Jidis

Plog, I didn't forget about this. ;) The temp board took a little longer than I expected, but it's all etched and drilled now. Haven't started populating yet, as I've misplaced my 25-pin male PCB connectors that I *think* I have here. George

Stryd, This Plog thing is quite small, so it won't be like two of the same design. Plog- I just read over the info on the website and saw my duplex question (among others). Somehow I forgot there was a whole page, and was getting all my info from that gif & asm file. :-[ :-[ :-[ Still working on a temporary layout to try it out. If it gets done early enough to etch today, I may be playing with it tonight, but I've got some housework to do as well. George

Are there limitations to what it can do using the port for direct MIDI? George

Thanks Plog, So they actually are LEDs. I just couldn't figure why there were so many. I guess I should have skimmed over the whole batch of files (the asm) before asking. :-[ I'll probably leave the MIDI i/o parts off this circuit and just put a couple pads or something to connect to, so I can change the stuff on the outside for right now. Didn't quite understand that part either. So, what exactly does it do for now if hit by simultaneous i/o traffic? Thanks! George PS (if Stryd's here) - So are you talking about another parallel port design? :o

If Plog's around-- I started throwing together a layout for that tonight (because I hate breadboard ;D). I'm guessing all those LED symbol things are just standard signal diodes, like the 4148 or something? Also guessing the MIDI i/o requires the same supplemental parts like in Thorsten's core circuits here (the opto,resistors,etc.)? Thanks Again, George

Canvas has turned more Photshop'y over the years, but when I got it, it was inexpensive competition for ClarisCAD and I guess AutoCAD. It does all the dimensioning and measurement stuff too: Still wish I was as comfortable with something more current. :-[

I've gotten really comfortable with a CAD app called Canvas (was by Deneba Systems, now it may be by ACDSee). I use a really old one though (v.3.5), which is limited to Win98SE & pre OSX Mac. It's tight as crap though. I've done PCB and panel stuff in it. George PS- I've learned that you still won't know exactly what the hardware version will look like until it's born, but it can give you an idea, and the dimensioning will be right at least. :)

Man, that's cool as s***. I'm surprised I hadn't heard about that. Which Opcode box is it, the 128? I wish more of those parallel port manufacturers had done that, but maybe it makes a difference whether the company is dead yet. I wonder if they worked with Opcode on it. George

Yes, but does it actually cooperate in 2008?? ;D I've got a nice MOTU parallel box that I don't trust for crap here due to its flaky 2K/XP drivers and a small MIDIMan 1x1 which does serial over one of those 25 pin ports (stuck at 98SE). Also an Opcode 2x6 rack box which is old Mac serial. If Plog's driver and circuit do OK, it might be cool to share some board swap designs for some of those old boxes. I redid the board for that 1x1 MIDIMan Portman box a while back, to switch over to a 9-pin serial connector, and still have the layout and hole diagrams: BTW- That had PICs in it too. I think it was three 16C54 chips. The box itself is solid as a rock though, all steel and feels like you could run over it with a car without killing it. George PS Plog- That 98 driver would be great too. I've run some decent 98 machines which didn't do well with audio & USB activity.

Hey again, Yes, they're definitely "A" chips. I'll let you know how it goes. :) George PS- There are probably a few archived posts here from me looking for DIY parallel MIDI circuits over the years. It's really surprising that there weren't any out there.

Plog------- You Rock!!! :D I'm on it. Always wanted to find something like that. I'll try to check it out soon. I've still got a couple 16f84's hanging around here. Much Thanks! George

I was just reading up on this again as I put that adapter back in my old laptop for something last night. I just found an interesting thread here: http://gizmodo.com/gadgets/peripherals/addonics-compactflash-adapters-replace-notebook-hard-drives-249594.php There's some info towards the bottom by Worf which might explain some of the performance issues (regarding the DMA modes). George PS- I think I could buy about fifteen of that P3/600 laptop for the cost of a small one of those solid state disks they mention. :o

This probably isn't worth the cost for those of us who would gut it for its panel, but it brings some interesting ideas to mind: http://tinyurl.com/3e46qz That would be a fast as crap front end for a 24 track DAW system. Got rec/solo/mute/select all at your fingertips. All that's missing is a jog wheel and maybe a timecode display (unless that's what that black rectangle is ;D). And don't any of you step sequencer nuts start getting any ideas. You've got plenty of your own threads here. :P George

Yeah, same here. Makes you feel "left out", don't it? ;D George

Yeah, they will likely have a "104" on them if you're looking to scavenge some off some old junk. George

NO.....NO....NO! They're totally raw (the one in that picture was something else). I had an email long ago from someone I asked about it, but it was old info. If you find any details on making a strong safe connection to them, please post or link! -Thanks, George

Hey Simone, No, this is just button type trigger junk (MPC style). I agree on the drum pads though (I play drums). I worked at a place where we had some Roland TDs a few years back and they were way nicer than my old-ass Simmons or the old Roland pad here, and I imagine the current crop of nicer electronic drum pads even smoke those ones. My relation with electronic drums however, is more for practice from books,etc., where most of the playing is more rigid and open, so the weird dynamics of lighter, faster notes don't really matter there. The "brains" are just as bad. The only new'ish trigger converter I've got is an Alesis D4. Then, I've got a pile of older stuff (the Simmons SDS-1000, an Octapad/PAD-80, and a Roland PM-16). It's a world of difference using one of those older ones for triggering than going with the D4. They're all pretty slow. I'm anxious to see what the MIDIBox or eDrum can do in that regard. This is likely similar to what I'll try on the pads: It's a piezo floated in a disc of fiberglass resin and coated afterward with liquid latex. It's also stuck to a base of mouse pad material for isolation. The ones I do now will probably be squares though, and a bit thinner. George PS- Got a bag of raw "new" piezos here just like you. I think I've had them over a decade now. ;)

Damn, there you go again! >:( That's what I want to do with one of the two Peaveys, but the boards are actually sort of long. I guess they're probably close to PC motherboard size (full ATX), but they run longways front-to-back. If I mounted it in an ASR-X type of config, I'd have to put the board sideways and rewire the jacks I needed to the back panel. Luckily, it doesn't have many (4 audios and MIDI). The newer one is cool inside. It's got power headers for internal drives and a 50 pin SCSI header on the motherboard. Funny though, it has NO space left inside for any of that (Peavey SPs are 1U!!). It's almost like maybe they were planning to go with a larger case at some point. It also has a s***load of open EPROM sized sockets inside for something. Would have been awesome if you could access your own custom ROMs along with the regular sampler RAM, but I guess that idea will die with its creator. BTW- One of the reasons I really thought about that Akai was that I kept hearing about how much of a crapshoot Akai patch conversion is on most stuff. I think the true Akais are the only real guarantee you have that you can play the CD format without anything sounding skewed. Were the 2/3xxx good about taking standard upgrades for memory and all? (that was one of the things I wasn't too into with older Akais I was involved with). Oh, and the drum trigger info I was referring to here was actually from people making MIOS/MB trigger apps (not the pad/piezo info). That was why I was more disappointed to find the forum links dead and none of the apps in the user projects or anything. If anyone had any success with one, I'd love to see it. George

Probably, I just wanted to keep it as minimal as possible since I only want a few pads and not much else. I just figured if there was already an app that uses the A.Ins for triggers or something, it would be a good starting point. And thanks Stryd for the pointer. I've got it saved and will be looking over it, but I'm probably going to work out the actual pad/piezo design first. I've got several trigger to MIDI units here that I can wire them to for trial & error testing. BTW- A bit of the good past info here by people working on drum triggers seems to be dead links and stuff now, maybe from the old forum archives. -- also- You actually had me looking at those Akai "S" units for a bit. >:( I was sort of liking the 3200 or something (the max'd out one right past the 2000). I've got to keep things in perspective though and see how much I actually end up using these stupid Peavey things in 2008 before I go grabbing more old rack gear. It's surprising that as simple as that old technology probably is now, they don't really have anything with the basic features, shrunk down to a small board or even a specialized IC. I'd love to have something like the Peavey,Akai,Kurzweil rack sampler technology in something the size of my SR-16 drum machine, with external connectivity for Akai CD/drives, sample transfers,etc. (...for cheap of course) George

Yeah, I saw the amp boards there and also at Tom Scarff's site (I think). I just don't want to mess with something if nobody else has already knocked out the trigger to MIDIBox part of it yet. 8) George Sorry to pry again--- So what did the burner do (what might I expect or be warned of)? Could save me some hassle if I get back to using it.

Hey Simone :) Cause I just want a few piezos converted to MIDI notes, and figured if I needed to do any weird mods to try to get note assignments spit out to LEDs or some custom switch/button code, I wouldn't be able to do much with a non-MIOS circuit. I also want it as small as possible. I could swear I've seen people add triggers to an MB64 app or something. I don't even need any of the pot functions. George PS- Yeah, I use those 2x40 screens too on junk boxes here! It's nice having something cheap that you don't have to worry about. Any ideas on what the burner did wrong, or what to look out for? I've got one here too that was etched from that same board file. I think we both did the same tweaks already. I've only needed to use mine a few times though.

I know these come up all the time, but I'm having trouble finding some basic details. I'm thinking of throwing together something similar to what Cheekyrooster was asking about the other day. I'd probably want 4-6 piezo based pads, but also an easy method of changing note out assignments to quickly map them to different drums. I'd go with one of the existing trigger to MIDI PIC designs on the web, but I'm considering ultimately not using an LCD and maybe trying an alternate method of displaying note assignment (maybe LEDs). I figure MIOS would be the way to go there. Has anyone already done an MB drum pad app that I couldn't find here, and/or could point me to any details on routing piezos to a core? -Thanks! George

Man, where were you when I needed you!!! ;D http://www.midibox.org/forum/index.php/topic,4211.0.html I remember having to pull parts out to get that to work, but it went on forever. That machine is actually here at home now, and I'm currently using that interface. I've got mine routed to a 9pin D-sub socket on a PCI slot cover, but that requires a 9pin to dual MIDI cable. Welcome aboard! George

I remember that from running Opcode's Galaxy with my K2000, but never pinpointed it to MIDI or the sampler's CPU (probably some of each). The main parameters I'm trying to tweak on this Peavey are pretty simple, and edit very smoothly from the inc/dec buttons, but they may clog if you were to make drastic jumps in the values (like text entry editing). There's a really nice discontinued editor called SP Remote by Relativity Systems, which is now freeware. IIRC, edits with that weren't bad, and I guess it's doing all that same "giant block read/write" junk. I think the worst (or impossible) part would be trying to manage enough of that activity from a MIOS app or something. If that Peavey ever shows up in Oz for cheap, it's pretty unique (reads Akai S1000 format, has built-in SCSI, has 8-30pin Mac SIMM slots and is only 1U rack). I think the SPRemote app was over a hundred bucks back then. I've seen the old SP go for $12 here on eBay. Twenty something is almost an average. Mine was $30. George

Cool!! So there was a "pre-SPDISK" floppy app? I haven't been doing much big stuff on floppy lately. I wish there was better outside support for the hard disk format though. I think ChickenSys is supposed to support the SP, but it doesn't look promising. Stryd- Thanks! I thought maybe that definition line jumped out of somebody's copy/paste buffer a few too many times. You know, they actually mention in the SysEx docs that there may be additions to the SysEx message system (I guess the SP's) which would allow for individual parameter access. Seems a waste that, as that whole object thing is just a sequential list of nibblized parameter values, they couldn't have just added an extra ID byte to that chunk of SysEx header crap that would tell it how far into the string of parameters it needed to go to get to one particular item (unless I'm oversimplifying it, and the machine itself can only access them the other way). Maybe had there been more Doug Wellingtons out there when it was current, they would have kept working on it. I didn't get one until the past year or two and have been kicking myself for it. It pretty much blew the crap out of everything that was around in it's day, for less money, yet nobody bought it. Doug- Are you "regular" SP? I bought a dead battery damaged SP+ first and fixed it, then grabbed an old SP for home a few months ago. Never needed the SX, as I do all SMDI. Check that SMDIXferGUI program if you haven't. I stuck it in the files section of the Yahoo DPM group, but I found it on the net anyway. It's really nice. That "plus" looks really promising inside BTW. Same size board, but they gained some space by switching most of the guts to surface mount stuff, so there's this whole bank of sockets for who knows what, an internal SCSI header and some power headers (even though there isn't much space for internal storage devices), and socketed program memory. The plus has double the SP program memory, but it looks like they both have a pair of the same chips (roughly the SP memory size) in them, then the plus has a couple additional larger memory chips, so I don't know if you can bump up the regular one (its program memory was a bit small for drum patches). Take Care, George