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About this blog

How long till magic smoke? A diary of MB builds.

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Now witness the firepower of this fully ARMED and OPERATIONAL battle station!

It's been a while since I've been able to work on any electronics projects, and while I've been I've been so slammed that I I've not been able to finish my last touches. (Filter pots, mix out, power LED... stuff like that) Starting next Tuesday, I'll have at least one recording session every week in my studio until sometime around mid 2014. Being that I'm already so slammed, my life, as far as my "hobby" projects go, will be over, for all practical purposes, until then. Therefore, I though

Blatboy

Blatboy

MB-6582 is ready. Ready. Ready. er, ready for what?

It's taken a considerable amount of time due to life/work getting in the way, but I finally got my MB-6582 to the point where it should power up and go. I attached the control board to the enclosure. All good there. I made all my cables. I ended up scrapping the original idea of making them removable on both sides, the plugs didn't fit inside the case. (Just as you had thought, Hawkeye) Maybe I'll find another use for those parts one day. I soldered the base PCB side of the cables

Blatboy

Blatboy

getting closer: LCD installation a success!

It's been a while since I posted, as it's been a while since I've been able to work on the MB6582. I've been waiting for parts to come in (namely the LCDs from China.) In the meantime, I replaced all the SMD capacitors on the logic board of an old, non working Mac Classic II I had bought on ebay for a song. It actually works now! I'm gaining a little confidence. (Look out!) So, I took all your helpful suggestions to heart. I made a new LCD cable, attached the connector, and tested all

Blatboy

Blatboy

...and a few steps back.

My next job was to tackle the LCD. I think I made a few mistakes, the first being the fact that I didn't take enough pictures. I made my cable. I crimped on the 10 pin connector to the ribbon cable, no problem. I did my tests and it seemed ok. When I started soldering the ribbon cable to the LCD, I think I did them upside down. It was odd, because I was trying to match the picture (photo 7 on step 12) on the tutorial, but I noticed the little arrow on the connector that I tho

Blatboy

Blatboy

Fixed mistakes w/solder wick, added capacitors...

So... After a morning session, a 5 hour rehearsal and 2 hours working in my studio, I was able to sneak into the basement lab to do some work for a short spell. Here's the board yesterday after I yanked... uh, carefully took out those resistors I had installed incorrectly... It's the R4_SIDx and R24_SIDx series that I had put into the C3_SIDx/C23_SIDx spot. (I stole, er, borrowed my wife's nice camera, so these pics are a little more detailed) There was still leftover so

Blatboy

Blatboy

Working, in more ways than one!

I'm sure you've all been waiting in bated breath to hear how things are going with my MB6582. Well, after some annoying setbacks that were pretty much all my fault I've gotten the box to work. Then, a big new job came in, which is great news! However, it pretty much takes away all my spare time to be midiboxing. :( Hence the reason I've not been around too much. I still have a couple last steps to complete my box. I've ordered some knobs, albeit somewhat boring ones for no

Blatboy

Blatboy

Patience. Patience. Patience.

Patience was never a strong trait of mine, at least when I'm obsessing on something. This MB-6582 project is certainly my main obsession right now, and I've run into another snag that I can only blame myself for. I was not expecting to be able to get any work done last night, but the opportunity came up. So, I started putting in the tactile switches into the CS PSB. When working on the CS, I'm following Hawkeye's amazing thread. I rocked step 6 while in a zone of meticulousness and awa

Blatboy

Blatboy

Progress: New lab, base pcb almost finished & panel arrival

My electronics "lab" has now been moved out of the laundry room and minimally set up in another nook in the basement. Still yet to see if the landlord approves... :ahappy: I got it set up in time to put a couple hours of work on the base PCB. I had picked up some 1K resistors at Radio Shack to replace the ones I destroyed. I picked up 1/2 watt resistors, thinking that was the right rating. However, bringing them home, I see they are much bigger than my original resistors were. I'm

Blatboy

Blatboy

First Week Recap

Here's a recap of my first week building my MB-6582. Pics were taken on an iPad. I love my iPad for a lot of things, and it's camera is definitely not one of them. I got my parts (so nice...so shiny) right before I had to split town a couple weeks. Once I got back, I was rarin to go. Everything started off pretty smoothly. I was being vigilant about following the construction guide. So I started with resistors, diodes, and caps that were inside of IC sockets. Although I didn't notice

Blatboy

Blatboy

Lab frustrations

So, a little background: I have been doing my work a temporary lab I had set up down the basement of the building I live in. It's actually in the laundry room. I get in the way of the landlord trying to do his laundry, and I'm ducking under drying jeans just to get to the table. I know the moisture in the room isn't ideal, but it's what I got. If you know anything about living in NYC, space is at a total premium, and just to have access to a basement (esp without owning the bldg) is a s

Blatboy

Blatboy

A few steps forward...

It's been a minute since I posted... I'm sure you've missed me. I made some progress... then I hit a bump in the road. Then, some work came in, and thank goodness for that, but it's eaten into the time I'd rather be spending getting this synth project finished. Anyhoo... the progress. (I'll put the bump in the road on the next post) Here is the front panel with the tactile switches: I made a mask with the cardboard that came with my front panel: Here's the

Blatboy

Blatboy

My first MB build - and cartoons with SID

Greetings. I'm starting this blog as a record for myself, and also to keep from pestering everyone constantly on the MB Forum over all the details of what I'm doing. Even though I think it's incredibly exciting, I'm still in an orbit deep within the galaxy of Noob, you dig. It's probably not that interesting to you kids out there with mad electronikz skillz. Perhaps my experiences will be of some use to someone else taking the plunge into this world, but I'm not holding my breath. I'm proba

Blatboy

Blatboy

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