c0nsumer

How about moving the wiki to MediaWiki so it supports more formatting tags? There's also a script which comes with it which will allow one to easily dump the whole thing to static HTML. Also, MediaWiki seems to run considerably faster than dokuwiki. -Steve

Oh, heh. For what it's worth, the desktop enclosure I'm looking at for the 9090 is something like $85 just for the metal box. :( That thing is going to be a bugger to assemble. -Steve

Just as another follow-up, look at this and you can see why I didn't want to try making my own panel. -Steve

Unfortunately I'm earning them and paying off a house and such. I really should buy gold or GBP, though... Thank you. I'm hoping to have a lot more of it finished tonight. Possibly even the entire thing, except for inserting a few ICs. -Steve

Enclosure, wood end cheeks, custom etched keycaps, and tactile switches. In the end it's costing me about the same to build a P3 as buying one new, but... ah well. It's a very nice enclosure, and I figured i twould cost about $220 - $230 to have a panel made from Front Panel Express, and it's worth the other $200 for the remainder of the parts. Making a nice box itself would be a bit of a hassle, and the whole thing would be challanging to label without the etched keycaps. I could possibly have done it differently, but at this point I just wanted to get it done. Photos of it (up to the point I stopped at last night) are here. I've got most of the boards populated, and I should have a Mouser order waiting for me at home which contains the remaining parts for it. -Steve

You've got the advantage of a weak US dollar right now. I just purchased a P3 enclosure which was $420 or so, shipped from Scotland.

Isolation transformers are generally pretty large. Read up on them. You may want to get a power conditioner if your power is really odd.

Well, there's the first layout. As soon as I validate that the schematic matches the one here and everything makes sense, I'll order the first run of boards. I'm only getting five and two are already called for, so if you want one, let me know soon. Oh, I guess these will also work in an SK-5. -Steve UPDATE: Updated to be the new, and likely final, layout.

Huh. Why not just use an isolation (1:1) transformer? You can find plenty of info about them in audio circles, and probably find one for cheap, maybe even in a scrap yard. -Steve

I just have to ask... Why?

Mouser will ship to Europe. Or just hop on eBay and buy a load of computer power supply cables. I generally pay about US$1/ea, and shipping shouldn't be too much. -Steve

If you just sent a program change the MIDIbox SID, by default, changes patches. Unless you have multiple banks you won't have to do anything special. -Steve

Are any of you interested in a PCB for adding MIDI to a Casio SK-1, as described here? I had originally etched my own board for this, but it was being a bit of a pain (fine traces, double sided, etc) so I'm instead going to lay out a new one and have some boards produced. I'm curious if anyone else would like one of these boards. Cost will be about $15/each. You'll have to source your own parts (I'll post a BOM) and trim the board to fit, but it should work just fine. I think the total price for the parts on the BOM will be somewhere around US$25. I think. -Steve

Check resistor values. I made a stupid mistake once and put a 5R6 in instead of a 5K6, and thusly the MIDI IN line to the PIC stayed at a solid 5V. -Steve

Yeah, because the shape of electronic instruments defines what they make. < sigh > -Steve

Well, I only made five, and the released gerbers and such (for public use) will be corrected. The problem is that the switches are essentially rotated 90 degrees. It's fixable by lifting a total of six traces and isolating six ground pads with a small grinding tip. Not hard, just frustrating. -Steve

One, Matrix Orbital displays typically have an extra PCB attached to the rear of them which convert a RS232 signal into HD44780. In order to do what you need, you'll need to come up with a device to take the HD44780 signals from the Core, convert it to the serial protocol which Matrix Orbital displays expect, and output it to an RS232 port. Then you could connect the Palm to that. Personally, I don't think that route is the best idea, especially as you'd probably want five to eight buttons as well. -Steve

For what it's worth, I regularly use a MIDIsport 2x2 under Windows XP and OS X with my MIDIbox SID and it works very well. There isn't much to say about it, really. The device just works. -Steve

The ammo case thing has been done for a while. But with the right case and some good design it could make for a nice plugboard-type modular / road case all in one. -Steve

The Palm III doesn't run Java. As the serial port isn't connected directly to the touchpad there will need to be some software running on the Palm which converts the input on the touchscreen to the serial MIDI stuffs described on the MIDIbox to COM page. In my opinion this is a poor way to go about implementing a touchpad. Too much overhead and work needed just to repurpose an existing device. -Steve

Have you started on the software for the Palm to support this? If so, do you mind sharing it? -Steve

I'm glad to hear that. :) I still think Dremel / drill + files are the best way to go for most people needing square holes. Nibblers will bend thin stock and don't always make smooth lines. In my experience they still require filing, if not re-flattening of the stock. -Steve

Thank you. Too bad the board is wrong. Despite triple-checking things, I somehow got the pinning of the switches off by 90°. It's fixable, but still frustrating. -Steve

Thanks. It was designed that way. The final one (with that faceplate) will have slightly dimmer LEDs. The resistors in place with those are intended to be used with some diffuse red LEDs which are a bit darker. Also, due to my misunderstanding the switches (although I thought I triple-checked it), the current front panel PCB isn't right. That has to be fixed as well. However, things are seeming to work out exactly how I intended it. That is, I end up with some MIDIbox SID's and everyone else gets enough plans / details that they can easily duplicate the work. -Steve

Thanks. And no, it's just a cheap Radium 49... Both side and knob-type pots to send various MIDI bits. I don't have them set up to send anything yet, though. I'm more concerned with getting the MIDIbox SID-NUXX going first. -Steve