4. The headphone jack problem

Did I overreact? - 11/06/2026

Two weeks before summer vacation in fourth grade, our middle-school math teacher came into our class and introduced herself so we'd know her earlier. In our class, if you have questions about tech stuff, you either go to me or another classmate, let's call him Billy Joe Bob.

Our future math teacher said that we "are two hackers", me in the software industry and Billy Joe Bob in the hardware industry. I didn't know what that meant at all, I nodded. I wasn't really as smart as you think.

In 2025, I started using Arduinos (microcontroller board). They're used to control electronic projects. You connect sensors / components to the board, write code on your computer and tell it what to do. This was my introduction to the hardware part. Then I bought an ESP32, which is like an Arduino on crack. It can connect to the WiFi and Bluetooth and is WAY more powerful.

I also bought a new phone then. And to my surprise... they removed the headphone jack. I didn't know that! My old phone still had a headphone jack. Ok, to be honest I wasn't really that sad. I dramatized things a little.

Forward to the end of 2025, I started getting into music (yes, back then I didn't listen to music AT ALL), and what pissed me off was that I didn't have wireless headphones or earphones for my phone. I only have wired headphones and earphones (not for USB-C either).

To fix my small problem, I didn't buy wired USB-C headphones or earphones, no. I made a fucking MP3 Player (It's actually a WAV player but whatever!! Does it really matter?).

So, here it is..

NOTE: It will take a while to load the gifs with the project (for me at least, but this is just a heads up)

Here are all the stuff I used for the project:

- ESP32 (44 RON)

- 0,96-inch OLED display module with EC11 rotary encoder and a button (39,98 RON)

- PCM5102 (36,89 RON)

- microSDXC 32GB (69,99 RON)

- microSD reader (16,14 RON)

- USB stick that modifies the microSD (36,99 RON)

- Medium sized breadboard (bought in 2025) (6,99 RON)

- Another medium sized breadboard (bought in 2026) (18,99 RON)

- Father-mother wires (8,97 RON)

- Data cable MicroUSB (ew!) to USB 3.0 (20,98 RON)

- Battery Holder (7,99 RON)

- Batteries (3,60 RON)

- The switch (0,97 RON)

- The box itself (7,00 RON)

Now calculate the final amount... 319,48 RON.

I can proudly say I created a bootleg "iPod". The project has 20 albums (Pretty Hate Machine, Broken, The Downward Spiral, The Fragile, With Teeth, Year Zero, The Slip, Hesitation Marks, Not The Actual Events, Add Violence, Bad Witch, Nine Inch Noize, Earthling, Blackstar, Lodger, Scary Monsters (And Super Creeps), 1. Outside, The Next Day, The Buddha of Suburbia and 'hours...') and the music quality is excelent! It also has a cool U.I.

NOTE: It will take a while to load the gifs with the project (for me at least, but this is just a heads up)

And here's a video of the project playing "I'm Afraid of Americans" by David Bowie.

What does each part do?

ESP32 - Think of it like the brain of the project.

OLED Display - Displays the U.I. and stuff.

Rotary Encoder - Previous / Next Album / Music

the CONFIRM button - Starts / Exits the selected album

PCM5102 - Plays the music ONLY when something is connected to it's 3,5 mm jack

microSD Reader - ...It's literally does what the name says.

microSD - Stores all the music (yes I had to manually download all songs)

This chaos is killing me *2

This is my most complex but my favorite project yet. And again, I don't know what else to type so... bye!

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