Building a VU Meter into a Case of a CD-ROM Drive

The project explains the mounting of a VU meter into an old CD-ROM drive case and be installed into the PC.

The VU meters are based on VFD displays which are much cooler than LED or LCD displays. The VU meters are taken out of some tape recorder and added some components like PIR PCB, and an old CDROM drive to serve as the case.

In preparing the VU meter, 3 voltages are needed such as +15V, -15V, and +5V. An FET transistor should be taken like the BF256C or BF245 because it is required as constant current source with rather low current and will be soldered onto the PCB. Since the input of the VU meter is DC coupled, some capacitors are need in the audio channels.

The power supply was built that can generate 15VDC and 5V of the PC PSU using step-up converters. The MC3406A chip is used to build positive and negative regulated step up converters. The output voltage can be adjusted with small trimmers. The PSU should be tested before connecting it to the PCB of VFD. The VU meter and stereo plug is mounted with hot glue.

Rest of the project