Tue, 22 Dec 2009 00:49:31 +0000 tk@midibox.org (MIDIbox Forum) IP.Blog 60 much time hast past since my last entry here, but this project is not dead.
what happened in the meantime?

my studies ate up much more time than I planned, so I had to change priorities.
but its not all about math and machine construction ;-)



first step was creating all the pcbs i need for building the controller and - my very own
PIC-Burner. I used his lovely little pre-project to gain some advanced skills for the
etching machine at work. thanks to my boss, i got a nice box, LEDs and faceplate for it.



next step was the first big order from bürklin (having access to non privat selling
companies via the company i work for in my freetime is a big advantage here).
the order contained all parts for building core module, several dins, ains and douts, and
a blue display from pollin.



due to my own impatience, all modules were finished very fast, but I made a mistake on the
interconnection between core and Display. result was a broken PIC and core... damnit.
I borrowed 2 other displays from a friend of mine and ordered a new pic. this time, everything
went well and I got the core up and running, with 128_din_dout software.



Another sunday evening solder marathon later, my very first prototype with one din and ain module
4 switches, three pots and one rotary switch (for multilayering knobs in the software) was build and running.
First tests with traktor pro 1.2 were sucessfull.



At this point, the progress of my project begun to slown down. main reason for that was to find a reseller for
my special alps potentiometers with buildin switches. actual status is that I am waiting for two mails from different
resellers which I ve asked. also, finding round aluminium profiles for the boxing (I have to have round corners on it!)
was a tough job. I spend around 3 weeks on the internet until I found www.weloe.com. I ordered 12 8cm pieces
for three boxes (yes I am going to build more xD) and awaited them in january. it was a big surprise when they
arrived this week just at my birthday xD
rest of the time I spent on this project I thought a lot about the frontplate and the layout of its buttons. the picture
from the last entry is not actual anymore, but I made only minor changes. I think the frontplate will be the last
thing that i order, since there are many things that still have to be planned in detail, for example the display
(I want to integrate a graphic one for informations like songtitle, bpm and selected effect, but i still did not figure out
if mios support anything like that). two other big problems i have to solve are the mounting of the pots and the control-
system for my RGB LEDs.

so long
Nasrudin]]> Sun, 20 Dec 2009 12:14:00 +0000
Therefore I ll present you my very own vision and development of a midi projekt.
I started to interest myself on Djing half a year ago. I did spend a lot of time finding the equipment, that suits my own requirements.
Unfortunately i didnt found the right thing.
classical turntables are to heavy, cost quite much (dont forget the prices for vinyl and needles, which have to be replaced often).
Good CD Players would fit most of my requirements, but cost pretty much (think about the Pioneer CDJ 1000).
I also wanted to use a software solution in order to save myself from carrying tons of cds or vinylbags.
Neither CD-Players nor Turntables have a usable native interface to DJ Software, workarounds with timecodes are innefective and expensive.
in a short sentence: i need a midicontroller.
Now, there are some quite interesting commercial controllers on the market which look fine at the first look. but many of them lack of usability and handling because of things like shiftkeys, micosized jogwheels, cheap plasticcasing. most promising produkt was the EKS OTUS, but 600 Bucks are pretty much for just one piece of plastic.

i started to look arround and finally i found this site through a german forum. Finally, my secret dream of my own perfect solution grew into a realisable project - the "Desire MC1"

MC1 stands for Mediacontroller (1 = Revision 1, simply because it looks cool ;> ). this means that the device does not have any faders for the mixerunit in it. (that will be a separat project or a conventional mixer). the design looks pretty similar to modern CDplayers, since i found myself that kind of layout to be the best.

Keayfeatures
-----------------

*Separate Media Controllerunit, without faders, Deck orientated layout
*Enough Encoders, switches and potentiometers to control every transport / effect funktions without double use.
*Big and handy Jogwheel with touchsurface
*Device virualisation - controlling up to 4 decks with one controller jusing a rotary switch
*Full visual and hapic feedback through LEDs and a Display in order to be able to focus on the music, not on the laptopdisplay
*Stable case (aluminium), quality switches, encoders etc.
*connectivity via usb, without special software drivers
*customized "ready to go firmware", configuration only via the midimodul of the software.
*optional Slot-In CD Drive for playing mp3s or old cd on the fly without integrating them first into the softwarelibrary
*Dimsions: 330*280*60mm (without feet)




Progress:

i allready ordered the main parts for building a prototype.
On the Picture below you see an outdated design of it (constructed with Inventor).

My Calculation that far: arround 300 Euros without surface engraving (still not sure what i want to use for the case).
I wont update this blog every week, since my studies comsume pretty much of my leisure time, but i promise to do it everytime i have interesting news and photos.

So long, greetings from Germany
Nasrudin

PS: As you probably recognised, i am not a native english speaker, so please forgive me the spelling errors.
Also feel free to leave a comment or corrections of bad faults in my text (last one please via pm, thanks ^^)]]> Mon, 09 Nov 2009 17:18:00 +0000