URI Student Develops Custom Amplifier

KINGSTON, RI — University of Rhode Island student Ahmad Almuhtaseb discovered a way to merge his dual passions — music and his computer engineering major.

Almuhtaseb, a native of North Providence, and two classmates collaborated on a project to build a custom circuit board that functions as an amplifier for musical instruments. The project was in partnership with XMOS, a semiconductor company based in Bristol, England, as part of his senior capstone project.

Electrical and computer engineering students at URI are required to take part in a capstone project. Students are assigned into groups to work from a list of proposals submitted by industry partners. This year, 53 students worked on 19 projects in the College of Engineering.

For Almuhtaseb, the potential partnership was an ideal fusion of his love for music and his fascination with computer hardware.

“It was the only capstone proposal that was directly related to music and all the computer stuff that I was interested in,” he said. “In the back of my mind, it just felt like it perfectly united the two things that I was most passionate about as somebody who does computer engineering and somebody who likes to play guitar and mess with amps.”

Creating and building things has always been a part of Almuhtaseb’s life. When he was a junior at North Providence High School, Almuhtaseb and his friends built their own computer.

“When I was sitting there putting everything together, I was wondering how all these different components fit together to create this machine, especially since computer technology drives the modern world,” Almuhtaseb said.

When it came time to choose a college, Almuhtaseb selected URI’s computer engineering program for exactly that reason: his love of computer electronics and their importance in modern society.

While he’d tried his hand at guitar a few years earlier, it wasn’t until 2020, that his passion for music and composition began to harmonize. During the pandemic, with more time on his hands, he found himself drawn back to the instrument. He grabbed the pick and guitar and tried again.

“It's been my primary outlet for the past three or four years,” said Almuhtaseb.

When the time came for him to put his musical talents and his affection for all things electronic together, he jumped at the opportunity.

The first step in the capstone project was determining how to adapt XMOS’ existing hardware into something that could take in, process, and put out musical notes.

“We needed to break down this board and see what we could take out of it but still allow it to function,” he explained. “We needed the bare basics—so just an input, output, and a processor to be able to read and interpret the data sent in from an instrument.”

Along with looking at the hardware, Almuhtaseb also had to create a schematic. But first, he needed to understand amp technology.

“After extensive research, I was able to jump into making some simulations on circuit boards using engineering software,” he said.

Through these simulations, Almuhtaseb tested whether the hardware could receive inputs from a guitar and accurately reproduce different cords and notes. His experience as a guitarist and knowing the nuances of each note, their frequency, and how it’s supposed to sound helped the project become a success.

Using simulation software Almuhtaseb was able to compare soundwaves that were pumped into the board, analyzed by the processor, and pumped out of the board. What he found was the soundwaves were similar, proving that his concept to create a functioning amplifier worked.

“It was the most fun I ever had working on a project because not only did my background in engineering help me but also my background in music,” he said. “For example, I was able to identify pitches by ear and use that to approximate the frequency of a repeating sine wave.”