Artesia

Hi, Fair comment, if anyone should know it'll be tk :) ..i could understand that; tho got half a feeling that with care.. good ASM code ...identical to manual coding could be auto-generated.. Mind ill not witter on about this anymore, until i have fully digested the Microchip ASM manual & understand whats happening a little better myself. Btw the SIDFM project is now effectively finished ...all 4 currently useable sids (2x8580 & 2x6581) are running perfectly. and thus until V2 firmware - or another way of running them all (without building more cores) comes along ..i'll consider this done for now. Thus i would like to request submission (somewhat late) to the midibox gallery. Ta..

think this is the right docs for picking appart 18F series... Anyone else also want to read too, please go ahead :) a detailed look at how the pic is programmed; still useful tho.. (continues looking. http://ww1.microchip.com/downloads/en/DeviceDoc/39576b.pdf mplab manual (280 pages): http://ww1.microchip.com/downloads/en/DeviceDoc/51025e.pdf Pic 18f datasheets (332 pages): http://ww1.microchip.com/downloads/en/DeviceDoc/39564c.pdf ..oh btw, the reason im so insistent in getting a good grip on the programming side of things here... is i am on a mission to adapt the MB CV & afew other things to make a fully automatable, modular Filter / analog processor bank (already well into building the filters & the initial MBCV's). And need to customise afew things in order for it to be a complete, coherent solution.

well ..we can but try. (just noticed that you actually put two posts in..) yeah.. i know pretty much whats happening from the electronics side ..except some people may not. and thus why i meantion it. Fair comments on all of the above, yup filling in some gaps on uncharted terratory would be helpful; if someone feels compelled to do so.. Ill go hunting for that Microchip ASM manual ..as i think it would be more useful for me to learn that right now.. aside of getting to the very bottom of this mios business; i also have a good number of small things i want to build as pic projects. That have nothing to do with mios; which would benefit from no nonsense coding. ah yes, before pics it was programmable logic cascades i beleive ...found a newer relative of one of those as part of the control circuitary for a waldorf pulse of all things !

Thanks for the in depth explaination wilba :) gives a little more insight... Problem in general with getting to grips with these things, is that no-one fully explains what is going on.. from the people who explain the microchip ASM (that is espially poorly documented so far) ..and those who write programs that sit on top of it; assume that the next person to have a go; could make sense of the ASM explaination. Added crucially, to explaining code segments functions right next to their lines of code.. though not giving a really clear overall breakdown on how the data is flowing and moving throughout the entire structure. In summary Grasping these things is difficult, because everyone throughout the chain of events; automatically assumes That the viewer has a clear understanding of how certain things happen & work ...usually that missing information overlaps so much ..that its impossible to visualize how it works. From a tutorial point of view, so that everyone has a grasp of learning whats going on... everything needs to be layed out clearly & completely in a visual way. Thats how your mind tends to map out these interactions. And if you cant plot exactly how something happened ...the explaination is not complete. In order for anyone to pick it up: 1st a short primer on how the electronics get the signals in and out... 2nd (Cpu Exposed) the exact way the assembler language instructions relates to what the PIC is doing.. needs to be layed out. 3rd The exact nature and breakdown of the midi protocol needs to be layed out bare to show what is available. 4th (hardware perspective) The perameters, limitations & program structures from the point of view of data coming in and flowing back out needs sketching out in a detailed flow chart (with exact mios name tags - &/or typical naming convention). 5th (software perspective) the typical program cycles (screen update, button scan ..etc) need laying out in a flowchart.. with direct reference to the files involved when this is happening. ..that sort of thing. Right, on with today..

well.. i came to this conclusion about menus specifically ..because for one item in a menu to work & be placed correctly.. code relating to it (specifically) seems to need to be in at least 10 places at once ...and often across files ..not just the same one. For the sake of spending afew seconds clicking a tab or two & typing some values to create the same content without spending potentially tens of minutes doing the same manually (and greatly reducing the likelyhood of debugging); it seemed to make more sense investing a little time making a tool which Strifes through defining really rigid & logical elements of programming like this. From experience with things like (ugh !) ..visual basic ...its the sort of thing that could be put togeather in a couple of evenings at worst... Assuming a good understanding of the actual assembler involved ..and that unfortunately i dont have right now; otherwise i'd be diving in and building this tool myself right now.

Hi, Another thing thats crossed my mind, in the process of getting quite stuck in trying to do the apparently simple task of Changing some button assignments on SID Interface Step B ...to allow exhisting menu buttons to select the sids used, when in 'base' menu mode 'patch select'... In the end wilba came to the rescue on that one.. Please see this post if those matters interest you at all: http://www.midibox.org/forum/index.php?topic=7854.45 Right, Well getting to the point, a really handy Coding Tool to have (assuming Recent developments with Code Blocks doesnt already cater for this).. is a tool for building MIOS asm Menu systems in a visually orientated fashion. Ie: to have a program which for instance has on one side the menu tree... and a stack of value / code boxes to define perameters & functions of the various things that go on; in as plain a language as possible. The visual structure of the program layout should clearly show the visual structure of the MIOS program & the resources its using & where. Surely such a tool would be useful for real coders, as well as the less well aquanited ? ..as im sure that building menus in asm (or c) is very time consuming & uninspriing. ...and a little time spent making a program that throws togeather these structures in a fashion like a html page builder (ie dreamweaver) ..would save alot of time on future projects.. leaving the coder to concentrate on the 'fun' things.. like writing a new interface protocol for talking to a new bit of hardware (CEM3396 synth chip anyone ?). On the less experienced side, it would of could of course leave the average user free to configure the interface layout to meet their needs.. and with further development, completely contain all the code modules needed to build a mios app (drop connections between User Interface / Midi Protocols & interface librarys with cables and nodes like in reaktor maybe ?).. without needing to get into the nitty gritty.

Sorted.. wilba Posted some code up on the sid/fm post. Ta !

yep that worked (except i changed it to place enter menu edit button on #1 rather than #5 :) Ta for bypassing my code tardyness :) Hmm... wonder if anyone will put togeather a simple program for assembling ASM structures for things like menus in a visual sort of way.. menu trees & property boxes to assign values, functions and so on... Kind of like Dreamweaver to HTML or ...er (cough) ..visual basic to code ? ....Mind isn't this 'sort' of where things are going with the mios dabblings with Code Blocks ? Would be really cool if so :) Hmm ..could save real coders a bunch of time doing that too ...laying out menus in ASM in particular must be really tedious ...i would assume ASM folks would be far more interested in spending their time making efficient chunks of code to interface to new hardware devices (such as the cem3396 synth chip.. etc, etc)

Thanks.. ah, well.. that explains some of the confusion... wonder if anyone whos sufficently versed in the ASM involved could give some input ? :) Well, im off to bed now.. literally. ..my head hurts ..hopefully i may awake to a little light on this matter :)

Hi, Anyone who's willing to give some pointers.. your input here is welcome :) Right, well i have a little bit of experience programming in the past, pascal and basic.. that sort of thing.. And been having some huge problems getting to grips with whats going on with both the overall structure of the MIOS source & the mish mash of c++ & asm is confusing the ell' out of me :/ The Seemingly simple task i've hit a current dead end with, is making the Sid Slave Select buttons/toggles accessble from within a Step B interface. The original intentions where to simply remap the four right buttons below the screen to those functions; when they where in the patch seleect mode (and not assigned to other things). I nievely remapped those buttons, for all function calls initially (see other post for details). The other option is to add 4 toggleable options within the first/root menu. See here for project post: http://www.midibox.org/forum/index.php?topic=7854.msg59000#msg59000 I'm, really, really stumped on this now ..i dont know which part of the 'ball of string' to start pulling at.. so that it'll all unravel in a way that makes sense...

and now iv'e got the required number of microcontrollers here to get everything into action, i rand into an evening or two of headaches... Fortunately got it all sorted, And resolved the issue of not having the extra sid select buttons by doing abit of Remapping of the duplicated root menu select buttons :) -Surely- this makes more sense, in the case of a Step B interface ? ...heres my first venture into compiling MIOS... Firstly the Sid Link needed to be enabled by default: Edit: setup_8580.asm (in my case..) And changed: #define CS_MENU_DEFAULT_LINK 0 to: #define CS_MENU_DEFAULT_LINK 1 <note back on this one in a mo', as detailed below.. it didnt quite work right ... duh !> Edit: cs_menu_buttons.inc Changed: CS_MENU_BUTTON_Sel5 ;; select button #5, set cursor to 5th position movlw 0x04 rgoto CS_MENU_BUTTON_Select_Cont CS_MENU_BUTTON_Sel4 ;; select button #4, set cursor to 4th position movlw 0x03 rgoto CS_MENU_BUTTON_Select_Cont CS_MENU_BUTTON_Sel3 ;; select button #3, set cursor to 3rd position movlw 0x02 rgoto CS_MENU_BUTTON_Select_Cont CS_MENU_BUTTON_Sel2 ;; select button #2, set cursor to 2nd position movlw 0x01 rgoto CS_MENU_BUTTON_Select_Cont CS_MENU_BUTTON_Sel1 ;; select button #1, set cursor to 1st position movlw 0x00 ;; rgoto CS_MENU_BUTTON_Select_Cont To: CS_MENU_BUTTON_Sel5 ;; Remap duplicated button function to sid select #4 movlw 1 << 3 rgoto CS_MENU_BUTTON_SID_Cont CS_MENU_BUTTON_Sel4 ;; Remap duplicated button function to sid select #3 movlw 1 << 2 rgoto CS_MENU_BUTTON_SID_Cont CS_MENU_BUTTON_Sel3 ;; Remap duplicated button function to sid select #2 movlw 1 << 1 rgoto CS_MENU_BUTTON_SID_Cont CS_MENU_BUTTON_Sel2 ;; Remap duplicated button function to sid select #1 movlw 1 << 0 rgoto CS_MENU_BUTTON_SID_Cont CS_MENU_BUTTON_Sel1 ;; select button #1, set cursor to 1st position movlw 0x00 ;; rgoto CS_MENU_BUTTON_Select_Cont Then Comple.. And just as i post that, i realise that i didnt do that quite right ..need to change it somewhere else. as it remaps the button functions for all instances ...Duh ! Right well i've got to do some other stuff ..so ill be back on this later, anyone whos less of a Code Tard than me knows the obvious answer ..please msg me / post it whist i'm away :) hmm... been working on this for some time ...tho having great difficulty in understanding the overall structure and interaction of the different code chunks.. Inevitably being a mixture of c++ & ASM is giving me a big headache trying to understand and intereprit all of whats going on... hmm time to query in programming..

ahh ...serves me right for thinking about these things at 3am ...yeah, given that the outputs are cyclically updated.. arresting drift is not nessursary. Hmm it occurs to me ..what we're dealing with here is an analog data bus addressing analog memory ...how about that :)

aahhem... that would be assuming that you only intended to control the filters cutoff ..what about other thing like resonance ? :) ...doing that brings the number to 32 boards. ..which do indeed fit comfortably into 2u ...with a little insanitising.

true... tho most of the CV connections in my case will be internal ribbon cables going to very tightly stacked arrays of filter boards, etc :)

true ...i was hoping for some transconductance opamps with more than 2 in a package ..couldnt find any tho. Was however, on a unrelated matter looking at multiplexer switchers.. and well, you beat me to that conclusion :) yes, cap thing should work i guess, provided that the charge leakage is very low ..otherwise static signals stored might drift. However i beleive it is possible to prevent this happening with the correct configuaration of negative feedback to stabalise against any really slow drifts. (the reason i was proposing Transconductance opamps, is that it would eliminate the need for a multiplexing switcher.. as you can already do that with just this opamp... tho just cant seem to get enough of them stuffed into one chip) as for compactness.. hell its worth doing it surface mount if it came to it... could even use a double sided board & put chips on both sides as independant circuits. ...then just drill holes & drop components like resistors in ..its a tad more skilled effort ...tho damn id do it, if it would fit 64 channels into a board the size of a fag packet & 1/2-1/3 the height :) On the other reason for looking at Multiplexing switchers, the next little project im working on is a Midi controlled (CV) FilterBank. ..and i want to be able to route the signal paths inside it. In this case im intent on using a soundcard with 8 to 16 In+outs ...and using the swithers to route the signals through the filters i want to use... then returning them to the computer for further mixing & recording (saves on blowing loads of money on audio channels which arent being used most of the time). Makes for a nice way to insert real analog magic into the 'infinate' synthsising Potential of a digital enviroment :)

Hi, Heres something which may give some pointers for a way to make a replacement CV multiplexer. Transconductance OpAmps can be used for a great many things (almost every analog synth circuit you could think of is in the following pdf) ..one of which is Sample & Hold. Please see National semi lm13700 - Page 18, fig. 20 for details as to how this can be done. http://cache.national.com/ds/LM/LM13700.pdf It might actually be practical to use such opamps; provided well-packed chips can be found :) ..not as neat a solution as the NJD's ..but oh well !

WARNING ! - Having problems getting SIDS or a refund from analogbrotha.. After just short of two months of contact ...neither has materialised. I would hope that its just a huge lapse of organisation.. tho things arent looking too hopeful.

lol ...wouldnt that be fun :) ...mind for one chip fatness ..you cant much beat a cem3396 for the money :)

ahhh... curious :)

curious... i missed the pa397 bit ...figured it was some sort of manif./date code. hmm... waiting in anticipation of playing with one of these... anyone wondering whats under the lid ? I sure am :)

the prophet 5 doumentation is included below ...however you may wish to consider the low down on the prophet one ...which i believe is just the monophonic version & is easier to pick appart... the prophet 1 uses a CEM 3320 filter (earlier relative to the cem3396 used in the matrix 1000 ...and sounds similar to me) ...and a 3340 as a Voltage controlled voice oscillator. see here for the pro 1 schematic: http://homepage.ntlworld.com/nausicaa.valley/ucapps/prophet/pro1-schematics.pdf see here for the pro 5 schematic: http://homepage.ntlworld.com/nausicaa.valley/ucapps/prophet/P5v3TechManual.pdf Here for the evolver manual: http://homepage.ntlworld.com/nausicaa.valley/ucapps/prophet/Poly_manual_1.0.pdf and here for the chip info sheets: http://homepage.ntlworld.com/nausicaa.valley/ucapps/prophet/c3320pdf.pdf http://homepage.ntlworld.com/nausicaa.valley/ucapps/prophet/c3320pdf.pdf Original sources: http://www.hylander.com/moogschematics.html (many other classic synth schematics here too) http://www.synthtech.com/cems.html

it would be nice ..tho i doubt he would ...expect the same results (new DSP distortion engine aside) could be acheived by reverse engineering the original prophet's CEM based circuitary ..gonna look that up rn actually.. Btw dave smith's a nice guy; actually got a response from him within two days of emailing him about afew features on the evolver. Not very often that anysuch company ..nor anyone so segnificant in the industry responds to the general public.. Quietly impressed by that matter...

ahh... yes ..good reason to avoid the predicament of spouse's (hmm.. what an odd word). Or certainly at least opperate with a co-operative democracy... ;)

Following a moment of insanty, shitty customer service from turnkey & having an evolver break on me.. i actually owned one for about a week... Heres the outside & inside of it documented for curiositys sake.. Also below is the clavia nord lead 3 i was lent whilst the Alesis andromeda thats replacing it instead, comes (naughty, naughty ! ..slap). See this post for that little drama & something equating to a rough review of the evolver & nord lead 3: http://www.midibox.org/forum/index.php?topic=8030.0 Also up soon will be an alesis andromeda & maybe some other quicker bits; like the waldorf XT, pulse & an oberheim matrix 1000 ...probably seen the insides of those tho ...doubt many have seen those meantioned above tho ;) ..let alone have explaination of what actual key components are under the lid :) ...Poly evolver & Nord lead up.. come back again sometime soon for Andromeda & some others... Click HERE for LARGE Version ! http://homepage.ntlworld.com/nausicaa.valley/ucapps/INSIDE_EVOLVER/INSIDE_EVOLVER_FRONT_1_LARGE.jpg I love these... also seen on the Moog Voyager... Click HERE for LARGE Version ! http://homepage.ntlworld.com/nausicaa.valley/ucapps/INSIDE_EVOLVER/INSIDE_EVOLVER_OPEN_6_BOARD_LARGE.jpg When i can be bothered... i'll look up the specs on the chips... Btw the DSI-120 chips apparently are custom remakes of the CEM Chips :) And with all that wasted case space ..its hardly unreasonable to expect a 'all in one case' 8 voice version sometime soon :) ...cost a luddy fortune tho' ...next up, clavia nord lead 3 Click HERE for LARGE Version ! http://homepage.ntlworld.com/nausicaa.valley/ucapps/INSIDE_NORD_LEAD/INSIDE_NORD_LEAD_FRONT_1_LARGE.JPG I Really like their user interface :) Another curiously sparce instrument.. Looked up the SIX (DSP56362) DSP cores made by freescale semi. & found this page: http://www.freescale.com/webapp/sps/site/prod_summary.jsp?code=DSP56362&fsrch=1 They are an impressive 120mhz a pce (a theoretical 700mhz between them is quite something for a Microcontroller project) And are quoted as being for low cost consumer audio apps & geared heavily towards being used in surround sound processors: "The DSP56362 is a high performance DSP optimized for cost-sensative consumer audio applications. A general purpose DSP56362 is available as well as a multimode, multichannel audio decoder for consumer applications such as Audio/Video (A/V) receivers, surround sound decoders, Digital Versatile Disk (DVD) players, digital TV, and other audio applications (applicable licenses are required). The DSP56362 supports all of the popular multichannel audio decoding formats, including Dolby Digital Surround, Moving Picture Experts Group Standard 2 (MPEG2), and Digital Theater Systems (DTS), in a single device with sufficient MIPS resources for customer defined post-processing features such as bass management, 3D virtual surround, Lucasfilm THX5.1, soundfield processing, and advanced equalization." Now heres the amusing bit, the company sells them for $7.5 a pce ! ...so everything component wise accounted for, clavia are probably holding back a huge ammount of cash for R&D costs + Profit ....hmm. Oh yes, and the MC68331 ($13.50) processor driving the stack is a 32 bit thing with a measily 20mhz ! ;) This setup must make seerious use of parallel processing, well done to them for getting this working properly.. tho i am left wondering why have hundreds of millions of tiny transistors trying to emulate the behaviour of roughly the same quantity of silicon arranged into several hundred transsitors instead ? I know which i would prefer... (as far as this application goes anyways). http://www.freescale.com/webapp/sps/site/prod_summary.jsp?code=MC68331&fsrch=1 Quote: "The MC68331 is a highly-integrated 32 bit microcontroller that combines high-performance data manipulation capabilities with powerful peripheral subsystems.This MCU is built up from standard modules that interface through a common intermodule bus (IMB). The MCU incorporates a 32 bit CPU (CPU32), a system integration module (SIM), a general purpose timer (GPT) and a queued serial module (QSM)."

some news... three pocket burning incidents happened at once.. one i got a serious bout of synth lust, followed by seeing one of the boards on B-stock for silly cheap money & then also got paid off for some odds and sods i'd been owed for a while ...result being i couldnt resist in putting down irrisponsible money on a synth. I did indeed, as crazy as it was.. own a DSI Poly Evolver for about a week... before the one i had, freakily broke down (so much for me harking on about modern kit being reliable !). Something to do with the communication between the cpu control and some of the dac circuitary went completely off on one ...followed by a total crash. before that happened, i have to say it sounded great, in its own uniquely trashy, warm analog way... pretty much a new prophet alright. Also the build quality was excellent ..heavy metalwork & decent construction throughout ..had the look of been made on a small scale in a low level production run (in t' usa). Another thing as well, overlooked the fact that the wavetable functionality is minimal; basically it is used as a way to program a single 'wave cycle' such that you are not just limited to the standard waveshapes offered by the analog oscillators. The only way to create changing wavetables is to use a modulation source (lfo, sequencer, etc) to scan through the stored waves (64 rom (?) and 32 user) ...with no iterpolation morphing between waves ..like on the waldorfs. So on the wavetable account; i retract my statement ..the waldorfs ..particularly the Q+ could leave it for dust, on using this route to create advanced shifting textures. And if i ever see a q+ going somewhere for a reasonable price; i'm going to have to pray that i can find the money ;) ...tho the all digital XT will do me for now :) following this malfunction, i found myself re-evaluating the situation & decided aside of its very fat, trashy sound ... it would have to be exchanged for something else which offered a greater justifycation for the expenditure.. I'm going to wait until the Poly Rack comes down to a reasonable price, as although its nice to have as a keyboard.. its contents dont justify the space it takes up (The whole gubbins will fit in a 1u rack!) ...and what it costs. Am replacing it with an alesis andromeda, as i wanted one of those for quite some time, and forgot all about them.. as when they came out ..they were insanely expensive.. Has 16 voices, a graphical programming interface & seems capable of a pretty huge scope of analog sounds ..and closely emulating many classics that would be too unreliable (cough!) ..and expensive to own :) Oh and on the note of virtual analogs, not a huge fan of them.. i was lent a Clavia Nord Lead 3 to check out (supposedly one of the best virtual analogs about) whilst the shop got an alesis in.. And although its an solidly built & has a damn good user interface.. The sound doesnt quite compare to the real analogs its attempting to immitate.. It has all the zing and texture of the sounds, but something doesnt sound right ...when you listen beyond the surface; you ralise that theres this huge depth of sound missing & it particularly lacks something about the bass qualitys. The sound just hangs there like a phantom ..rather than knocks you off your feet like a boxer :) Actually did a comparison between the clavia & a oberheim matrix 1000 ...duplicating the sound settings. The matrix beat it hands down.. as far as my ears where concerned. ...and given that the matrix is far cheaper (£120-£300) & probably as reliable... it would be silly to spend 6-10x the price on a "well its not analog, but it sorta sounds like that". So yeah.. when buying/building anything for analog sounds ...check out the real mccoy analogs first :) Oh also, i now Hate Turnkey with a passion usually reserved for fascists... Got absolutely appauling customer service when dealing with them... For one, no one could tell me when it was due to arrrive (and 10 days later it did) ...nor if it had actually been packed. And dispite the fact that it arrived in immaculate condition, the ejit who packed it, neglected to put the power pack in & only included the '8 style' mains power lead.. That was a very frustrating evening. Oh also went down to london (was going anyways) ...and went to pick up the power pack in person. Now after standing around for (what felt like) 15 mins in a not very busy shop; the sales attendant who was all of 3 feet from me (and had just finished dealing with another customer) turned his back on me and started some casual conversation with one of the phone attendants on the desk immediately behind him ..and everyone, busy or otherwise ignored/dodged requests for some service (hmm surely im not that scarey !). When he did talk, the first thing he tried to tell me (without listening to what i had to say); was that i was in the wrong shop.. as i had just at that second produced a sound control receipt. And it took some effort to get him to listen to the point that they had bought the kbd through turnkey on my behalf (they are all under the same parent company now) ..and that i was in the store to collect the missing power supply. Now although the manager at my store had spoke explicitly to staff there to ensure they knew about the missing psu & that theyd have it ready; no one knew.. nor where they keen to run and get one. In the end i got my psu, although hardly customer service with a smile... Cheers turnkey, you are such a 'lovely' bunch ! ...Needless to say, i wont be going out of my way to give turnkey, my custom and deal with them again anytime soon ...talk about ungreatful sods. oh btw Check out my latests post: i took appart and photographed the contents of both the Poly Evolver & the Clavia Nord Lead out of my own curiousity & figured people here would be interested in what goes into these expensive boxes these days :) Alesis andromeda up next..