nebula

It works very well, and very quickly. It improves the solderability of your board and reduces corrosion caused by oxidization. It's a bit expensive, so I usually pour the stuff back into the bottle when I'm done with it. Make sure you've polished your etched board very well before applying liquid tin. A light scrub with steel wool and isopropyl alcohol works wonders.

Too bad I missed it! (j/k - look at the price :o :o :o ) http://cgi.ebay.com/prototype-VOCODER-of-german-70-s-Electronic-Pioneers_W0QQitemZ300001522431QQihZ020QQcategoryZ1287QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

I've found that 78xx / 79xx regulators like to see at least 1 or 2 volts more than the output voltage. Sometimes (not always) they do strange things if you only give them precisely the rated output. However: you're right. An 8580 requires a 9V (7809) regulator, so 12 V should be plenty! Analogbrotha: where in Canada are you?

OK, does this mean I have MIDI working correctly: - In MIOS Studio I attempt to send the HEX file (with mios_update_v1.9b) "update_with_old_mios.hex" - I have "wait for upload request before starting upload" and "use feedback from core" checked. - I press 'Start', then apply power to the Core. - MIOS Studio sends all blocks. I notice that sometimes it reads a lot of "Received Upload Request" messages between "sending block xxxx" messages... - At the end of the process it says "Upload process complete" So far, so good... but what if MIOS STUDIO doesn't really "know" it worked correctly... - I try to do this operation after removing the cable connecting my computer's OUT to the MIDI IN of the CORE (so that the computer still receives messages from the core, including the initial Upload Request): - MIOS Studio tells me it received "unexpected MIOS SysEx message" several times and the job (obviously) does not finish. From this I am guessing that MIDI is working correctly, from a hardware perspective. It is obviously responding in a way MIOS STUDIO wants to see. Please correct me if I'm wrong! Now, to test it further, I want to upload MIDIMon. Does MIDIMon automatically pass data received at the Core's IN to its OUT, or is it "IN" only? Also, I am TRYING to figure out what my PIC ID is, but I can't seem to figure out how to derive that from the Sysex it is sending out.

Remember, I'm relatively new at this, so I would ask that you kindly be patient with me while I seek help... I am working with a CORE that I am reasonably confident I have working - sort of. I obtained the module second-hand from somebody who decided not to continue with the project. He wasn't sure what is currently on the PIC. I have been able to power up the Core, and thanks to the help of some users, I got MIOS Studio running on my Mac. It seems the Core has a version of MIOS on it, but I don't know how to tell what version that is. On power up it sends: F0 F7 F0 00 00 7E 40 00 01 F7 Ch1 prog change 0 (3 times) (*) F0 00 00 7E 46 01 0D 00 00 00 F7 F0 00 00 7E 46 01 0D 01 00 00 F7 F0 00 00 7E 46 01 0D 02 00 00 F7 ...then a much longer sysex message ...then repeats from "(*)" two more times. I have not yet gotten my LCD to work. I don't know if it works or not. I think I have it connected correctly, but I am continuing to investigate and experiment with this. I have tried uploading stuff to the CORE via MIDI, and I have even seen it seem to reboot itself immediately after the upload process, but the behaviour is the same. So, I'm not sure if it is receiving MIDI properly. My two questions: (1) is there a way to tell, from the data I showed above, what is actually on the PIC? (2) is there a simple way to get it to loop back MIDI so I can be sure it is communicating properly? [egad - I've been up all night! i'm going to bed. thanks to all who have helped so far]

In defence of my Mac ... Nope. I mean MIOS Studio requires Java 1.5, which I do not have, although the PlumStone option will perhaps provide a workaround. Stay tuned... ;)

Thanks - except that MIOS Studio won't recognize MIDI ports on my Mac.

I have been scouring the forums, and finally Google answered this question: http://www.ucapps.de/midibox/mk_syx.zip ... although I just tried using it and maybe it's an old version or something. When I try to convert the file called "update_without_installed_mios.hex" I get an error "ERROR: File doesn't end with '.ini'". I tried just changing the file name to end with .ini instead of .hex, then executing again, and I get a new error: "ERROR in section 0, line 1: don't know what to do with statement ':020000040000FA'!" I am continuing to look into this, but if somebody with experience in this field could help me out I'd be most grateful!

Bizarre - the way I learned it, R=EI. (Yup, "E" is voltage)

AIIIIIIIIIIGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!! Do you hear yourself??? How do you know why viruses get targeted to one platform or another? Do you write them? More vulnerabilities all year for non-windows systems? Are you on crack? Yes, please back that up with a link or something. This is not a flame - it's a challenge.

^^^^ Pussy. How's this? When I use MSIE I feel as though I'm sucking Bill Gates off. The notion that FireFox "integrates poorly with windows" is a good thing. It keeps the browser separate from the operating system. In fact, the whole browser integration concept was nothing more than a deceptive ploy on the part of MS to "cut off Netscape's oxygen supply" by bundling their browser with Windows98. When the U.S. Supreme Court ordered that they were not allowed to do this, they insisted that Internet Explorer is part of the OS! Has been since the dawn of time! Microsoft has "driven the browser boat"? By doing what, exactly? Luring lazy developers who want to create enterprise-based web apps? Um ... that's a no-brainer, because every Windows-equipped enterprise machine has MSIE on it already! Why would I, as an in-house developer, ever test my apps on other browsers when I know everybody will already have IE? >"If people don't want these features then why do web developers use them?" Because they're easier, in the short term, even though they break consistency of syntax and structure. Example: if you were working on coding MIDIBox SID, and TK put a function right in MIOS called something like "play_sid_piano_note(x)" where you stick in a value from 1 to 127 and that uploads a cheesy piano sound to a SID connected directly to that core, then plays the specified note about a quarter of a second later -- would you ever use it? Probably not, because it doesn't work all that well - but at least it's consistent. You're a musician, after all, and you need better. There are functions already in MIOS that will make this possible, but it's going to require a lot more work than that. Enterprise application designers don't give a rat's ass about web standards. They want their job done quickly at the end of the day. The reality is you could use that SID Piano function to make a little tune. It would sound like garbage, but you could push a tune out the door. Where do you get this from? I used Netscape for over a year (since version 0.7), before MSIE even existed. In fact, MSIE used the NCSA Mosaic engine when it was first introduced. MS bought it. And MSIE was a separate download from Windows 3.1 and Windows95. In fact, if memory serves, I don't even think there was an Internet Explorer version 2, because Netscape was already up to version 3 by that point, and Microsoft didn't want it to sound as though they were "1 behind" to people trying to pick a browser. So they skipped right to version 3. OK, do you work for Microsoft? Can you elaborate on this? Too far ... for what? As far as the printing stuff: my workplace is fast-paced. Our enterprise machines have MSIE only on them, and users are locked out from installing any software. I am issued a personal laptop however which I can customize as I please. Frequently over the course of a day I am required to find a product or tidbit of information on the web, print it, and give it to somebody. MSIE almost never works on the first try. For this reason alone, when I know I might have to print a web page, I move to FireFox on my laptop, even if I'm already sitting in front of a corporate desktop. And to suggest that this is due to laziness on the part of web developers is a copout, when "alternative" browsers such as FireFox, Safari, Opera, etc are developed based on standards-compliance. I would contend that the lazy developers here are the ones who make MSIE. I maintain my position, but elaborate: Internet Explorer is not a modern web browser. Perhaps as you state, IE7 will be better, but right now almost all other browsers run circles around it. Is it from a different vintage? I don't care. Everything else is better right now. And I don't understand why you apologize for it. As for tabbed browsing, I've been doing it for the past 3 years or so, long before MSIE was nearing EOL. This might seem like an off-topic rant, but it's not completely: This is a community of open-source developers, information sharers, hobbyists, and tinkerers. We are the people who stand to lose the most when companies arbitrarily put their proprietary meat-hooks all over everything and mess it up for the rest of us. Look at the Mackie Control C4, a simple yet beautiful goddamn box of knobs and displays, yet Mackie made its protocol proprietary to prevent people like us from ever making anything that can work as well - it is big business (Mackie) dealing with big business (Apple/Steinberg/Digidesign/etc), and they genuinely do NOT have our best interests in mind. There is no reason in the world why that protocol ought to be closed, other than to protect their bottom line. What would happen if a synth manufacturer were to make their own proprietary messages over MIDI? You know, so that when it's talking about notes and mod wheel, other synths think it's talking about program changes and active sensing. Then they made their synth really inexpensive, but really capable? Ignorant newbies would buy it as their "first synth", and then software developers would have to make their stuff able to talk to it. Guess what? That synth manufacturer just hijacked MIDI! Suddenly our MIDIboxes cause havoc when they're connected on the same chain as a 72-MIDI-channel polyphonic humidity sensing Rolahorg DX2000! Is my point of view extreme? Probably... but I'm glad to not run MSIE, and frankly I care more about what I just flushed down the toilet than I do about making pages work well in it. I'd much rather boycott that company and all the evil things they do. I leave this comment until the end. Stryd, I'm going to be honest with you: I appreciate all of the contributions you make around here, but this comment offends me. I bash MS and I'm fully educated. And I'm not alone. In fact I would contend the opposite ... that people should not jump on the "defend MS" bandwagon until they've had a chance to fully think through the ramifications of MS's actions.

Right! I guess I'm just making sure that the one jumper (moved from pin 22 to 28) is the only hardware rev required for MIOS 1.7 and beyond. You see, this page on ucapps.de sort of implies that there are two mods (bankstick connection and SID connection) - do I accomplish both of those by moving the one jumper? (BTW it's a brown board, so it must be V2. And it has a 10 MHz crystal).

Hi Thorsten, Thanks, but the boards are already assembled, with the wire jumper going to pin 22. I'll change that to pin 28. Is that the only revision to the CORE I need to worry about? ... and I assume the only SID revisions are layout-related?

I have added some soldering tips to the end of the "soldering" page in the Wiki. Even if you have a lot of experience, these tricks of the trade could be valuable to you. Enjoy.

FWIW I'm a Mac user at home as well, and at work I find MSIE on Windows to be just a horrid browsing experience. No tabs, lots of pages lay out poorly, and -- did you ever notice this -- it can't print! Just go to any page with tables or frames, and try to print without having at least one edge cropped off. Seriously, Microsoft has totally missed the browser boat. Everybody who's anybody is using FireFox or some other browser that actually works nowadays. I say that if people can't get another browser working then they're probably not really up for the task of building a MIDIBox.

I have received a CORE and a SID module from another MIDIboxer who decided not to complete the project. I don't know whether it is tested or not. The CORE appears to be a CORE R2 from SmashTV. From everything I can gather, there is a mod required to make this work with MIOS 1.7 and above - or are there two mods required? The first is a jumper from J4 which presently goes to pin 21 of the PIC, it appears that I will need to connect that to pin 28? From looking at the module, I see pin 28 is already connected to a pin on J10 and J15. It looks like I can connect my jumper to one of those points rather easily, otherwise I'd have to desolder the IC socket. Am I on the right track, or is there an easier way for me to do this? Also, is there another jumper I'm supposed to relocate for connection to the SID module? TK mentions it in the MIOS changelog for V1.7, but it doesn't appear to be addressed on Smash's site.

If you're using female header connectors, you could be using "IDC" + ribbon cable ("Insulation Displacing Connector" which clips on to your ribbon cable with pliers, no stripping needed), or you could be using the little molex-style housings with individual female pins that crimp to your wires. If you go with the molex style connectors, you can buy the pins for slightly larger wire, then just twist them together and crimp them in the same pin. Plus, if you want to only buy the one size of pin, you can still crimp the smaller wire into it by stripping twice as much insulation off and doubling the wire back.

Reverse engineering the C4 would be cool. What would be even cooler? Devising a standard "control surface protocol" subset of MIDI communication, not unlike GM or MMC. It could accomodate a wide variety of devices, such as faders (motorized or not), touch sensors, jog/shuttle wheels, rotary encoder "v-pots", buttons, switches, meters, displays, etc. Make it an open standard, something that all control surface manufacturers -could- adopt, and get it into some software - start off with Open Source stuff like Audacity, then let the commercial software vendors implement it as well. Beat companies like Mackie at their own game. What an arrogant response from Mackie. C4 is nice, but the cost is exhorbitant. "A lot of hard work and intellectual property that we need to protect carefully"??? It's some displays and knobs, for crying out loud! Thanks - I promise this is my last rant on the subject. That topic just came to the top and I forgot how mad Mr. Steinberg's response made me - especially since the C4 pumps its data along something that only ever worked because it's an open standard - MIDI.

Logic Control protocol and hardware was devised by Emagic. Mackie looked after industrial design and manufacturing. Logic Control appeared on the market long before Mackie Control. Now, I'm not in the loop about what happened next, but I have heard it rumoured as this: Logic Control's sales were probably a bit slower than Emagic expected, and they left Mackie on the hook for some money. Rather than wait and work it out, Mackie jumped ahead and changed the sticker and firmware, released an identical product that would work with all DAWs except Logic, and called it Mackie Control. Emagic - bad for being slow to pay Mackie, Mackie - bad for breaching a (huge) licence agreement. Emagic probably had a pretty strong case against Mackie, however they were being courted by Apple at the time, who would eventually buy Emagic and shut down all of their hardware operations anyway. Much better to kiss and make up, and concede Logic Control to Mackie. The next part: Mackie Control users are offered an "upgrade" to "Mackie Control UNIVERSAL", which is actually the Logic Control protocol. Now, this bugs me: Uh-huh. Well, sorry but the sysex details of Logic Control and LC Extender were released to the public by Emagic. That remains the de facto protocol to this day. I feel compelled to call bullshit on this one. It has not been a case of reverse engineering anything. It has been a case of using the code as it was released to the public to do as they choose with. You can't revoke information. In other words, we can discuss how much Mackie wants to charge to licence the protocol. Wow, I wish I had the time and smarts to actually reverse engineer a C4. It is such a simple beast, yet it is so powerful because of its tight integration with the host software. I wouldn't be surprised if they encrypted its MIDI stream! ;) What concerns me most about this is whether Mackie is forcing software manufacturers to sell their souls... i.e. "you can use the Mackie Control protocols as long as you don't make it too easy for users to just plug in any ol' controller and have it function as well". Of course that's just speculation, but it is pretty damn hard to control Logic with just any ol' box of knobs.

You want 15 volts, and 100 mA or better - if I were you I'd seek out one that's 15 volts and at least 300 mA. It will run cooler, and will continue to work even if you decide to add more COREs, SIDs, display, LEDs, whatever. The mA rating (milliamps) determines how much current the transformer / wall adapter is capable of providing. The circuits you connect to the supply determine how much current you will actually use. If you draw more current than the rating of your power supply, it will run noisy, its voltage will sag, or worse - it will overheat and eventually burn out. The higher the current rating on a transformer, the more robust it will be. (It is likely to also be a bit larger, physically). In my experience, 100 mA wall warts are usually crap. An extra $5 buys you something that you can depend on. (Your mileage may vary)

Stryd, two things I noticed in this page: (1) 8 rows of 12 columns? Do you mean 16 columns? (2) PIC16F88 in line with TK's prototypes? I searched the whole Wiki and Forums for '16F88' and didn't see anything. From Microchip's site that looks like a less-capable PIC than the 18F452.

I haven't seen the modulation display because I don't have an LED matrix, yet. Please tell me if I understand this correctly: - This affects users with a multi-SID system - The LED matrix shows LFO and ENV values - If you switch your control surface to a different core, the LFO and ENV still show in the LED matrix for the first core? If that's what's happening, I would like to agree with Rio and suggest that they should at least not be displayed when controlling a different SID. I don't believe that the problem is that they would be "annoying", I would prefer to think of it as "distracting" or "misleading" because it looks like your modulation values are different than they actually are.

As for the clock pin, the details are on http://ucapps.de/mbhp_sid.html - take a look at the second last picture on the page. To follow this revision (which may not have been there when you first started) you need to remove the oscillator from the SID board. Welcome to the joyous world of desoldering. For home use I personally use a "sold-a-pullt" although vacuum bulbs or solder remover wick both work well. (On boards with plated through-holes, however, the wick is less effective).

Don't swap out the 6581 for an 8580 unless you also change the regulator, otherwise you're putting too much voltage to the 8580. The 8580 takes 9V, 6581 takes 12V. I see from one of the shots in your first post you've got a 7812 regulator but you should use a 7809.

Stryd, Any forum posts or wiki pages on this? I'm still trying to figure out the best way to approach a 'schaltwerk' -type sequencer, which is really just like a tr-style sequencer with multiple rows of buttons and LEDs.