smashtv

Don't take it too seriously, Someone must have confused the brake pedal with the gas.... ;) Here's a +1 for testing Studio on the mac...... Or maybe someone completely got the wrong idea and is "smitten" with your avatar? ;D </joking> I know I know, shut up and get back to the kit mill..... ;) Best SmashTV

Kicking the wayback machine with the search, I found this: http://www.midibox.org/forum/index.php?topic=748.msg4267#msg4267 ;) They are cheap when you compare the hole yield per bit with any of the standard carbide pcb bits or HSS bits that like to break. Best! Smash

Guys like John are truly one in a million. I remember many moons ago, when I was just a 12 year old kid and had to have my mommy drive me to get parts for things, I darkened PAiA's door for the first time. John was very nice, but most importantly he did not write me off as some stupid kid and treated me with respect, something I was not used to from dealing with others in the local electronics business. Most simply could not be bothered to waste time talking to a kid. It has been on my "list" since then to do any engineering with him or even just some good conversation time, and it never really happened except for the usual visit for parts or enclosures. Time to move some things around on that list, I really missed out by not making that a priority, especially considering he was just across the city from me for all these years, not on the other side of the planet. PAiA will live on, they enjoy what they do. RIP John, many thanks for the encouragement, it was priceless in my life and quest for knowledge.

Just to be clear, it is an old config. I eliminated the programming connector (was J3?) from my boards a long time ago.....No jumpers needed since the connector is not there..... ;) I have no idea if the same is true for Mike's boards. Best! Smash

Heya WF! I wish the forum would let us use tags on the subject line, so you could change the topic to Re: wanted: SID chip - will trade it for a c64 psu.. or something of the like for completed deals. We do need to figure out how to indicate that the stuff is no longer available, something instantly understood by everyone reading the topic so we don't continue to get messages about something traded off long ago. Best! SmashTV

Very cool! Whew.....Some of us have been into electronics for many years...... :) Looks like I need a new digi cam. Wisefire your pics look great, what cam do you use? One and one post per person seems like a good idea (considering you can edit your post as needed). That could keep it fairly tidy for the database with two big threads vs. many small ones. Not to mention that any other way will get spam-like and not worth reading really quick. The huge bonus here is that specific part numbers from have/wanted lists will be correctly indexed in any forum search..... Just thinking out loud, I have no idea what I have to trade yet, etc. and just to be clear I don't want to trade for stuff in the store (I already can't keep up with emails, much less new random trade offers) but I would love to get some trading going to get rid of some of this spare/odd stuff....it's stacking up! ;) Back to making up kits with me.....I'm way behind :-\ Best! Smash

Hi Nick. First you should read this thread. It answers the question why you can't buy a ready to use MIDIbox SID. To answer this, my favorite quote from a friend: "Bypassing doing and learning is not the purpose of the midibox." - Moebius Locally: Swap meets, flea markets, thrift stores, pawn shops, depending on where you live even eBay auctions from others in your area. Globally: eBay, but be prepared to ship a disk drive that you don't want or talk the seller into sending only what you want. They also show up here for sale from time to time. Remember there is one in each of the millions of old Commodore 64s that are still out there. Time to practice your soldering skills, and know that this great (and patient with newbies) community is here if you run into trouble building your box. Best! SmashTV

Today, thousands of MIDIboxes around the planet chime, bing, bong, bloop, click and blink in your honor.... ;D It can't be said enough, Thanks again TK! Enjoy the space cookies! ;) Smash

Very cool that they he is doing the right thing. Hopefully he plans to do this for everyone who has been waiting.... Smash

Cool! I copied the info, now I'll edit your post to remove the info so there isnt a copy of your address/info floating around in a google cache forever.... I'll let you know what happens @ each step. Best! Smash

Totally understood, but you must understand that this is the reason (not willing to prosecute) that he's been able to accept money and not ship anything for over a year now, and still doing it. You can not prosecute all you want, but that does not make you less of a fraud victim. Since nobody else has contacted me I'm going to call this matter done and over. We got screwed, and I won't fight on behalf of people who can't be bothered to take action beyond complaining. I will however collect for myself. Complaint without action falls into one of two categories, warning others, which is good, and whining, which is bad. Nothing personal to anyone here, it's much smarter to just write it off then be willing to spend 20 times the original amount in question to ruin a fraudster. I'll have some quite expensive SID chips when it's all done, but it's a small price to pay to be able to sleep at night without dwelling on how I got screwed and did nothing about it. : ) Centsible=stain on the pavement when I'm done. Realize this guy is still out there ripping people off, and by taking no action after he takes your money is the best help he could ever have. Again (so we don't get a flameware going here!) I'm not looking to offend, nothing personal at all with anyone here, etc. But lack of action when things are going way wrong right in front of you is not possible for me any more, people not keeping thier own "in check" is bad news all around. I see this every day as an American citizen, nobody cares so whoever has an agenda can spread it wildly, without worry that anyone will do anything about it. Good criminals count on and understand a lazy victim. "If it's really that bad, someone will do something" seems to be the rule of the day for everyone, while the ones who do the bad stuff are actually the only ones doing anything. Sorry for the rant but it needs said, I could go on forever about the state of the US but free speech is mistakenly labeled for treason a lot these days so I'll save that fight for my representatives in the govt. (Many of them future -former- representatives. ;) ) That last statement in itself is a big clue about the result of lack of action.... Best! Smash

From the "SmashTV is completely scatterbrained" department: So I make that post this morning, then work half the day packing orders and doing dad stuff, when I realize that I ordered from Centsible too......something I had managed to almost completely forget. Paid for a couple of SIDs for a test order, on August 4th of this year. Too much going on I guess..... :-\ Anyway this will be like bringing a gun to a knife fight, this poor guy has been added to -my- list. Unfortunately PayPal only gives you 45 days to file a dispute as a buyer, so if it has been longer (like with me) your dispute will automatically be deferred, but it will show up in his record and with each addition to the record PayPal is more likely to close his account. I just talked to his voice mail, but as you would guess did not get anyone on the phone. Gave him 24 hours to respond via phone before I bring the fight...... So if you want to send me proof of payment and a signed statement about who you paid, when you paid, what you paid, what for, and that you did not receive anything, did not communicate, etc. I'll fax it to the local police along with my stuff, and hand a copy over to the postmaster when I meet with them. PDF is fine, any other method needs to be quick so I can present it all at once in a few days. This guys day/week/year is about to get very bad.....mail fraud/eBay fraud makes for great headlines in the local paper and easy arrests for local police......Postal inspectors file federal charges that are prosecuted on a state and national level.....A small claims case here would give me what I need to file a lien against his property (judgement lien) which I can sell to the collection service for 10 cents.....who will decimate his credit report if he does not write them a check. I really don't have the time for this right now, but it could prove entertaining enough to be worthwhile...... : ) Best! Smash

Very soon.... Best! Smash

Man I hate to hear this. I took Centsible off of the "where to buy" page on the wiki. Take a look at http://www.centsible.com/pressreleases.shtml to see where they/he were recently spanked by eBay for including their URL, and apparently has a little less than solid infrastructure (operating from storage spaces?) Wish I had time to do more, best thing you can do if you know he's ignoring the emails is to contact the postmaster. If enough (read more than 2) complaints hit the same local postmaster, his mail service can be suspended until they investigate, and if they do thier worst (best depending on your viewpoint!) he'll see criminal fraud charges. Don't do the usual.....complain "I got screwed" and write it off, that's the reason he's been able to scam/ignore more than a few people already. Get together and cause this guy some trouble until he's forced to address your issue! While PayPal will do absolutely nothing to help you on this in any way, they do still have records of your payments to this guy, and that will help with the local law and the postmaster. If he's still doing biz under the Centsible name, he's bound by any agreements made in that name..... First read this:https://www.usps.com/postalinspectors/fraud/GetWhatYouOrdered.htm as it outlines US law that pertains to this, and then fill out the form on this page:http://www.usps.com/postalinspectors/fraud/MailFraudComplaint.htm The USPS has 300+ people that investigate mail fraud alone, and they have a tendency to react, resolve, and press charges faster than any other law enforcement agency I know of. Don't worry if the local police are no help or won't write up a complaint on this for you, it looks like a small town and they really do have better things to do (when you look at the big picture). If you can get enough people filing complaints with the postal inspector they will file the charges and get the local law involved. Know that you probably will not be the first to file a complaint with the postal inspector, making your issue easier to push/investigate for them: http://groups.google.com/group/comp.sys.cbm/browse_thread/thread/e6b44432b072845a/ http://groups.google.com/group/comp.sys.cbm/browse_thread/thread/9e02a1c7b27789e3/ http://groups.google.com/group/comp.sys.amiga.marketplace/browse_thread/thread/413a77eff09a1687/ Best! Smash

No worries about rocking the boat, It is very important people understand these things.... ;) TK wrote the code that makes the boxes work, and he has stated that this project is for non-commercial use, and its given freely for personal DIY use only. It's really a trick to inspire learning, perpetuated by TK and helped by the community as a whole. You can't throw a rock around here without hitting someone who came here with no electronics experience, but now has learned more than enough to help newbies and solve problems on their own. It's a great motivator, and since it is not available commercially it gives people who think they "could never do that" a kick since they can't just buy it. Whoops, got ahead of myself, you said EXACT......Check QA2, QA3, and QA4 from the wiki. Right, the hardware designs are textbook stuff, "obvious extension of existing technology" for the legal types, but the code it runs is 99% or more TK's creation, is not an obvious extension of any other code base, and is the magic that makes this rather simple hardware sing. The big difference here is the code/software that runs it. If your mate did not have to do any programming to make the rig run, then his creation (actually his company's creation) is an obvious extension of existing tech. If any of the off-the-shelf parts have a processor it's likely that the code they came with is part of the purchase price, and is subject to whatever licensing terms were in place at purchase time. Most likely those parts were sold as modules to be used in this way, and the usage agreement for them allows for this type of use (OEM). Quite simply the usage license for the MIDIbox does not allow for this type of OEM use. What we need is the magic sentence that can make this obvious to anyone who sees it, so we can spend this time tinkering instead. :) Best! Smash

Actually, the A and B markings are subjective to the manufacturer. The most common (standard) is A=Log and B=Lin but now some manufacturers make Linear pots marked A and Log pots marked B. From -most- manufacturers a "10k A" will be a log pot. The only way to know for sure is to measure. I have seen mention on usenet of Malpin and some other known parts houses selling pots with the "new" marking standard.... Best! Smash

Great work! :) Smash

It's up to you, this is totally up to what you prefer......My habit is all jumpers on the parts side, but the boards look cleaner and it takes way less time to put the long/insulated ones on the solder side. ;) You got it! Best Smash

Yes, if you have more than one .33uF in the kit one is an extra. Sorry for causing confusion (to everyone with the "spares") Kokoon is 100% right on this, I usually use cut resistor legs for small ones and small gauge insulated wire for the long runs, all on the top side of the board, stuck to the board with a couple of dots of RTV silicone.....Old habits.... ;D This takes tons of extra time though, tack soldering your long jumpers to the solder side is the most painless way..... Thank you! :) Best Smash

Specific info on the differences is herein my info section: http://www.avishowtech.com/mbhp/info.html This is probably an accidental spare (unfortunately it happens, my method of packing 100 kits at a time helps me make sure all the parts are there, but does not show me when I put in extras) So please take a look at my info pages, and if your capacitors are all where they should be then the .33uF (334) is a spare. This also happened with another of the kits from that batch. I'll pull the sample from that lot and count the caps, but if one has extras, i'm sure they all do.... Sorry for the confusion! Best Smash

Just to be clear: the word "din" in that sentence is a typo right?If you ground the inputs on the ain board -and- remove the chips, the connection from core to ain will be left floating.....and it will give random data depending on cabling. My rule of thumb is to inspect polarity, connectors, and soldering. Usually don't have to go past there, but next step if solder passes visual again is to reflow every solder connection on the board. Even pro solder monkeys can make a bad solder connection that looks great. On your AIN board: are you using mine or another layout, and are your jumpers in place? Describe your power supply.....I have seen builders with these symptoms from trying to run a switching power supply vs. linear. Ready to help, but need more info...... ;) Best! Smash

Great! Have fun and let us know how it goes..... :) Best Smash

While I don't use these much myself anymore for prototyping, when I did I used a Dremel tool and routing bit intended for plastics to tear off copper where I needed a gap. Too much time with a knife trying to electrically separate things caused this behavior... :) As with everything YMMV, but some care with the Dremel proved much less frustrating than using a knife for me. Best! Smash

NOTE: I edited the dupe post in the HUI forum to point to this thread. Best! Smash

Please allow me to be more clear than this poor choice of words from my last post: My concept on this has not changed, the price of a MIDIbox includes learning and time.....DIY So I still reject large orders not connected with a group order (I don't supply for hire builders), etc. but I just won't be so quick to jump on this type of behavior with teeth bare in the future. I did not mean to say that it would not bother me, just that I would rather be a freindly admin these days than wear the war paint..... ;) Smash