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Junluan Tsui
Junluan Tsui

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How to Make the Speaker Louder with the KT148A Voice Chip? Key Points Affecting Sound Volume

One Customer has reported that the sound of their products is too low and provided the following information: The speaker parameters are 8 ohms and 1W, and there are sound holes on the casing.

Schematic

Customer's The speaker VS Ours

Casing are not properly designed
The reasons for the low sound volume of the customer's product are as follows:

  1. The speaker size is too small, and the selected speaker is likely a "film - type" speaker.
  2. The sound holes on the casing are insufficient and not properly designed.
  3. The sound volume is estimated to be only about 40% of a mobile phone's external speaker volume.

This issue has nothing to do with the driving capability of the KT148A itself. Even adding an external amplifier will not significantly increase the volume and may risk burning the speaker.

There are limited solutions, and improvements can only be made from two aspects: the speaker and the casing.

  1. Choose a slightly larger speaker, as large as possible, and preferably one with a "paper cone" structure.
  2. The casing should have more sound holes. ==> Our documentation package includes detailed descriptions on this, with the path as follows:

The path of our documentation
Here, we provide additional product image examples for your reference:

  1. For general toys with loud sound, the speakers they choose are as follows:

Speakers in general toys

Speakers in general toys

  1. The design of sound holes on the casing is generally as follows:

Holes on the casing

Holes on the casing

In summary: Sound volume is a systematic effort. The KT148A itself has strong driving capability, reaching up to 200mA as shown by the current. Therefore, for speakers within 8 ohms and 1W, there is no need to consider an external amplifier.
The selection of the speaker should, in principle, be as large as possible, depending on the structure. Try to choose paper - cone - type speakers (search on Aliexpress), as they produce clearer and louder sound and are only slightly more expensive.

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