Therezin

Did anyone else look at that Neko and just get a new integrated PC / keyboard / MIDIbox idea?

It sounds like a pretty damn good idea to me. Is there nothing in the MIDIbox documentation project forum?

I thought they stopped that years ago?

@Jidis: I assume that when you're etching alu with HCl, the bits you want shiny are the ones you coat with toner? Silly question, but I's gots ta ask... @Artesia: That s**t is hot.

If you're after reliability, remember to make sure you're PCs power supply is up to the job too - audio can be very processor-intensive, so get the most powerful PSU you can afford, as a PC that pulls more than the PSU can handle will have no end of hangups and resets. Vast quantities of RAM and a large, fast hard disk are also a pre-requisite. I've got 1280MB of RAM and a 200gig SATA150 hard disk that do the job nicely, tho the 200gig's running out quickly. When I built the PC they cost me a hell of a lot, but now you should be able to pick up the same stuff as i'm running for about £100 if you shop around.

The application you load onto the PIC in your CORE module controls how the CORE interfaces with other modules. Your SN76489AN module would conceivably work, but you'd need to write a MIOS interface program to work with it.

If that's true, it's worth the price of the upgrade. That simple.

The C16 had a very similar case to the 64, and that was a very dark charcoal grey, with light grey keys. Saw one at a car boot sale ~3 years ago for £2, but decided against it... Edit: More here - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commodore_16

Can MPASM handle path/filenames with spaces in them, and more than 3 letters after the ".", or is it strictly old-school?

I remember seeing a thread on here that mentioned 15 minute PCBs, and on the site it linked to they gave a board a solder-masked appearance, but using ordinary green acrylic spray paint - it doesn't do anything soldermask-wise at all, just looks good when you've finished.

Happy birthday TK!

I'd say it's OK as long as the amount offered is appropriate - if someone does me a favour, I have no problem in buying them a beer or two.

I'm still interested, as long as it's not another 5 months 'til I hear from you again ;) - I'll take 16 of them if you still have them for $1AU each.

Welcome to the forum! Buttons and such: The main thing is that they're a normally-open contact. You'll find that a lot of calculators, phones etc (probably most of them in fact) use a scanning matrix rather than individually connecting the buttons, and this might cause a problem... or it might not. YMMV. Pots/Faders: The big issue here is whether the pot/fader (they're essentially the same thing but a different shape) uses a linear or logarithmic taper. Linear taper means the resistance increases in a linear fashion, while logarithmic taper means the resistance increases by a larger amount the higher up the scale you go. MIDI wants linear, while volume controls and the like tend to be logarithmic (because the human hearing is logarithmic). Joysticks: Basically 2 pots controlled with one stick. They tend to be linear. Mice: Use 2 encoders the same way that a joystick is 2 pots.

@ RTurner: My advice to you would be... zinc tablets. My mom works in the office at a lead mill, and to counter the effects of the huge amounts of lead in the air there they all have to take zinc tablets and have a monthly lead count test. You can pick them up from just about anywhere that sells vitamins.

That... is awesome. And just to make me even more jealous, he has a 909 :'(

I've had 2 cheap rotary tools in the past, never a dremel - the one thing that always annoys me about the cheapy ones is that they're so easy to stall the motors, even the mains-powered ones. is the dremel the same?

Isn't SynthEdit a program for making VST's? I'd suggest MIDIbox SE, whish is in keeping with the naming convention of the other MB's too - MIDIbox LC, CV etc...

It doesn't need to be exactly the same as long as it can take the voltage and current levels you're giving it. Shouldn't be a problem as they're normally rated for mains levels (230VAC) rather than the 9VAC we're giving them.

Wow, I didn't realise that so many people actually looked at my page - I better get on with buildingthe rest of the damn thing! I'll also update it with the info. about this problem, 'cause that's liable to catch a few people out if they're not expecting it...

The way I'd probably do it is using "plasticard" (think that might be a brand name, basically it's a sheet of plastic) and a glue called polystyrene cement. This stuff's basically a kind of glue that welds 2 pieces of plastic together, and it takes quite a lot of force to break it. I'd probably cut the plasticard to the shape of the keyboard cut-out as exactly as i can, then cement it in place. i'd then put some strips of the same stuff over the back of the join, again using poly cement - this should give it some extra strength.

Just to complicate matters, you can run v1 on a PIC18F4620...

You can use a wide range of pot values, but most commonly used is 10Kohm. Buttons have no resistance value, but you want momentary, normally open switches. These are the kind where

Sounds pretty cool - are you still shipping PICs with just the bootloader as well? I think that for those of us building our first midibox, it might be useful to know how to upload MIOS...

Right, I know this topic's getting a little old now, but how's this sound... TV resolution, frame rate etc are limited by available memory, and the app to display to a TV takes up most of the rest of the memory leaving no room for anything musical. 1. PIC18F4620 has a lot more memory than the 452, so can this be used for more code / resolution? 2. Could a driver be written that uses the MBHP_TV as a large (G)LCD, running off a second MBHP_CORE? EDIT: I know it annoys people to say this, I know it certainly annoys me, but my programming skills are nowhere near good enough to implement this, I just came up with the idea and thought it best to post it before I forgot..