Shipping 2,500 MIDI Recorders Taught Him Hardware Was Easy
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- Jamcorder has sold 2,500 units in roughly 18 months, sustaining itself as a standalone business from a piano-recording device that captures every performance fully automatically.
- The creator spent over three years writing approximately 200,000 lines of code across firmware, app, and manufacturing tooling — the software, not the hardware, proved the hardest part.
- Jamcorder's hardware is intentionally stripped down to a single PCB, one-screw assembly, an injection mold with generous draft and no slides, and omitted features including USB-C, a power button, low-battery detection, and ambient-light detection.
- Trump's tariffs on Chinese manufacturing came close to disrupting production but ultimately did not derail the build, per the creator.
- The creator recommends keeping the BOM simple with multi-manufacturer components, partnering with a Chinese assembly house via Alibaba, targeting at least 70% gross margin, final-QA'ing in-house locally, and writing a step-by-step assembly guide with pictures.
Why it matters: The creator's caveats matter as much as the headline: Jamcorder worked because it was deliberately simple and protected by high margins — he concedes 10x more complexity, 100x more scale, or entry into low-margin markets like smartwatches or cars would 'be a different story,' so the 'hardware is easy' lesson applies only to narrow, margin-protected niches.
