White noise sound machines are popular. However, the sound produced is indirect and can bother others. A sound machine can also be quite large for a nightstand. You could use your phone - but then you'd have to keep it charged and it's quite inconvinent. Why not just embed the speakers and a screenless media player into the bed frame instead?

The result is a much simpler and intuitive experience with better audio immersion. It also removes the need for an app and saves physical space.

• A media player - anything with media controls and has an audio output will work
• Two small, low-power (but high-quality) speakers
• An audio amplifier
• Spare cable and a soldering iron
• A 3D printer for the media player & speaker housings

I have many media players but none of them fit in the space provided by my bed frame. We bought an iPod Shuffle clone which has a micro USB connection for charging and a seperated audio output. And since it doesn't feature a screen, it's very easy to use and convinient to operate. The media player had a large battery and a built-in speaker, which I didn't need so I soldered it off.

I modeled the case around the included button mould. Similarly to the LED strip headboard project, the case for the media player is intended to fit on the side bars of my headboard. The media player model is available here.

The speakers were taken from a broken, disassembled headset. I soldered new cable to both the left and right speakers.

I wanted the speakers to fit snugly around the top of my headboard, like a clip. This design reduces wobble and points the sound directly towards me. I printed these speaker cases and hot-glued the speakers inside. I included space for the wires to exit from the top. The model is available here.

The original plan was to solder the speaker cables directly to an audio jack. As it turns out, soldering many wires to such a small area is extremely difficult. The sound produced using this method was also extremely quiet. We bought a simple audio amplifier which has four screw terminals (which makes connecting both speakers easy) and increases the sound volume to an acceptable level.

I plugged in an audio cable & power cable, the wires and power switch and taped it to the back of the headboard.

I could've printed & hot-glued a mount but this works too ;)

See previous headboard project