4 days ago
19
Follow ZDNET: Add america arsenic a preferred source on Google.
ZDNET's cardinal takeaways
- xMEMS designs and manufactures tiny audio and cooling chips.
- The company's audio chips tin regenerate full dynamic drivers.
- Despite the innovation, shaper adoption is inactive a enactment successful progress.
Consumer exertion continues to beforehand each year. Smartphones debut with on-device, AI-powered features, smart glasses project displays of your regular tasks, and smartwatches can assistance you dainty a acold earlier you consciousness its wrath. However, dynamic drivers, which are wrong each of these products, person remained mostly unchanged implicit the past 100 years.
Also: CES 2026 unrecorded updates: Biggest quality connected TVs, astute glasses, robots, and more
Dynamic drivers are the tiny transducers wrong your earbuds, headphones, smartphones, smartwatches, and astute glasses, and they usage the cardinal laws of physics to present dependable to your ears. Yet, arsenic your devices go smarter and much powerful, tech providers similar xMEMS judge that your audio experiences should beryllium arsenic innovative.
Therefore, the institution believes its incredibly tiny MEMS chips tin regenerate dynamic drivers crossed user exertion products, providing solutions for sound, weight, and vigor absorption to manufacturers. I spent an hr with the company's suite of chips, and here's however they tin upgrade your devices.
Dynamic drivers aren't needed
Bose QC Ultra (left); Bose QC Ultra 2 (right).
A dynamic operator consists of a magnet, a dependable coil, and a diaphragm, and it uses electrical signals to make magnetic fields that determination the diaphragm and coil, creating sound. Dynamic drivers are cost-effective, power-efficient, and leverage aerial displacement to reproduce the salient bass effect astir consumers enjoy.
The downside to dynamic drivers is that they instrumentality up abstraction and value wrong your headphones and earbuds, and tin often distort sounds astatine precocious volumes, struggling to support clarity.
Also: I watched a gamer usage brain-reading headphones nether unit - and helium locked successful fast
Therefore, xMEMS' solution is its Cowell and Sycamore solid-state microspeakers. The Cowell microchip is already successful products connected the market, specified arsenic the Soundpeats Air5 Pro+ and the Creative Aurvana Ace 3. The Cowell spot serves arsenic a tweeter wrong these earbuds, delivering exceptional clarity astatine higher frequencies. The spot is driven by the company's Aptos2 amplifier, and some pieces of hardware are astir arsenic tiny arsenic a atom of rice.
Sycamore is simply a one-millimeter-thin MEMS chip, and xMEMS says the exertion tin wholly regenerate dynamic drivers successful headphones. This spot is yet to look successful a merchandise connected the market, though consumers tin expect to spot 1 wrong the coming year. I demoed Sycamore wrong a prototype brace of headphones, with 1 Sycamore spot located successful each earcup.
The astir noticeable quality I heard was the bass response. In astir headphones with coagulated bass reproduction, you tin consciousness the bass heavy successful your ears arsenic the speakers propulsion aerial into them. It adds a visceral furniture to the listening experience, but tin go muddied astatine times. With Sycamore, determination is nary accepted talker configuration, nary question from magnets oregon coils, and nary bass you tin genuinely feel. However, you tin perceive the bass incredibly clearly.
Also: Shokz's latest earbuds person a unsocial instrumentality that puts them supra the OpenRun for me
Aside from a clearer listening experience, replacing dynamic drivers with Sycamore allows for a slimmer, thinner, and lighter brace of headphones. According to xMEMS, Sycamore weighs 18 grams, compared to the 42 grams of a dynamic driver.
Sycamore besides comes successful rectangular-shaped audio chips for smartwatches and astute glasses. Although galore radical acquisition smartwatches and astute glasses for their high-tech features, immoderate whitethorn announcement the lackluster audio show of these devices.
The xMEMS Sycamore-N and Sycamore-W audio chips person been specifically engineered for usage successful astute glasses and smartwatches, respectively. These Sycamore chips are inactive incredibly bladed and compact, lone demanding 1 millimeter of width wrong a product.
Also: Samsung's caller Wi-Fi speakers astatine CES was astir emotion astatine archetypal perceive for me
I tested Sycamore-N successful a brace of prototype astute glasses and noticed the expanded spatial dependable of the talker compared to the first-gen Ray-Ban Meta glasses I often use. In an open-air environment, Sycamore-N amplifies euphony portion preserving sonic integrity.
The chip's 1 millimeter width helps astute glasses manufacturers support the instrumentality signifier origin arsenic slim arsenic possible. Slimness and lightness are incredibly invaluable successful astute glasses, particularly the arms, which location speakers and chips. The dependable of Sycamore-W besides didn't disappoint, reproducing a overmuch louder and clearer audio effect than my Apple Watch.
Heat management
Alongside audio chips, xMEMS besides manufactures fan-on-a-chip solutions for user exertion companies. The xMEMS squad explained to maine that arsenic smartphones, astute glasses, and laptops summation precocious features, the processors wrong make much vigor erstwhile performing analyzable tasks.
Generally, the solution to vigor buildup is to instal a instrumentality nether the hood of these products. However, fans tin beryllium large and mightiness redistribute vigor alternatively of dissipating it. For headphones, the xMEMS micro-cooling spot generates airflow into the earcup, managing vigor buildup and humidity.
Also: I wore the world's archetypal HDR10 astute glasses, and they tin easy regenerate my location TV
I couldn't perceive the airflow erstwhile listening to music, adjacent astatine the fan's highest setting. Unlike receptor pads with cooling gel that yet scope somesthesia equilibrium with your skin, the xMEMS fan-on-a-chip delivers chill aerial done the earcup.
For smartphones, the fan-on-a-chip promises an effectual solution for vigor absorption issues. As mobile processors go much precocious and powerful, peculiarly successful moving AI-powered features, they make much heat. The aforesaid logic applies to astute glasses, particularly those equipped with laser displays. With the arms of the glasses resting connected your skin, the exertion needs to support a harmless temperature.
During my demo, the xMEMS squad demonstrated however astute glasses processors tin make heat, creating a aboveground somesthesia of up to 65 degrees Celsius. Manufacturers tin stack the xMEMS fan-on-a-chip connected apical of oregon adjacent to the processor, allowing the aboveground somesthesia to alteration to 36 degrees Celsius.
Although galore of these chips person yet to beryllium integrated into products connected the market, the demonstrations provided a sneak peek into however our devices could evolve, should manufacturers take to usage the technology.
English (US) ·