Muzo - Your Personal Zone Creator with Noise Blocking Tech - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: EEVblog
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: June 18, 2016, 09:23:58 am
content: More fancy infographics than you can poke a stick at.But they have real hardware.https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1280803647/muzo-your-personal-zone-creator-with-noise-blockin/

author: TheAmmoniacal
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: June 18, 2016, 10:02:25 am
content: This is a hard one to judge; it's one of those -- some of it is possible in theory, but I have difficulties believing a practical application to meet their claims is impossible. (I want one)

author: JohnSL
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: June 18, 2016, 03:18:44 pm
content: At a minimum, I think they're promising more than they can deliver. It looks like their solution is a combination of active noise cancellation and sound generation. Unless active noise cancellation has gotten a lot better than I'm aware of, it works with periodic sounds, such as engines, fans, etc. But not with speech. They "demoed" reduction in all the sound from a person yelling in another room. I call BS on that aspect.Additionally, they have a demo with a periodic sound, and it took a while for their device to start reducing the noise, which makes me wonder how well it works.Finally, the campaign says they're located in San Francisco, but their web site domain is registered to a company in Hong Kong:http://www.networksolutions.com/whois/results.jsp?domain=celestialtribe.com

author: Rerouter
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 18, 2016, 03:37:36 pm
content: Well equally you would never want such a system cancelling the noise of someone yelling, as most of the time its to get your attention, e.g. your house is on fire.

author: edy
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 18, 2016, 07:50:31 pm
content: Sorry, I'm going to call this more B.S. than truth [Edit: At least to the over-whelming marketing B.S.... although it can work for some situations, which I will explain below]. I am trying very hard to keep an open mind, but it is not possible for this device to do everything it claims. I'll explain why.Sound cancellation depends on directionality, distance and speed. For example, if you have points set up as follows:A (source) ----> B1 (device mic) --> B2 (device speaker) -----> C (ear)Sound generated at "A" will get to B1 and device will hear it. Processing very fast, in the speed it takes for sound to get from B1-->B2 in physical space, the device will emit a cancelling audio output at B2 which will mute the sound from "A", so that it will be diminished at "C" (your ear). That's how most noise cancelling headphones work. They first of all acoustically shield your ears from external noise, but on top of that they will also add a cancelling audio which is exactly the same but inverse to the external sound it is picking up by microphone to the audio generation, thereby helping to additionally mute out external noises.You can also do it another way but this is harder.A (sound source) ----> B1 (microphone) -----> C (your ear) <------- B2 (speaker)If the device "B1" microphone picks up a sound and it is able to generate an inverse sound signal at "B2" speaker, depending on the distance from B1--> C and B2--> C, you can end up with a cancellation "NODE" in space where sound at "C" is muted. That is, any audio coming out of "A" and heading towards your ear "C" will overlap with the exact cancellation sound coming from B2.In that case, the B1 microphone has to be slightly further from C as B2. Why? Because you have to account for the time for B1 microphone to process the sound, electronically transmit the signal to B2 (via Bluetooth or whatever), decode and generate the sound at B2. However, regardless of how you do it.... The physics REQUIRES that sound from A and the cancelling sound from B2 have to overlap at C. If you have sound bouncing off the walls, or there is any other indirect path or you move your ear "C" to any other point in the room, you are NOT going to get full cancellation, and in fact you may even get louder noise if you are positioned at a super-imposition of the waves rather than a cancellation of the waves.This is not much different than simple standing waves in a string of a certain length. You have certain frequencies which will create standing waves, you have spots that are completely not moving (nodes) and you have spots that are vibrating through the full amplitude. You can even see this in tubes with speakers on one end, where you have gas flames at different heights (Kundt's tube).Anyways, the "Muzo" can only cancel sound in the following scenario. Imagine someone is yelling in the room next to you, or outside your window, or whatever. The sound hits the window, the window or wall vibrate and therefore transmit the sound into your room. Obviously the air is not directly passing to your room. Sound energy transfers to the window/wall, which in turn vibrates, which in turn then vibrates the air in your room.The "Muzo" would basically pick up the vibration of the window or wall, and generate a sound that is cancelling to that vibration. It could also act as an "inertial damper" in that it could have a small weight on it and actively move it so that it lessens the vibration of the window or wall. Even a free-moving pendulum could to that.... No active movement needed. It would add mass to the system, and dampening, so vibrations of the window or wall are reduced. If your window is 10x heavier, it will move 10x less in amplitude, and that in turn will move the air molecules in your room also 10x less. [Edit: I see that is one of the features of the system, so yes I believe this is possible].As you can see, the "Muzo" would then be great for windows, and certain geometries of walls or doors. However, if you are in a crowded restaurant, you may reduce a bit of the sound bouncing off the table by dampening the table. But it will not "acoustically" be able to cancel sound from all directions, the geometry of the paths the sound is making and your ear picking up sound from all directions, is just the wrong configuration.Same thing for home. If you are in the room that you are trying to reduce the sound from, and you put it on a wall... The Muzo may dampen sound bouncing off that wall. You will still hear the original sound coming from the source, but you may dampen the ECHO.So..... in summary:1. Inertial dampening with perhaps sound acoustic dampening when sound is travelling through flexible objects like windows, walls, when blocking outside sound sources.2. Echo removal when blocking inside sound sources but dampening/cancelling echoing sound.3. Maybe some dampening and cancellation (minimal) in restaurants.I'd like to try an experiment.... Tape a piece ofLEADto your window and see what it sounds like before and after. I'm curious to find out how much of an effect that would have alone. Anyone want to try this and report back?The idea is great, but the proof will be in the pudding. Let's find out how well it works. If you really want to get peace and quiet, stick in some earplugs or put on a set of noise-cancelling headphones and play nothing on them.

author: snoopy
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 21, 2016, 06:52:17 am
content: Quote from: EEVblog on June 18, 2016, 09:23:58 amwhat a croc. This reminds me of that snoring cancellation device that is supposed to have an infinite battery supply the size of a pea !!

author: Xenoamor
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: June 21, 2016, 12:16:22 pm
content: They actually had me going until...How on earth could this even work with a single, non-directional speaker. You'd have to know the exact location of everyone's eardrums in the room and be able to push a pinpoint accurate anti-phase sound wave to all of themOn a more serious note though the anti-vibration stuff is cool. Could be useful for roadside single glazing

author: The Soulman
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 21, 2016, 01:25:39 pm
content: And remember that the noise cancelling sound needs to beperfectlyin opposite phase and same amplitude as the original sound at the listenerposition, if any of the two sources or the listener moves a foot it will cause a 180 degree phase shift at approx. 565hz everything abovethat is shifted more and may cancel but most likely not, everything below that is shifted less but won't perfectly cancel out anymore.And yes humans tend to have two ears making it next to impossible, not taking account yet reflecting or resonating surfaces or standing waves.It only works when noise originates from a single source and is actively cancelled at that source, for instance a cancelling speaker in a car rear muffler. (already seen that 15 or 20 years ago).Or the ears of the listener must be fixed distance from the cancelling source, for instance headphones.Anything else..

author: Corporate666
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: June 21, 2016, 03:55:13 pm
content: I can't imagine how this can do anything unless it's just a white noise generator. Unless you have time to analyze the incoming sound and produce an inverse waveform (I know I probably butchered the terminology there) you can't do what they are claiming.I watched the video a day or two ago so perhaps I am forgetting something - I thought the idea was they were using the window itself as the speaker, but the image with the device on a wooden table eliminates that idea.Hopefully KS cracks down on this - at least requiring more information before they let this go. And what about "no renderings, only actual devices"

author: Maxlor
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 21, 2016, 04:01:11 pm
content: Quote from: JohnSL on June 18, 2016, 03:18:44 pmIt has gotten a lot better; current gen Bose noise cancelling headphones will block speech easily. It's really rather impressive when you try it for the first time.Whether Muze can duplicate that performance, and do it with a single membrane out of their control, and with positioning that's out of their control as well, is another story though.

author: earl colby pottinger
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: June 21, 2016, 06:41:24 pm
content: Could be a 'White Noise' generator. That will tend to mute sounds around you but not only does it not cancel out outside sounds it will interfere with the conversation taking place inside the Zone.

author: edy
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 21, 2016, 06:50:34 pm
content: Like I mentioned in my previous post, I think it has value as an inertial dampener, whether active or passive. Just having an extra weight there in the middle of your window will stop external sounds from transmitting through the window.I suggested this experiment, if anyone has a microphone sensitive enough (a dB meter) and can plot some comparison charts using a controlled environment...Experiment:For example, 2 rooms separated by a glass window. One room will have a speaker with a controlled sound output that is pointed at the window (say 2-3 meters away). The other room will have a dB meter/microphone, also about 2-3 meters away from the glass.You start off by trying the experiment with glass unmodified. Then you duct-tape various weights to the middle of the window. Try some steel or lead plates of various thickness. Alternative experiment would then use a single layer of drywall as well, between two enclosed rooms (I know most have 2 layers and possibly insulation between).The assumption is, sound hitting the window causes the glass to vibrate, which then vibrates the air in the 2nd room. If you add a weight to the window, or even several parts of the window, you can dampen the amplitude of the vibration because it will take more sound energy to create the same oscillations. This is of course frequency dependent, and the sound at the right frequency can also create standing waves in the glass (which is why you can even shatter glass with sound). Regardless, the weight should do it.You can even try different thickness of glass to see how that changes the effect of the added weight.I'm curious to see if this has been tried and what the results are. Could a simple "passive" dampener work well enough? The "active" dampening would have to react super-quick to absorb sound. It would essentially work on a feedback loop where the movements would create an inductive current in the coil which would feedback instantly to resist the movement. Essentially, the greater the vibration frequency the more it would dampen. The lower the frequency, the less is dampens. Almost equivalent to a low-pass inductor or capacitor-based filter.Here's a study that does something similar with different numbers of windows and air gaps between:https://estudogeral.sib.uc.pt/bitstream/10316/4037/1/filee0aec1aa21024e55b37c28755f99fb89.pdf

author: mtdoc
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 21, 2016, 07:18:47 pm
content: I'm unimpressed. This is old tech. They had this figured out already in the 1960's.BTW - is it just me - or is there a passing resemblance between Dave and Maxwell Smart?

author: mikeselectricstuff
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 21, 2016, 07:33:16 pm
content: My guess it may sort-of work in some situations, but will generally be of minimal to no use most of the time.

author: chris_leyson
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 21, 2016, 09:11:53 pm
content: I can't see it working very well with a single microphone and speaker, you would need an arry of microphones and speakers to at least get some sort of directivity.However, I like Edy's active dampeneing ideas and also,Quote. I think that has potential as you only have to actively damp a planar source, well almost a planar source, as glass will have 2D resonant nodes. Do the resonant nodes come into play at average sound levels, perhaps, but you would need something like laser interferometry to measure them. Sound damped windows are a nice idea and probably more practical.

author: alexanderbrevig
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 21, 2016, 09:54:47 pm
content: Psychoacoustics. Tricking the brain has little to nothing to do with 180 phase and amplitude.

author: Halcyon
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: June 21, 2016, 10:19:28 pm
content: There is some merit in using white noise to mask sounds. Concert venues use huge white noise generators which are close to residential areas (such as Fox Studios in Sydney). However I'd argue using a device like this in a cafe or public space would actually draw more attention to your conversation when people are trying to work out where the hiss is coming from.Looks like a bit of a gimmick to me.

author: chris_leyson
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 22, 2016, 07:44:32 am
content: QuoteI hadn't thought of that and just noticed "Noise Blocking Tech" in the title rather than noise cancelling, two completely different things. Thanks.

author: Xenoamor
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: June 22, 2016, 11:56:12 am
content: Quote from: Maxlor on June 21, 2016, 04:01:11 pmThis can only work as the speakers are in a fixed location relative to your ear drums

author: Cyberdragon
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 05, 2016, 09:38:57 pm
content: First time poking around in this section. There's some juicy garbage in here, wonderful!Looks like these guys attempted to cover their asses. However it's stillthey claim to mask only conversations. O RLY?! #whitenoisegenerator"The purpose of Secret mode is to protect user's speech privacy. Muzo uses sound masking technology with the specific frequency to protect your conversation content. We cannot provide a noise-free environment in an open area. The bubble in the video is to show the effect of the sound masking function. If backers support us because of misunderstanding the feature of Secret mode from other sources, please tell us before this Friday and we will arrange a refund for you. Noted that we do not accept any refund request after this Friday because the components will be confirmed and ordered for production. Kickstarter fee and credit card processing fee are also the reason."

author: CJay
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 06, 2016, 09:58:20 am
content: It uses BS Technology, how could it fail?

author: MicroBlocks
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: September 07, 2016, 01:38:16 am
content: Does 'BS' stand for 'Beyond Science'?

author: danmcb
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: September 13, 2016, 03:11:23 pm
content: This is a real shame. Kickstarter have a policy that you have to have a working prototype for hardware projects, but unfortunately (as has been pointed out above) there are a ton of really good reasons why this cannot work as advertised, and KS seems to have allowed themselves to be duped by some fancy video editing. But of course $500k on someone's account is a real good motivation to do some fast marketing. Things like this can get the crowdfunding scene a bad rep, which would be a tragedyas some great stuff comes out. I feel that KS have dropped the ball a bit on this. (Not that that will stop me starting off my perpetual motion machine appeal in the near future ...)

author: Cyberdragon
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 14, 2016, 10:36:01 pm
content: There is only one way to defeat a trulyproduct like this...You take it and you go:*powers up tesla coil*"AVADA KADAVRA!"*BZZZZZZZZZAAAAAP*=Voltamort strikes again!

author: T3sl4co1l
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 14, 2016, 11:27:45 pm
content: Quote from: Cyberdragon on September 14, 2016, 10:36:01 pmWell, I can't argue with that.

author: Cyberdragon
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 12, 2016, 10:03:44 pm
content: O RLY?! They still want toafter Voltamort already blew them up?https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/muzo-state-of-the-art-vibration-monitoring-sys-sound-sleep#/Well then...EDIT: But wait there's more!https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/silent-partner-quiets-snoring-noise-like-magic-sleep#/

author: keethrax
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: October 17, 2016, 05:38:17 pm
content: Quote from: mtdoc on June 21, 2016, 07:18:47 pmThe technology clearly wasn't mature yet back then. And now it's better and affordable to the consumer instead of just thsoe big gov't agencies...QuoteI never would have noticed it, but now that you mention it someone needs to send him a shoe phone for the mailbag.

author: Dave3
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: November 09, 2017, 12:07:11 am
content: I works!!Not. Complete garbage even as a portable speaker. Fun testing of actual unit.

author: EEVblog
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: November 09, 2017, 12:51:09 am
content: Can't believe they actually shipped it

author: Cyberdragon
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: November 09, 2017, 11:19:56 pm
content: My favorite part is the fact that it just makes random diner noises and does nothing on the other modes...not even white noise.Oh the backlash will be strong with this one.

author: nidlaX
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: November 10, 2017, 12:19:27 am
content: And of course Electroboom's video gets demonetized!Any guesses as to where the reports came from?