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Once upon a time, music visualizers served an actual purpose: to help audio engineers and hobbyist audiophiles adjust the frequency levels of their stereo equipment. A completely flat equalizer is only natural if no piece of equipment introduces bias. But everyone quickly noticed that illuminated sound-reactive visualizers look cool and it wasn’t long before that beauty became the entire point for many people. Anyone with Winamp in the ‘00s knows that visualizers on computers are old news, but Lixie Labs' Sensory Bridge brings a similar experience into the real world.

All fancy language aside, Sensory Bridge is a device purpose-built for use as a light organ – a type of music visualizer that expands on simple frequency level indicators. But Sensory Bridge has a few advantages over conventional sound-reactive light show devices that one can find at any audio equipment store. First, it is open source and hackable to your heart’s content. That also means that users will benefit from development by the community, which will likely come in the form of new visualization modes. Second, Sensory Bridge has a lot of processing power. That means it can do speedy analysis of music in real time to create complex visualizations without any perceivable delay.

That capability is thanks to the use of an Espressif ESP32-S2 microcontroller that has a powerful dual core processor. It can handle Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) calculations for the entire audible frequency range at more than 60 times per second. There is almost no delay and the LED animations are very smooth. The Sensory Bridge PCB has a built-in MEMS microphone, so there is no need for an external microphone or line-in (though both may become add-on modules in the future). Just place the board in the room with your music and you’re good to go.

There are only three adjustment potentiometers: Photons, Boost, and Mood. The first two control LED brightness and microphone sensitivity, respectively. The third controls the reactivity of the algorithm, with a higher value being flashier and a lower value being more relaxed. There are also two buttons to adjust the current visualization mode and to set an ambient noise baseline, so you can filter out background noise like fans. Finally, a trio of LEDs below the Boost knob help users find the sensitivity “sweet spot.”

Lixie Labs' Sensory Bridge can connect to any string of WS2812B individually addressable RGB LED light strips or users can attach the Mini Mast, which is a vertical strip of LEDs that snaps right on. The simple provided enclosure is 3D-printed plastic and power comes through a USB-C port on the board.