Touch sensor
On the top side of the Hapticlabs Satellite, in the center of the Hapticlabs logo, there is a capacitive touch sensor. You can visually locate it as a small metal area. Touch this sensor to trigger the track that has been saved to the satellite at slot 1.
Multi-purpose interface
The Hapticlabs Satellite features a multi-purpose interface. Its position is indicated by an “input” label on the casing. It consists of a ground connection (labeled GND), a 3.3 V power connection (labeled 3.3V), and two multi-purpose contacts (labeled S1 and S2). The labels are printed on the underside of the satellite.
Powering the Hapticlabs Satellite
The satellite can be powered through the GND and 3.3 V contacts from a 3.3 V source. When powering the Hapticlabs Satellite through these contacts without any connection to Hapticlabs Studio, you can still play back tracks that you previously saved to the Hapticlabs Satellite.
Powering a 3.3 V device
The satellite can power low-power 3.3 V devices through the GND and 3.3 V contacts.
Triggering saved tracks
It is possible to save tracks from the Hapticlabs Studio on the Hapticlabs Satellite (see Interface: Save tracks). By providing one of the multi-purpose contacts (S1 or S2) with a voltage of 3.3 V with respect to the GND connection, you can trigger playback of the respective tracks (S1 triggers the track saved to slot 1, S2 triggers the track saved to slot 2). Note that this is based on values, not edges: by keeping the contact at 3.3 V, you can repeatedly trigger the track playback.
Using Hapticlabs Sensor boards
We offer multiple sensor boards, which directly connect to the Multi-purpose interface and offer different modalities to trigger track playback:
- Touch sensor: Triggers the track saved to slot 1 or 2 on receiving a touch input
- Dual Button: Two Buttons that trigger the track saved to their corresponding slots (button 1 triggers the track saved to slot 1, button 2 triggers the track saved to slot 2)
Using another microcontroller
If you have an advanced electronic setup and want to trigger haptic signals programmatically, you can connect the output pins of your microcontroller to S1 or S2 (or both). Depending on your setup, you can also power the microcontroller through the Multi-purpose interface (see Powering a 3.3V device). An example setup could look like this:
Using the Grove beginner kit
To connect to the Grove prototyping hardware, you will need an additional adapter cable connecting the Satellite JST connector to the Grove proprietary plug. Reach out for more info.
Connection to Blokdots
Blokdots is a simple to use software to build interactive hardware prototypes without writing a line of code.
Within Blokdots, the Hapticlabs Satellite unit can be used as an output device. This setup allows triggering saved tracks with other sensors such as a potentiometer, encoder or pressure input. You can even connect Hapticlabs to Protopie and Figma! More info can be found in the Blokdots documentation.
