Connect All Headphone Demos
Retail demo position for createq BRIQX Connect All — one ESP32-S3 + NXP RT1021 board that can feed headphones over USB Audio Class, Bluetooth transmitter, and AUX so stores can swap brands (Razer, JBL, Sennheiser, …) without rebuilding the fixture.
What I built
Connect All is the flexible headphone / small-speaker demo for European retail floors. Merchants need to put a gaming headset one week and a lifestyle headphone the next — different connectors, same pedestal. I worked on the dual-MCU firmware path that makes that possible.
USB Audio Class
NXP acts as USB audio host — digital audio + charge path into USB headphones / speakers on the demo cable.
Bluetooth TX
Bluetooth transmitter path for wireless headsets (Razer Blade gaming, JBL, Sennheiser, …) without a phone-pairing circus for every shopper.
AUX
Analog jack path for products that still demo over 3.5 mm — same board, same ESP control plane.
Technical work (my side)
ESP-IDF firmware: SoftAP Wi-Fi provision, multi-sink player control, MQTT status into BRIQX Control, OTA. Reports listening / sink state to the fleet dashboard so ops see what each store position is doing.
Bare-metal USB host / UAC, AUX, and Bluetooth transmitter paths over the dual-MCU UART protocol — designed so USB, BT, and AUX can run at the same time on one demo position. Same NXP family as Iconics/Cove, headphone-focused production branches.
Brought up and hardened demos for Razer Blade gaming headsets, JBL, Sennheiser and others — stores swap SKUs on USB / BT / AUX without a new electronics install per product.
Devices join BRIQX Control over MQTT for telemetry, firmware updates, and remote device actions — same portal that manages Cove/Iconics and LED fleets.
Stack
- ESP32-S3 (ESP-IDF 5.3) + NXP i.MX RT1021 dual-MCU
- USB Audio Class host, Bluetooth TX, AUX analog
- Binary UART bridge + XMODEM/MCUBoot OTA for the NXP side
- MQTT → BRIQX Control (React/Next.js + SQL) for fleet ops