c0nsumer

Hmm, thanks for pointing them out to me. London, ON is only about three hours away, but I'd still have them shipped. That said, a quote from them is for about US$50 for five pieces (not counting customs charges, if they are applied) with a bit longer turnaround. I may give them a go for the front panel PCBs, but PCBFABEXPRESS has been pretty reliable thus far. That said, I'm probably going to need a piece with a large cutout for the front panel, and I'm not sure PCBFABEXPRESS can / will do it. First comes the design of it, though. -Steve UPDATE: Their site is a bit odd... fcpcb.com returns nothing but a directory index, although this page supposedly listing the equipment available to them is in there. I can't get a shell right now so I'm unable to dig a bit further, but they look really questionable... Unless something with their online presence changes quite a bit within the next few weeks, I'll probably stick with PCBFABEXPRESS. The risk of not getting my boards / whatever isn't worth the $25 savings.

Lall, Thanks very much. It's coming along nicely... Last night I ordered the remainder of the parts needed to finish building the five boards I ordered. I also placed an order for for the rear panel. It should look like this paper mockup, with only a slight change to the wording. Also, the white angled marks at the top will be cut-out vents. Next comes work on the front panel... This will be interesting. I've got about 147mm x 46mm in which to fit the LCD, five pushbuttons, two LEDs, and a rotary encoder. Plus needing to layer everything nicely so that the pushbuttons stick out far enough, etc. At this point I'm thinking that the front panel PCB will end up being manufactured by PCBFABEXPRESS as well, but at $13/piece(quantity five) the cost rivals the time/materials needed to etch them myself. -Steve

After a few months of on and off work, I'm ready to announce the latest project I've been working on, the MIDIbox SID-NUXX. The MIDIbox SID-NUXX is a single-board MIDIbox SID which has a power supply and the Core, DIN, BankStick, LTC, SID, and IIC_MIDI modules all on one board, along with MIDI jacks, Audio In/Out jacks, power jack and power switch. The board has been designed to either mount via pre-drilled holes or slip cleanly into an aluminum enclosure. (Front and rear panels for the enclosure are still being designed.) All together, this puts everything needed for a PIC18F4620-based MIDIbox SID with hardware MIDI data indicators, eight digital inputs, and patch storage all on a single PCB. All documentation related to this project, including EAGLE files, Gerbers (so one can have their own MIDIbox SID-NUXX boards made), and such is freely available to be used for non-commercial purposes. As an enclosure for the board designed is completed, all information (Front Panel Designer files, cable diagrams, etc) will also be made available. For more information including the aformentioned files, Bill of Materials, LCD cable pinout, etc, take a look at the MIDIbox SID-NUXX page itself. I'll probably also post updates here from time to time, but (of course) if you have any questions about it, don't hesitate to contact me directly. -Steve

TK, Thanks for the final answer. While I don't completely understand your reasons for the decision, I do respect your wishes that these PCBs not be made available for sale. That said, I am continuing to work on this project as I was originally was -- for myself and a couple of friends -- while making all files / documentation available for everyone to use and share. I have also gone ahead and renamed my project to 'MIDIbox SID-NUXX'. I have ordered five PCBs for myself, and once I'm sure they work as desired, I'll make the Gerber/Excellon and Eagle files available so others may make use of them. Hopefully I will have them within two weeks. After I have more documentation / final information available I will start a new thread in the SID portion fo the forum to announce it all and make people aware of its' availablility as a resource. Thus far I am planning on releasing board layouts, case specifications, front / rear panel designs, and all other related documentation. Most of it I just have to finish writing or create. ;) Anyway, thanks for getting the MIDIbox project going, TK. This has definitely been an interesting learning experience, and hopefully by the time I am finished building "my" MIDIbox SID I'll have contribute bits of information to the community which people find useful. -Steve

I have used PCBFABEXPRESS for my original prototype boards and I was really happy with them. As 5-piece quantities for less than 20 square inches they cost around US$13/each. Fot these prototypes I'll probably go with them again. Turnaround from order placement to at-my-doorstep was about 1.5 weeks. If I somehow end up actually needing a large quantity of boards (50 or more) I'll probably go with Advanced Circuits. They have a very good reputation, good prices, and make the boards in the US. I'm also going to look K&F Electronics, but only because they are located about 10 miles from my house. It might be nice to work with someone local. For small runs of personal stuff, though, I would strongly suggest you take a look at PCBFABEXPRESS. I can vouch for their boards being quite nice. I've got some 600dpi scans of my first prototype PCBs here if you want to see. -Steve

Yes, I am using a legal copy of Eagle. I have a license for the non-profit version detailed here. This allows me up to 160mm x 100mm boards. These are actually 159mm x 80mm (to compensate for potential tolerance issues in the enclosure), but that's besides the point. Because of this license I would need to upgrade to a commercial standard license at an additional cost of US$273 if I were to sell the boards for a profit. With this taken into account, it's only after I sold enough boards/kits/whatever with a profit of >$US273 that I would be 'making' anything off of these sales. If you take into account prototype PCBs and such, that break-even point of US$273 goes up even higher. But I'm not counting that. That said, my other option with this license is to simply have a small number of boards made and sell them (with appropriate PICs, most likely, as many people don't have an easy way of programming them) at my precise cost. Thusly there would be no profit, no commercial sales, and I would be complying with the letter of the license. Accepting payment for the PCB+PIC sets via PayPal, I presume I would figure the at-cost price as follows: PCB Cost + Portion Of Overall PCB Shipping Cost + PIC Cost + Portion of PIC Shipping Cost + Packaging Cost + PayPal Fees + Final Postage Cost = Final Price With the aforementioned cost of PICs and PCBs I would see this being somewhere around US$25 + postage. However, I am only likely to offer a small number of these for sale (20 or so). That is because I would want to ensure that *all* of the sets sell, because I do not wish to have money sunk into unused parts just setting around. Perhaps the best way to ensure this would be to ask those interested to pre-order these sets. That way I'm assured that I won't be 'stuck' with unwanted kits. Making a profit isn't a concern, I just do not want to lose money. While I agree that the aforementioned calculation by illogik of the potential profits from the sale of 100 kits sounds good, I question how long it would actually take for one to sell that many kits. While I -- and many others -- think the MIDIbox (and MIDIbox SID) project is great, I'm not sure that there are enough people who would be interested in a kit such as mine to ensure these sales. With an off the top of the head judgement made by reading the MIDIbox SID forum, I would estimate that one or two people begin construction of a MIDIbox SID per week. Presume I had 100 kits available for sale, if every single one of these individuals (based on my estimate) purchased a kit, it would still take 1-2 years to sell through them. So, I guess at this point I'm starting to re-think my whole idea of selling these. I may be interested in selling a very limited number of sets at cost, if there is sufficient interest. But, we'll see... I may also just fall back on my previous idea of having only 5 or so boards made -- the original quantity intended for myself (I want to build 2 or 3 complete devices) and a couple friends who are also interested. By the way, now that the design of the main PCB itself is wrapping up, I've begun thinking about the PCB for the front panel. That is, the one to which the LCD, six pushbuttons, and rotary encoder intended to be used for Step A -- Control Surface. I don't want a full control surface, just something which will allow easy selection of patches via an LCD and such. My current plan is to use this LCD (it arrives tomorrow) with everything situated similar to how TK did it in Step A. There's the chance I may just go with all buttons (instead of a rotary encoder) but that'll be determined sometime later. Anyway, that's where things stand now... TK, if you'd like to discuss this out of a public forum, please feel free to email me at the address listed in my profile. I'm also available most of the time via a variety of instant messangers, which are also listed in my profile. Oh, and illogik, don't worry, I'm very open to whatever comments. I tend to feel 'weird' whenever the idea of making money comes into any project as well. Unfortunately this always comes up when absolutely all of the parts cannot be produced by me, and I need to spend time doing things I rather dislike (packaging / driving to the post office / handling orders) there becomes a desire to make at least a bit of money off the process. If it were just a matter of drawing a PCB, posting it, and everyone could suddenly use it, money wouldn't come up at all. That part I really enjoy doing. -Steve

I understand. I'm learning here as well... That's a big part of this project for me. After reading the datasheet, I decided to go for it. It also allowed me to clear up a few other areas as I shuffled things around. I also went with a ground plane encircling the audio lines as more of a safety measure. I've seen it done on other audio gear, so I put it here as well. To be honest with you, I don't see how the special routing of Vcc, Vdd, and GND could help much, but I figured that it can't hurt. I've also put up yet another version of the image. Provided all the parts footprints check out (they should) and my checking once again (triple? quadruple?) versus the reference schematics is good, this is the layout I'll have made into the prototypes. -Steve

Earler in this thread Wilba suggested that Vcc, Vdd, and GND for the SID be run back to the power supply on their own. Well, this seems a bit silly on this board, but I went ahead and did that anyway. I also added some shielding around the audio lines. To see the current state of the layout (this is likely very, very close to the final one) either check the link above, or here: Small - Large The only thing left to do is validate the physical dimensions of the parts, give everything one last going over, and then I'll order the prototype boards. -Steve

Not to drudge up an old thread, but I was curious if there is a high resolution (and hopefully two-color) version of this logo available? The current one has a good bit of light grey fringing which makes it difficult to use when etching into a front panel or PCB or whatnot. Any format will work... Vector graphics would be especially welcome. Thanks! -Steve

Thanks very much. I won't be able to have the layout and part footprints validated before then (Mouser order arrives on Wednesday) so this should work out very well. -Steve

Thorsten, I fully understand these concerns. As such, I'd like to explain how I came up with the estimated US$100 figure. First, here are my rough costs: All on-board parts from Mouser: US$35 - US$38, depending on if I order enough parts for 50 or 100 kits. I'll include the BOM in an attachment. Wall Wart Power Supply from Jameco: ~US$4.50 PCB: US$9 - US$12 (after tooling charge), depending on 50 or 100 boards ordered. (Double sided, with soldermask and silkscreen, 160mm x 80mm, non-leaded solder. Using a soldermask color other than green would increase this cost US$1.50 - US$2/board.) Packaging (anti-static bags, plastic bags, box, chip tubes, etc): I'm guessing this will total US$3 - US$4 per kit. Postage from vendors to me for all aforementioned parts: An estimated US$2 - $3 per kit. As you can see, my total cost per unit would be somewhere around US$60. With the time I would spend putting in programming the PICs, kitting the parts, re-shipping them, and simply handling the order, I do not feel that this is an unreasonable markup. My understanding is that markup for electronics kits is typically greater than 100%, and this is far below that. However, there is another option which I am beginning to think would be better for everyone involved. That is, I could simply produce and sell the PCBs along with a programmed PIC16F88 and bootstrapped PIC18F4620. In quantities of 50 the cost would be around US$10 (plus a bit for postage) for the PICs. Board cost would be the same as above. Then, along with all the other documentation, I would just provide a parts list individuals could use to order the components themselves from either Mouser or whatever other vendor they prefer to use. After checking SmashTV's site, I see that the total for one each of the Core, DIN, LTC, and SID modules (PCBs only, not kits) and a PIC18F452 is US$31.95. Additionally, my board / PIC set includes the newer (and more expensive) core PIC (via Mouser the PIC18F4620-I/P costs US$1.50 more than the PIC18F452-I/P), a PIC16F88 (cost at Mouser of $2.60), and the IIC_MIDI module (for which a pre-made board currently is unavailable). Combine this with the simplified assembly, I feel that a price of around US$35 for my PCB and programmed 18F4620 and 16F88 PICs would be in line with the spirit of name MIDIbox SID-LC -- a "low-cost MIDIbox SID". While writing this reply, I've come to believe that it would be in the best interest of everyone involved (you, those purchasing the kits, and myself) if I were to produce and sell just the PCBs with the two programmed PICs. I see the following as some of the additional benefits from my sale of PCB+PICs sets as opposed to full kits: I do not have to invest almost US$3000 to initially make the kits available. Individuals purchasing the PCBs will see a lower overall cost because I wouldn't be spending time kitting the parts. Individuals not wishing to use all aspects of the board may choose to leave some parts out. I would envision parts such as those needed for the LCD display, MIDI LEDs, and DINX1 being left out by some. This would lower the overall cost even further. Individuals in areas which don't use 60Hz/~110VAC will not end up with an unneeded wall-wart power supply. Greatly decreased packaging costs. I could likely reuse all antistatic packaging from original parts shipment, and packaging for PCB and chip tubes would be < US$1. Lower postage costs (and potentially lower customs charges) to ship from myself to individual purchasers. So, Thorsten, may I ask your opinion of this new idea for me to sell just a PCB and pre-programmed PICs for around US$35? Also, is the MIDIbox-related labeling / copyright notice on the proposed PCBs acceptable to you? If these PCBs are produced, it will generally read as follows: [tt]MIDIbox SID-LC ©2006 T.Klose // ©2006 S.Vigneau www.midibox.org // www.nuxx.net v1.0[/tt] Thanks again. I look forward to your response. -Steve bom_for_mouser.txt bom_for_mouser.txt

Okay, I just worked up the BOM and ordered a set of parts for final confirmation of sizes before ordering the prototype boards. Based on my calculations the kits will likely cost around US$100 plus postage (should be cheap). The complete kit will include: PCB All board-mounted components Turned-Pin Sockets All ICs Parts to support either an 6581 or 8580 SID Wall-wart type power supply (110VAC) Programming of PIC16F88 (IIC_MIDI) and PIC18F4620 (MIOS Bootstrap) So, now I'm just waiting for the parts to arrive from Mouser to I can confirm the footprints, finalize the layout, and order the prototype boards. TK, if I may ask, what are your thoughts on this project / sale request as it stands now? Is there any more information I can provide to you? Thanks... -Steve

Thank you. :) Ground is currently being handled by a ground plane on the top of the board. I generally leave this out of exported images for clarity. I may still add some extra ground runs around the audio in/out on the bottom of the board (or possibly another ground plane there) but that's still up in the air. I see what you are saying about the Vcc, Vdd, and GND specs in the 6581's datasheet. I need to think about this a bit... I'm not sure that running this as separate traces will be that useful. For what it's worth, my routing of these lines is quite similar to that done by both TK and SmashTV, and neither of these boards have issues. Also, there's no mini-amp in there. If you are talking about the extra circuitry on the output, that's to keep the SID from being cooked accidently if fairly hot audio is accidently fed into the Audio Out.

Thanks, that's good to hear. The reason I'm thinking of doing full parts kits is because everyone will need a programmed PIC16F88 and a PIC18F4620 bootstrapped for IIC_MIDI. Since most people don't have PIC programmers, I figured at least these chips have to be provided. Since the power supply is built on the board here, there's really no way to leave that out. It'd just be fed from a wall wart. Oh, for what it's worth, I'm in the Detroit area. I'm going to try and work up some pricing today, so hopefully I'll have a rough estimate of full-kit costs today. -Steve

Thank you. If I do, I'll be sure to make enough that there are plenty to go around... Just curious, would you be more interested in purchasing just a PCB, or a whole kit? Currently I'm thinking that kits would sell best... As far as noise goes, the design is similar to the previous prototype I made. That is, except for crossing themselves at one point, absolutely nothing else crosses the audio lines. You can see this cross-over the 300 dpi view of the board at R28 just above the AUDIO_IN jack. The only noise I've heard thus far is the standard SID bug where one can hear the VCA (I believe) when the levels are turned up rather high. As expexted, this is more pronounced in the 6581 than the 8580. If you are interested, I've posted a recording of the Airwolf theme played via ASID XP and the MIOS sidplayer app over here: sid_airwolf_clip.mp3. This is with a MOS 6581 CBM as seen here. Oh, yeah... The BankSticks. The current plan (and layout) is for it to support one Microchip 24LC256 (standard bankstick). A four-pin header (called J4A) will allow one to connect up to seven more banksticks. I would envision this being done (if the user desires it) with a board similar the one laid out by Mike which can be seen on the MBHP BankStick page. I'll probably lay out something like this out and post it with the other docs for the board. That is, a board which could plug in to the MIDIbox SID-LC board and nestle nicely amongst the other components. That way if someone wants one, they can make one... Hope that answers your questions... -Steve

In case anyone is interested, I'm back working on this project after a bit of a break. My first prototype boards arrived and everything is now working great. I've finished a first draft of the layout for what I hope will be sold as either kits or stand-alone PCBs. After I'm happy with this layout, I'll order another 5 boards. If these check out, I still have the motivation, and TK is fine with it all, I'll probably go ahead from there. Just so everyone knows, this is everything needed for a single-SID MIDIbox SID with a Step A control surface (up to 8 buttons and an LCD). That is, it's the MIDIbox Core, SID, LTC (LEDs only), DINX1, IIC_MIDI, and Bankstick modules, with headers for adding more DIN/DOUT/Bankstick modules and an LCD. There is also an ICSP header for the core PIC. This board is designed to be used with a PIC18F4620, and thusly it uses the IIC_MIDI module / software for MIDI out. Oh, and a power supply which expects ~12VAC or ~15VDC. For good measure I also made all the headers pin-compatible with SmashTV's boards. A PNG showing the this draft is available here: Small - 300dpi The board is currently 160mm x 80mm and is designed to slide right into a Hammond 1455T1601 (warning: PDF) enclosure. (Actually, it'll fit right into any of Hammond's 6.30" wide enclosures... But I digress...) Anyway, that's it for now. I thought you all may be interested in an update of where this Proposal / Sale Request stands. -Steve

No, this will be done on my own. I'm just taking a short break from the project for a vacation and the time needed to get ready. I should have more info in the first week of May... And yes, my current design is to have all the DIN/DOUT headers, the LCD header, and even a 8-input digital input (DINX1) on the board as well. This is because I want to stick the board in a small enclosure with an LCD and two buttons for switching patches. I'm wanting this to be very usable live, but without making a whole control surface. -Steve

Ah, okay. Thanks. I am hoping to allow people to connect LCD displays to the board, but hopefully it won't be much of a problem. Due to cost I'm trying to avoid the use of a switching power supply, nor do we have access to any C64 supplies. I'll just continue going down the path I've been with the separate regulators running off of whatever the DC input ends up being. Thank you. :) -Steve

In the MIDIbox SID implementation I'm working on, I'm using ~15VAC, rectifying it with four 1N4004 diodes, and feeding it to a LM7805 and LM7812. As you can imagine, the LM7805 gets quite hot while running. I've got heatsinks a heatsink on it, but this still doesn't seem ideal. As a solution, I was thinking of running the LM7805 off of the output of the LM7812. Is there some reason I'm not yet understanding why this would be a bad idea? Or, is there a better way to provide both 12VDC and 5VDC off of a single supply? Thanks! -Steve

Thanks for the link, that'll likely prove useful. -Steve

Eh, the problem is more that I thought I could also use it for the MIDI input... But I can't. The other problem I'm having is that it seems that MIDI IN is stuck on, and I'm not sure why. Output from the 6N138 (on pin 6) is *always* ~5VDC, and I'm not certain why. My layout matches the MBHP_CORE schematic, so maybe I have a bad 6N138? I also noticed that pin 7 on the 6N138's I see in other designs floating around the internet have pin 7 left floating or tied to ground with a 10K resistor, where MBHP_CORE uses a 5.6K. So, I'm not sure what's going on yet... I'll poke at it more either tonight or tomorrow once I'm home. Oh, the reason I think that MIDI IN is stuck on is because when attempting to flash the PIC using MIOS Studio, all I ever see are the same-old SYSEX messages from the core, and nothing I send to it seems to work. Since I don't see the MIDI IN line (to RX on the PIC) bouncing around between 5V and 0V, I'm pretty certain this is where my problem lies.

By the way, thanks for the help on this. Turns out the problem was one cooked IC and my failing to solder the socket on the top side of the board. (Double-sided home-made PCB.) That's what I get for trying to work on this while half asleep...

It's embarassing, but I'm realizing that I screwed up the first design of my boards. Based on this thread I figured it was 'proper' to use IIC_MIDI for both MIDI in and out. Well, after building the hardware and having things not work, I went digging and came to the realization which prompted the previous question. By the way, thanks for clearing that up, TK... It's only a single jumper wire fix, but it's still frustrating, regardless. Ah well, at least I'm learning things as I go along...

This is probably a stupid question, but I can't seem to find a specific answer, and reading the MIOS v1.9 source isn't leading me to the answer I'm looking for. Am I reading things wrong, or am I correct in my (new-found) belief that IIC_MIDI cannot currently be used for MIDI input? That is, that input still must be handled by the core's USART and only output can use IIC_MIDI? And if I'm correct on that, may I ask if there are plans to change MIOS itself so that it may be wholly bootstrapped via IIC_MIDI? Thanks very much... -Steve

Hehe, thanks. :) Those will definitely be socketed. I'm really not sure where I went wrong, because this is the first time I've ever fried an IC. I feel like quite a fool for it. I've mounted and desoldered plenty of parts in the past without problem, too. Maybe I accidently heated the parts for too long while soldering the top side of the board. (Yes, I'd made a quickly laid out double-sided board because I had the material and was being lazy.) I'm really not sure why it happened. Ah well, I'll be certain to be more careful about about it in the future, and maybe socket more things... Ah well... I should have the replacements on Friday. The prototype PCBs are coming Thursday, so everything seems like it's going ahead...