs more than merely connecting an active speaker.

I’m not saying at all that it can’t be done, just that it probably needs a step back to the drawing board (and I’m all ears, if you come to a result).

3

Hi-Fi Audio Upgrade for Home Assistant Voice PE (Complete How-to Guide) is probably of interest.

4

If you have other speakers integrated with Home Assistant as media players, I believe you can edit the configuration of the Voice PE to direct output to them. No need to build anything.

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