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@ranger: Perhaps use a dual-comparator IC + a logic XOR device and connect it to the slider of the fader? The first comparator channel is set to 2,4 volts, the second to 2,6 volts. Both outs are going into the XOR: The output is then on high if the voltage is between 2,4 and 2,6 volts. But for that you should perhaps open up another thread. @rogic: MB64E supports ALL!!! ;D ;D ;D 8) (even motorpots if no multiplexer is needed)

I made something similar and this works good: Just take the standard PCBs from ucapps.de or smashtv´s PCBs and copy/paste it together as you need it onto you format (e.g. 160x100 with core+LTC+some DINs or so). The interconnections are then just soldered permanently. MUCH less effort than making everything new in Eagle and a piece of cake, too. The ready PCBs (for copy&paste) can also be found as .pdf´s in the portal of midibox.org. Greetz.

This will be very hard as DIY in my opinion. You need lots of memory for that (I don´t think a "normal" bankstick with 256 kbit or 64 kbyte will be enough at all - it will store some seconds or perhaps even some minutes but not much more). I don´t know exactly, but in this case I would think about sticking to commercial stuff perhaps (MIDI recorders/players or similar). And also: Every *SLOWEST* PC on earth is a wonderful Midi player (you can even use C64´s or Amiga 500´s for that). Greetz!

I use the PAIA one here. I built it by the schematic. If you use two channels in parallel the sound quality is good, one alone is to bad in my "ears" (it´s going into distortion to early then). Greetz.

First of all: Sorry for the late answering, I´m actually totally freaking out @work. :P :P :P Whatever... THNX again and again and again! :D :D :D For the buttons (I thought I already wrote that somewhere): The base are normal Digi buttons as those from Reichelt (the classical SID-Buttons) - these cheap ones. The top is made out of 6mm Plexiglas (translucent and satiniced on both sides type so the light is diffused nicely). I cut the round thing out by mis-using a "Lochsäge" in German - I think holesaw on English could be correct. The holesaw is a tool for cutting out bigger holes with a drilling machine. But if you put the middle driller away (which stabilizes the thing while drilling the big hole) and use it @ a good stand-driller you can use it to drill those round buttons out of nearly everything (DO NOT use it with a hand driller - you will kill your material - not a chance to hold still). Just go through and get the round plug out of the holesaw (most holesaws can be put into parts for that). A little training is needed for the whole procedure but then it´s no prob. The end is a appr. 2mm deep hole into the middle of the button (that´s a little tricky - you really have to aim for drilling as exact as possible into the middle) with a diameter of 3,5 mm. That´s the point where the base button (that Digi button from before) gets glued to (I used 2-component stuff again) - while the glue is still hardening out you can adjust the top so it´s sitting horizontal on the button. Voila! Just a LED right behind it and that´s it. ;D @ranger: I will switch to english if that´s ok for you? DO NOT THE HELL use a middle-detend crossfader! REALLY DO NOT! Not *one* DJ-mixer on the world got that! Just use a good fader (P&G or ALPS) which goes smoothly for that. The Scratch wheel is activated by the button next to it. If the button is pressed, the record is stopped and you can go forward/backward with the scratch wheel - the feeling for that is a bit hard to get but it works (somehow...) - no good option if you think of scratching that like Vinyls... it´s a *BIT* different... ;) You don´t "need" a display, but it´s very useful if you want to change the setup the fast way. In my opinion, a display can catch up a LOT of problems. Without a display you can get into different situations where you don´t know what´s up now. I recommend it for nearly *any* Midibox. All pots and faders have 10kOhm, right. Phew, enough for now. GREETZ! ;D

Good luck! ;D ;D

Oooops, all that writing let me forget your question rogic, sorry: Pots and buttons are just soldered to the breadboard, not more. The breadboard itself holds to the frontplate with some additional screws, the encs (screwed) and the faders. That´s it. The plexiglass in the back is made by myself. I think you can guess I don´t have a laser cutter @home. ;D It´s drilled and sawed and filed in the classic way and then, yes, again some self-adhesive transparent foil, where all the stuff get´s printed in a normal inkjet-printer. Yeah, you´re right with the LEDs, but in fact (that means in front of me) the backlit buttons are much more mate-like. The light is not so "pointed-out" like you see in the pictures (e.g. there actually is no white dot in the buttons...). ;) And still something else: Perhaps there will be some other knobs for the pots. I´m not 100% confident with those now, so I ordered some other ones. Let´s see... ;D Greetz!

Hi there! First of all: THNX a lot for the credits again! Means a lot to me to tell the truth. :) At last, my Traktor Controller is done! Started appr. August last year and finished in January. The whole project costed about 400 Euros (with some tools), but I sold a big amount of midibox stuff I still had here and didn´t need anymore (some of you will remember) so I came out to a final amount of about 200 Euros spended for this box. And for such a box this is nearly nothing I think. :D My motivation for such a box is that it´s unique in every sight. The controllers are thought for Traktor but as there are pots, encs, faders and more than enough buttons, the controller screams for more apps to control. Moreover the positioning of the controllers is very untypical compared to a "normal" MIDI controller, so every place of each parameter can be remembered easily (much more easy as with a 8 rows of 8 pots controller, I think). And last but not least, within a MB64E you got the BIG advantage to have every controller type you like including pots, faders, encs and buttons. All in one. A little stuff, I wanted to implement, too: As compact as possible, desktop case, expandable, backlit buttons (yeah). As for the first point I decided to put as many components as possible onto a breadboard PCB. I misused Eagle for planing this (with the correct autorouter options and a big amount of handwork Eagle is a pretty good breadboard design tool). So, if we are there already let´s go over to the pics: 1) You can see the result of the breadboard planning on the top of pic 1. All DIN´s (10 SR´s) and DOUT´s (4 SR´s) are on the breadboard (!). And the AIN is permanently put at the bottom. In this way, you save a lot of space due to the fact that you need much less cables for connecting everything! BUT I DO NOT RECOMMEND THIS IN ANY WAY!!! Reason: The debugging of such a huge thing (all together 14 IC´s with interconnections) is pure hell! Really! Even if you´re a experienced pro-solderer you *will* make mistakes. And on such a huge board these mistakes are not found easily! I had to debug the whole board nearly up to the end of the project and in the end I had to resolder approximately 30-40 places (keep in mind that there are more than 600 interconnections and 1200 solder points). For me, I will NEVER EVER do such a project again on breadboard!!! PCB and nothing else. It´s worth it (especially worth the time & frustation during debugging). Moreover, you can see the fitting of the breadboard in it´s case (there you also see how narrow everything is planned to get a compact box). 2) Frontplate + printed self-adhesive transparent foil + cutting out the holes + case = Traktor! :D :D :D In the case you again see the core (the only thing which was not connected to the breadboard) and on the left a little headphone amplifier (1 audio in and 2 audio outs for two headphones - the headphone level can be controlled much more easily here as it´s analoge). In the middle there´s a D-SUB 25 + cable for further extensions (e.g. making the box Traktor 3 compatible) - there is still place on the core for 32 more pots/faders and 24 more Encs! :D And you even can get a glance of the 4 LED´s + reflectors which make the next picture possible. 3) YEAH! 4 ultra-bright LEDs + plexiglass back = cool insight for all those people coming by and asking how it looks like inside. ;D 4) It´s done! Traktor controller! At this place a few more facts: ONLY (!) ALPS controllers (ALPS pots, ALPS faders and ALPS Encs - only the buttons are not ALPS but self-made for being backlit). The buttons are made of normal Reichelt Digi buttons + cutted, satiniced and translucent plexiglass. The plexiglass is cut at a drilling machine by miss-using a so called hole-saw (it´s something like a driller, but for bigger holes). In this case the hole-saw does not make holes but nice, perfectly round button tops. Little hole into the middle (appr. 2 mm deep is enough), glue it to the button itself, LED behind it and done is the backlit button. 5) Here you see how bright the whole thing actually is. Even at daylight it´s no problem to see whether a button is switched on or not! Wouldn´t have thought of such a good result. -> me happy ;D And: I love that blue LCD! Really something to recommend to everybody, because for a little more Euros you get much higher viewing angle (for a LCD) and less current (appr. only 75 mA in this case). 6) U F O ;D 7) A cool view of the Traktor controller to bring it all to a cool end. 8) Gotta go and mix some tunes so: Greetz!

There are *some* shops left, which sell the 8085´s but you really have to be lucky to 1st find these (they got really few in the last time) and 2nd get a good price on the ICs (some shops are charging 10 Euros or more for one IC !!!). So best option is *still* Ebay for C64´s and cannabalize them. :\ 6581´s nearly can´t be found in shops anymore. Greetz!

Bitte Preis inkl. Versand & Standort (beides nur ca.) noch angeben. Hast du vielleicht auch Bilder? Hilft... :) Danke und Gruß!

Fix, fixer, TK... ( ;) ;D )

Traktor 2 (3er hab ich noch nich - duerfte tuerlich kompatibel sein). Jau, Bilder kommen noch. Mach auch einen *kleinen* Bericht drueber. Gruss!

The whole case should be grounded somehow. Always take the ground from the core / the SID for that (not the ground from your wallplug!). To get it even better, use shielded cables for the audio plugs. Meaning: The Audio In and the Audio Out of the SID should be made with shielded cables (shielding naturally to ground). Best is if you put a metal piece between the core and the SID, which is grounded, too. This way you should get away all the rest (the hum should come from the core and the power cable to it and the MIDI stuff always brings in some distorted sound, too). Try all these steps in order until you´re confident with the result (not all are must-do´s). Greetz!

Kann ich nur bestätigen: Mein Traktor-Controller ist fertig und ist mit MB64E aufgebaut -> Für Traktor so ziemlich das Ideale meiner Meinung nach. Kannst einfach alles verwenden. Gruß!

??? Eeeeeeerrrrr.... no idea... to be exact, *never* thought of that...

I don't know about the converter, as I'm not able to look at the .pdf in your second link (chinese stuff?) and there's nothing stated about that within the first link. Normally you don't need it. Most LCD's work with positive voltage. Only real cheap LCDs sometimes do not. A graphic LCD is just capable of bringing you more information than a caharacter LCD (CLCD). It has more dots. Not much more about it. You can draw there like you want to. But the programming of a GLCD is normally MUCH more time-intensive than a CLCD (because you have to draw your graphics pixel-wise and you can do much more stuff). A CLCD is also capable of bringing up some basic graphics (e.g. the different bars or arrows which you can find on ucapps.de). But that's more like very very basic and no real graphic. It's called character LCD because it's thought for that. For most apps a CLCD is more than fine. Only bigger apps (like the MBLC) really should be used with a GLCD. But in the end it's dependent to the needs of the user. My advice: Look at Ucapps.de for different apps (e.g. MBLC) and look at the different LCDs used there. As you will see also in the gallery most people stick to the CLCDs (and that's not only because of the cheapness of those LCDs). Greetz!

Hi! Tell me when my stuff I wrote you worked out! (See PM) Greetz!

I did something like that for four banksticks. It´s really no problem, you can do that easily on a breadboard. I think it even won´t be worth making a PCB design. Schematic stuff see on ucapps.de. Greetz!

I didn't use it, but the slow/fast function is cool for those Enc buttons, too. Pushing the Enc+ rotating = sweeping the range or stepping slowly. Greetz.

Encoder benutzen zwei DIN Pins, richtig. Encodermaesig wurde hier schon oft ALPS verwendet - ist eine der besten Marken. Auf UCApps.de gibts eine Linkliste mit Anbietern (die voti.nl Encs sollen auch gut sein). Fuer Traktor wuerde ich nicht-gerastete Encs verwenden (!!). Die Encoder ohne Achse sind nix fuer hier. Ja, es gibt Encs mit Achse ;) Wie gesagt: Guck nochmal genauer auf ucapps.de, da steht alles (man muss sich ein wenig durcharbeiten - was aber nicht schadet). Google mal nach STEC16 ALPS. Die sind bspw. mit Achse. Jogwheels gibts zu kaufen. Ist halt ne Such-Finde Frage (siehe rambinators Vorschlaege ;D) Ich hab mir meine Jogwheels am Schluss selbst gebastelt. Ist auch ne Moegllichkeit, wenn man das richtige Werkzeug hat (und die sind dann tuerlich auf dich angepasst ;) ). Hab allerdings fuer zwei Stueck gut einen halben Tag gebraucht.

Baaaaaaacklit... end. ... ... :D Yeah, really. Get a backlit one. Ever seen #any# commercial box (no matter what box) with a not backlit LCD? Nope... And the price doesn't play that big rle if you stick to the green backlight (although the other colors are damn cool). ;D And if you don't like the backlight... switch it off. (but you won't - believe that). The connection is not more complicated. Doesn't matter to much if you have to connect either 14 or 16 wires. Greetz

Do not take the cost in to much account! DIY is normally not for cost-saving, it´s for getting the stuff the way you want it. ;D To be exact, normally (taking into account you buy good stuff) the costs more or less come to the same point or little below as if you would have bought a similar piece from the market - *normally* - heavily depends on *how much* you are doing on your own (e.g. the frontplate can be some hell of work, but on the other hand you can save *at least* 50 Euros by building it yourself). My traktor mixer is getting to an end finally. I´m counting with three more weeks or something like that. And HELL it´s some fun. And HELL it was some bunch of ass much of work (sorry for those words - but it really was - you will see why when it´s finished). Think of using encoders instead of pots for that deck control! First Encoders can be rotated infinite - much more a vinyl feeling - and second they can be used for producing increments. Pots can NOT do that! For a deck control that means: With a pot, you get the deck where you want it with the pot, let it play, and if you touch the pot it jumps back to that position (in normal operation - there are very good workarounds for that). With an Enc you just tell the deck to go "forward" or "backward" depending on your movement - without giving a absolute position. Like I said before: Muuuch more a vinyl feeling. :) Anyhow: GOOD LUCK and Greetz! btw: If you´re not sure what to do/use/whatever use the search function implemented in this forum and search for "Traktor" and similar - there are waiting some inspirations! ;) And: Readreadreadreadread - the forum and ucapps.de - readreadread... did I already tell you to read?? 8)

Radiohm potentiometers (here it's mostly called pots) are *OK* - not great, but OK. But do not buy the Radiohm faders - they suck... Both is possible. Either use the Midibox to com option or the Midibox MIDI option. The MIDI option is the more flexible one anyhow. This way you can connect the mixer to any computer with a MIDI interface (including a to-com (also called serial) MIDI interface). Greetz!

And just a little thing about those faders, pots or encs (I am building a Traktor controller, too, at the moment). Especially when we're talking about a controller for real live-stuff (e.g. a DJ controller) only get good components! I highly recommend ALPS (for all - faders, pots or encs). They're normally a bit more expensive - but it's reallyreallyreally worth it! Greetz!

I´ll recommend we´ll just switch to English right now... ;) I just tried the links, actually they should all work. Try another browser and perhaps the Refresh button. Otherwise you reach all stuff over this here: www.midibox.org Greetz!