• JohnWorks
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    1 day ago

    Some reason I always thought that the crystal was struck to generate an electric signal not added electricity to vibrate. TIL!

    • Cethin@lemmy.zip
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      1 day ago

      That is done too. It works in both directions. What you’re describing is a microphone. A quartz crystal is vibrated and it generates an electric signal. If you play that electric signal back into the crystal it reproduces the sound, aka a speaker. The design of the two change obviously to improve quality for their purpose, but if you have a headset or something with a 3.5mm jack with separate mic/speaker inputs, try plugging them in the opposite way. Your mic will start playing sound and your speaker will produce input when it hears things.