pinksoir

Ha ha. The world is too feckin small! I found a nice synth for brassy sounds, a Yamaha SK20. It has a nice band pass filter on it. Was that you who mentioned the midibox on that thread? If so, thanks a million. I've been having mucho fun putting it together and designing my CS. It's pretty addictive... I saw that dude selling the replacement PSU on ebay you linked to. I'll probably pick it up if it stays at that price. You reckon the replacement ones from the states are fairly crap? I figured they might be. I feel like maybe building my own based on one of the designs here. Thanks for the suggestions Hawkeye. I'll have a look through my options tomorrow. I might buy a replacement for now, just to get things up and running, with a mind to building a more permanent solution for the final complete CS. I'm glad it's nothing serious anyway. If it had happened further down the line I'd have been pulling my hair out trying to find the source of the problem!

So I built the optimized power supply and plugged it in. I had the led connected and it glowed for a second and then went out. I measured power on the board and there's none. I also measured at the plug end (the part that plugs into the optimized power supply from he commodore PSU) and there's nothing there either. So it looks like my commodore PSU is kaput. Is this a regular occurrence? Is it fixable? Or should I go ahead and buy another PSU. I see there are replacement ones on eBay. Would anyone recommend them? Thanks in advance, and I hope someone can help! Karl.

Hey, Any update on this at all? Thanks, Karl.

Hi, Thanks a million for your reply. So my control surface would be something like this: I have to say that I don't really feel comfortable asking someone to do all the work for me, but if it is something simple enough and you wouldn't mind, then I would very much appreciate your time and effort. The CS mock up above is a rough idea and I think it would definitely be better to control the arp mode with one button. I would like to have a gate length encoder too. So I guess the extra controls needed would be: Buttons: On/Off; Arp Mode; Hold. Encoders: Speed; Gate; Range. Obviously there would need to be one LED each for On/Off and Hold, and 7 LEDs for the Arp Mode selector. Also, on the mock up above there are no buttons for Up and Down (near the shift button on the complete CS). However, I would be using them on the final version. Again, thanks so much for your time and I hope it's not too much to ask. Karl.

So. Anyone have any information on arpeggiator buttons? I guess Thorsten is the guy who will know . :ike: THORSTEN!!! :ike:

Sweet. Multi engine sounds like fun.

Ahoy. I'll probably put one in there for, as with you, the peace of mind. I'd say I'll only have one stereo SID pair though as I'll be using the MB SID as a one part mono/poly synth within a band setup. In all likelihood it'll only ever put out mono live though, stereo is a rare enough thing at gigs. I'd happily have just a single SID, but am I right in thinking that one SID=3 note polyphony and a SID pair=6 note polyphony?

Good work dude. It's looking great. I'd be interested in having it as an internal PSU in the MB SID I'm currently working on.

A CMoy amp seems pretty easy and a nice addition alright. Cheers for that. I'd say that I'll be using my MBSID mostly in studio, but quite probably live too. I'll look into implementing it into the design, though I'm not sure how necessary it'd be for my uses really.

Cheers m00dawg. I saw that parameter in the source too. Like you, it's the only one I can see referencing the arp though. There is mention of midi CCs for controlling arp speed and gate speed too in the "MIDIbox SID V2 CC Implementation Chart" on UcApps. However, I see no mention of the arp type/direction anywhere. I have a feeling it should be controllable though, simply by virtue of being controllable in the main menu. Though, as I am an ignoramus I could easily be wrong! As for volume, yeah I mean global volume. A 10k pot sounds about right. I presume it'd be inserted between the output pins and the output jack? Thanks again for your help.

Hi, This is following on from my last thread. I'd like to have dedicated buttons on my MB SID to control the arpeggiator and I'm just wondering if it's possible. Ideally I would like to have buttons for: 1 - Arp on/off (I know this is already an option) 2 - Up 3 - Down 4 - Up/Down 1 5 - Up/Down 2 (possibly a combined button to select between the 2) 6 - Down/Up 1 7 - Down/Up 2 (as above) 8 - Random 9 - Hold I'd also like to add knobs to control the arpeggiator speed, (possibly) gate length and range. It might also be cool to have a knob to cycle through the arp direction options (Up, Down, etc...) instead of buttons, and to only have buttons for On/Off and Hold. I'd also like to add a knob to control the output volume. I wonder why this isn't a standard option for the CS. So. Is any of this possible? If so, how would one go about it? Thanks a million in advance, Karl.

Ok, thanks janis. I'll start a new thread to find out.

Thanks, those links are pretty useful, though it'll take me a few reads to get my head around them... I'm completely ignorant of coding! Is it possible to add other buttons and encoders to control the arpeggiator on the control surface, like in my mock up CS I posted?

Thanks Janis. That at least brings me one step closer! How difficult is it to code for new button configurations? The more I think about it, the more I'd really like to have dedicated arp buttons. I've seen a few Midibox SIDs with different layouts so it must be doable I suppose...

Thanks guys. Everything on it is based on available hardware etc. Here are the tact buttons if anyone is interested.In fact, the only thing I can't find a source for is a 2x20 LCD in black and red negative. Plenty of 2x16s though. I did find a 2x20 in black and white negative though. It dos look pretty cool with a 2x20 blue backlight if all else fails. nubula, I originally tried placing the square 12x12 buttons on the top half but it sort of looks better without. There are coloured tact button covers avilable like these that you can see on the design above. It's by no means a finalised design so I'll be most likely messing around a bit more with the layout. I do have that bender too. It's from the Roland midi keyboard I canabalized! It can be pushed up for modulation as well. Imp, cheers for the info. I might stick the up/down buttons back in so. I wasn't sure if they were that useful as the CS page on UcApps says that they were just there as there were pins free. No harm in having them if they serve a purpose. I'd really like to have a dedicated arpeggiator section as I reckon it'd be one of the features of the SID I'd use it a lot, especially on the fly live. I'm not too great with coding, but I'm sure with a little help from the (great!)community I could work it out. The design is inspired from part Yamaha SK-20, part Prophet 600, part Jupiter 6 and part Juno 106, so you got one of the reference points!

So here is a mock up of the synth. I've added buttons for the arpeggiator. Is it easy or difficult to add that option to the hardware? I would certainly like to have an arp at my fingertips. I wonder if I've laid it out properly. Would there be a better button configuration? How about for the up/down 1 and 2 being the same button with two leds, and the same for down/up 1 and 2. Is this possible? I also added a dedicated volume control too. I wonder why that's not on the usual CS, though I'm sure there is a reason. I'm pretty sure that the complete CS layout has enough DINs free, especially since I've taken out the SID selection (I'll only have at most a stereo setup) and the Up and Down buttons that were near the Shift button. As it was there was about 15 places free on the 3rd DIN. I might need another DOUT though... The octave buttons are from the midi keyboard. What do you think?

Again, thank you so much Peter for your help. I'm in Ireland, so I think I'm going to order the full kit with control surface from Mikes (I won't be building on vero). I guess that does mean I won't have the convenience of buying all the bits in one place (10 pin IDCs mainly). I was leaning towards using SILs and soldering. But IDC connections seems better and more "idiot-proof". Which in my case is certainly a good thing! Also, from the looks of it, it looks like Mike's PCBs are laid out to take IDC connections. I just have to find somewhere that sells them... ebay is looking quite sparse unless I want them in lots of 100! Are Y connections bad, or generally to be avoided?

Ahaaaa... I see. So copying the bottom part of this circuit onto a new veroboard (obviously with a 7809) will regulate it down to +9v. Should I run it from the 14V line after the sid modules? Also, I see on the schematic that it says it's only 100mA. Is this a problem, or am I misunderstanding the schematic? While I'm on the subject of power, what sort of cable and connectors should I be using to, for example, connect the 5V output of the optimized PSU to the core and SID modules? How do I split this cable? Or do I split it at all, but rather run two pieces of cable from the one connector? I hope I'm making a little bit of sense. Thanks so much for your help, Peter, I really appreciate it. EDIT: I searched around and it's SIL sockets. How do I connect ribbon cable to them? I presume I solder them. But if I want to connect two wires to the one socket, eg. to connect the 5V line from the PSU to both the core and SID modules, what do I do? Is it possible to solder two wires to the one socket? Sorry for my complete ignorance, I'm fairly new to circuitry etc having only built a few effects stompboxes. I'd like to have it clear in my head before I go ahead and start building, I guess. EDIT 2: Ok, so it's actually on uCApps what to do. I directly solder the cables to the SIL headers. I presume I can use a SIL socket instead of soldering straight to the header...

Cheers Peter, I'm not great at reading schematics and that PSU confuses me a bit... Perhaps in practice it's not too difficult though. I think I'll forget about effects for now. What would I need to run just the midibox SID and the controller keyboard? Karl.

Cheers guys So I went and dug out the old keyboard. It's not usb powered but runs off a 9v adapter, 500mA. Or batteries. I have no idea how I could modify the optimised PSU to run it though, but it certainly seems to be within the operating voltages... I'm kind of thinking out loud, but would it be possible to run an effect off the power supply too? Sort of like daisy chaining. It would be cool to put a chorus effect in the synth, like a juno type BBD chorus or something. Possibly delay too.

Hi there, I am going to embark on my first midibox stereo SID. Of course first I'm going to get the core and sid modules and get it up and running, but I also want to plan ahead. I'd like to build an all in one synth with midi keyboard integrated. The thing I can't really get my head around is how I would power the keyboard. I presume that because most midi keyboards can be powered from USB that they are low power consuming, but I'm not sure if I'd be able to power it from the C64 optimized power adapter or not, or if it would need it's own independent power source. Or if it was USB powered, whether there'd be some way to power it from usb in the box. Something like this one by Reboot: Hope someone can help. Cheers, Karl.