Ixox

I made some progress... Here is the final control surface before lazertran transfer. To clean the 3mm and 4mm wholes, i used my drilling machine with a 9mm screw (not sure about the word), and i drill very slowly and carefully just to remove the dirty aluminium surplus around the wholes... (I pushed harder on the wholes for the screw to make a kind of screw shape appear). It worked rather well. (Sorry for my foot..... :-[ ;D ) Waiting for the varnish to dry on the surface and for the paint to dry on the case. (Next time i will use varnish spray... My brush was to big and leave some very little bubbles and some print.) Here is the control surface. I cut the lazertran to make the whole between the 2 coats of varnish... The paper was hard enough to be cut propely and the second coat make every thing looks cleaner. And the whole set... I'm waiting for some 2,5mm screw to be able to fix the LCD. I now have to drill the case and screw all the PCBs inside (and may be fill the 2 empty 24C256 places.) And it will be finished..... Xavier

Yes it is possible. Nothing special to do. Put one core, one sid module and all the required DIN and DOUT. The Link button as well as SID1, SID2,SID3 and SID4 buttons will not be very usefull, but you'll need them if you upgrade later. And yes it makes sense. Less voices but full control. Xavier

Thanks Thorsten for the advice. I have begun the main row code... I will keep both assign rows and i added even an empty one... The new register has its 8 bits used..... ;) I have the code working for the MOD (reduced matrix) that you saw above. That was interesting to do : I learnt how the FSR* registers mechanism of the PIC (to light the leds). Up and down buttons OK... (To bad there were not a ready to use CS_MENU_ButtonDec beside CS_MENU_ButtonInc...) This is i think an interesting cutdown version of the full matrix.That may interest some. I'll publish all my modifications later. Xavier

It took me some time to understand the encoder/function link. But i think what you are looking for is in cs_menu_enc.inc and the function is called CS_MENU_ENC_CS_Handler. The information it gets is the encoder line number in the mios_tables.inc or something like that. Hope that helps... At least that allow me modify some encoder behaviour. Xavier

A variation easier to build, and with room for more evolution. Any opinion on which one is better and why ? UPDATED : i really think the second one is the one to go... Xavier

Sorry but it's hard to understand what you want.... That may be why you have no answer. I modifed some encoder functions and have explaind some code modification in : http://www.midibox.org/forum/index.php?topic=7233.0 Read the last post... For each could you explain the difference between what you'd like to have and the reference design ? Xavier

Thanks Jaicen. I have an other control surface idea which will be even simpler to make : No more left part... (Are the leds really usefull when you can read the LCD ? I may keep the filter leds however...) And 3 buttons in column (exactly like the knobs) whose action depend on the current row. (choice of the item number, of the wav type, and the third for ring/sync for OSC.) LFO and Filter will have each his own row. I'll try to make a drawing tonight. Do i need the 2 Assign# rows ? What are they usually used for ? I may keep one... Does it have to be OSC or ENV related ? That would require : 2 dout + J5... including 2 assign# rows,the filter leds, CC and Edit. Still 5 Din... 33 inputs... If the matrix have only a down arrow, that would require onlyt 4 dins....Maybe interesting...

Yes i'll buy the 18F4620 as soon as the V2 is available.... and as soon as i'm sure i get a EUSART bug free one. In the meantime if i cannot get some memory from the Mios i could get some from the SID programm... (matrix, Master/Slave 26Kb inc file and aout). But i'm not sure i'll need much free memory, the matrix arrows when pressed will show the same as the "Mod" menu. Anyway... I'll have to test before keep on talking without knowing (i speak about me).... ;) Thanks Xavier

Hi Thorsten and thanks for the answer, I've always thought the all STEP B buttons was only for multiple SIDs box.... I've never read this page before.... :-[ Yes i have space beside the matrix for that... Keytracking ? I'll try to find out what it is ! I had in mind to remove some drivers from the MIOS. Graphic LCD, Ain, iic... Will that free some memory or is the SID program always loaded at the same adress (and the free space will so remain the same) ? (that question may show that i didn't understand very well how the bootloader/PIC works...). Xavier

After modifying the code to be able to control the LFO and the Filter with the same knobs/button like shown at the bottom of : http://www.midibox.org/forum/index.php?topic=7233.0 I had the idea to do this surface control in the same box model : (UPDATED : see below for next evolutions) (Black circle are buttons/encoder and red/yellow are leds...) 5 dout + 5 din + J5 enabled for some leds. Does enabling J5 have side effect ? The bottom part with the 6 yellow leds will have one led lighted and will show the row that the knobs will control. Pushing the up/down buttons will change the row and will allow to quickly switch from a control to an other. The left part is, i think, exactly the same as the original design. Before going further, just wanted to check i didn't forgot important controls... Or miss something. The box has 1 SID inside. The code i'm not sure with is to control the matrix like the picture shows.... Don't know if i'll have to write much stuff. The idea is to read the matrix row name on the LCD. Idea, suggestion ? Xavier

Every thing seem to fit rather well :) I leave the protection film and drew on it where to make the wholes. I drilled with the film on. I used a dremel little drill machine with a vertical column support. 2 things i noticed. - The surface is nicer on the side you drill. So drill on the front face of the surface. - I used medium/slow turn speed and i push down the maching rather slowly. The last wholes i made are muche better than the first ones which were done on the backside and and with high speed. Current design done with The Gimp.... my lazertran paper is waiting.... Remarks or suggestions are welcome, Xavier

Hello, First thanks again to Thorsten (and the other who helped him in any way) to make this midibox possible. Here are some pictures of my Midibox FM. I find pictures blogs very interesting and some of them very usefull to build my midibox. I like thinking this one may be usefull for some. All Parts are working. I played a little (without box it's not as fun as with) with the matrix and the 4 controlers and that made many controls very quickly reachable... This matrix is a very good idea. I add a 5th DIN to have the 4 OP and 4 Instruments buttons available independently. I found the idea in this thread ( http://www.midibox.org/forum/index.php?topic=4940.0 ) All PCBs are from SmashTV. First the PSUs... One wall adapter without the plastic (8,2V 600mA) and one made from Throsten pdf... The transformer is a 2x15V AC that's why i put a 7915 and a 7815 before the 7912 and 7812. I dont know exaclty the consequences of that but that works. (The 7912 refused to work without.. The input voltage is about 26V DC when no current is produced). First the core, the 4x20 LCD and the back side connections to the Opl3 module. The Opl3 Module... the DIN4, DOUT4 and the additionnal DIN and the bank eeproms. The 3rd DOUT has the ouput connector to the matrix rows. The Matrix : The Operators/instruments selector : The 8 select button, escape, config and main encoder. The 4 encoders : Now i have to build the box... I'm afraid the matrix will be hard to put inside... I'll see.... Xavier

Realy realy beautifull !!!! :o Bravo Ludo ! Looking at mine just after made me laugh (a good laugh)... ;) Xavier

Thanks Thorsten, I had to install the sdcc kit for that but that was interesting... The main.c skeleton looks great... The C functions seem to be very documented (like the rest of the project).. I found how to select the bankstick in 10 seconds... In the init() the function did not exit from the loop (!!!)... I may have uploaded something wrong. But void DISPLAY_Init(void) __wparam { unsigned int addr; MIOS_LCD_Clear(); MIOS_LCD_CursorSet(0x00); MIOS_LCD_PrintCString("Formating... "); MIOS_BANKSTICK_CtrlSet(0x01); for(addr=0; addr<32768; ++addr) { MIOS_BANKSTICK_Write(addr, 0x00); } MIOS_LCD_CursorSet(0x00); MIOS_LCD_PrintCString("Finished...."); } did exactly what i wanted... Now my MidiboxSID have again its 2 * 24C256.... :) Xavier

OK based on 1.7303b source code... First adding the LFO/Filter state into the programm... app_define.h line 169... Thorsten left some value specialy for that kind of customization.... :) CS_MENU_SELECTED_FILTERLFO EQU 0x069 Then cs_menu_led.inc line 177 (after the TMP5[4..0] part). ;; TMP5[6..7]: selected Filter or LFO movf CS_MENU_SELECTED_FILTERLFO, W call MIOS_HLP_GetBitORMask swapf WREG, F rlf WREG, F rlf WREG, W andlw 0xc0 iorwf TMP5, F I choose bit 6 and 7 to copy and past the code from "TMP2[6..7]: selected ENV Ctrl. " So i had nothing to code... This part is a little obscure for me. Don't know exaclty what it is for.. The 2 only encoders i have declared in mios_table.inc : ;; additional CS encoders ;; SR Pin Mode ENC_ENTRY 2, 4, MIOS_ENC_MODE_DETENTED2 ; Filter CutOff / LFO RATE ENC_ENTRY 2, 6, MIOS_ENC_MODE_DETENTED2 ; Filter Resonance / LFO DEPTH ENC_EOT Now the din entry in menu_io_table.inc after CS_MENU_BUTTON_Env_Ctrl : DIN_ENTRY CS_MENU_BUTTON_LfoFilter_Ctrl, 2, 2 SR 2 pin 2 was one of the 2 DIN i had left. The dout in still in menu_io_table.inc ;; Register and bit SR# Pin# Description DOUT_ENTRY TMP3, 0, 1, 0 ; Filter O1 LED DOUT_ENTRY TMP3, 1, 1, 1 ; Filter O2 LED DOUT_ENTRY TMP3, 2, 1, 2 ; Filter O3 LED DOUT_ENTRY TMP3, 3, 1, 3 ; Filter Ext LED DOUT_ENTRY TMP3, 4, 1, 4 ; Filter LP LED DOUT_ENTRY TMP3, 5, 1, 5 ; Filter BP LED DOUT_ENTRY TMP3, 6, 1, 6 ; Filter HP LED DOUT_ENTRY TMP3, 7, 1, 7 ; Filter 3O LED DOUT_ENTRY TMP5, 6, 0, 1 ; LFO MODE I remove all SR0 pin0 to avoid side effect with the J5 driver enabled. in cs_menu_enc_in replace the current CS_MENU_ENC_CS_Handler function by (That part won't work if you have other control than the filter... It considers you only have the filter !!). CS_MENU_ENC_CS_Handler ;; move incrementer to MIOS_PARAMETER3 movff MIOS_PARAMETER2, MIOS_PARAMETER3 movf MIOS_PARAMETER1, W addlw 0x0f IFSET CS_MENU_SELECTED_FILTERLFO, 0, goto CS_MENU_ENC_CS_Cont addlw 0x02 in cs_menu_butttons.inc add after the CS_MENU_BUTTON_Env_Ctrl function the new following one heavily inspired by CS_MENU_BUTTON_Env_Ctrl : CS_MENU_BUTTON_LfoFilter_Ctrl ;; do nothing if button has been depressed IFSET MIOS_PARAMETER2, 0, return ;; else increment FILTERLFO Ctrl parameter incf CS_MENU_SELECTED_FILTERLFO, F movlw 0x01+1 IFGEQ CS_MENU_SELECTED_FILTERLFO, ACCESS, clrf CS_MENU_SELECTED_FILTERLFO IFSET CS_MENU_SELECTED_FILTERLFO, 0, goto CS_MENU_BUTTON_LfoFilter_Ctrl_LFO movlw CS_MENU_FIL ; menu structure goto CS_MENU_EXEC_Hlp_ChangeMenu ; deselect parameter CS_MENU_BUTTON_LfoFilter_Ctrl_LFO movlw CS_MENU_LFO ; menu structure goto CS_MENU_EXEC_Hlp_ChangeMenu ; deselect parameter I think that's all i've changed in the code. Was fun to dig into this assembly :) I plan to have a other cleaner version of my box with the LFO and Filter leds like this : the code will be exaclyt the same, i just have to add a DOUT. Thanks for the nice words ! Xavier

Hello, It seems that a FM Box reformat correctly a SID FM bankstick although the contrary is not possible. The SID freeze (each time at the same pach) and reboot when trying to reformat a 24LC256s formatted by a FM. Is it something known ? Is there a way to totally reset a 24C256 ? Thanks for the answers, Xavier

Thanks a lot ;D But no it's not very well done !!! ;) This is my first DIY project and i made all the possible mistakes... Adding the filter section is very easy, just modify the pin assignent... (I modify some code but it's not required as far as i understood... The modifications are the end of that : http://www.midibox.org/forum/index.php?topic=7451.0 ) For my control surface i have 2 DIN and 1 DOUT. (+ 1 J5 pin in the last version). I added a little nice feature last night to my Midibox, a button to switch all the filter controlers to LFO ones (I realized they both have 2 knobs and 2 buttons). Just press the little button under the ugly LFO text and the cutoff controls the LFO rate, the resonnance the LFO depth, the oscillator button controls the LFO nuber and the filter type the LFO wave (The leds still show the filter state... ).. press again and you're back to normal filter mode... very usefull. That's possible thanks to Thorsten code which is very very very well documented. Thanks Thorsten for that !!!! :-* I was lazy the other day and i had 2 CD pens near me : My midibox FM which already sounds will be nicer, i promise ! Xavier

This is strange... The problem seemed to come from my (steel) knobs that were in contact with the encoder. Perhaps, that turned the signal into something the core did not like. I left 1 or 2 mm between both and every thing works like a charm... Took me 2 houres to find that out !! For those who are interested i changed some code to have only the 2 filter encoders from StepC on my front face... mios_tables.inc ;; additional CS encoders ;; SR Pin Mode ENC_ENTRY 2, 4, MIOS_ENC_MODE_DETENTED2 ; Filter CutOff ENC_ENTRY 2, 6, MIOS_ENC_MODE_DETENTED2 ; Filter Resonance ENC_EOT ENC_EOT ENC_EOT.... The adress of these encoders changed so I also had to modify CS_MENU_ENC_CS_Handler in cs_menu_enc.inc : ;; -------------------------------------------------------------------------- ;; CS Encoder Handler ;; IN: encoder number (-1) in MIOS_PARAMETER1 ;; incrementer in MIOS_PARAMETER2 ;; NOTE: the menu encoder will not be counted as encoder #0 here to avoid ;; problems with the INCDEC_BUTTONS option ;; -------------------------------------------------------------------------- CS_MENU_ENC_CS_Handler ;; move incrementer to MIOS_PARAMETER3 movff MIOS_PARAMETER2, MIOS_PARAMETER3 movf MIOS_PARAMETER1, W addlw 0x11 CS_MENU_ENC_CS_Cont ... Regards, Xavier

Updated with informations found on the forum : I should have begun by that..... :-[ "Is MIOS_ENC_MODE_DETENTED2 OK with Voti encoders ? " Yes : http://www.midibox.org/forum/index.php?topic=2615.0 "I let the current numbers which are SR that i don't have (3 and more) except the filter cutOff and Res. that i put on SR 2.. Is it OK ?" No : some people set SR and Pins to "0" but it seems better to remove not used encode entry and put a ENC_EOT at the end.... I'll try that tomorrow.... Regards Xavier

Hello, I've finished my midibox a few days ago, and i started playing with it. It does not work properly. If i turn the filter encoders (resonnance, cutoff) or oscillators (atk, dec...) while playing a note. The sound stops... not at once.. I can play with the filter during a few second then it stops. If i don't turn anything i can play all the presets without problem. Then i have to return to the main menu and change the patch to have it working again. Does any one have an idea ? I wired a Dout *1 and a Din*2 on a vector board ? Can the problem come from a shortcut or something ? I only have the filter part on the front face... what am i supposed to set as SR and pin in "mios_tables.inc" for the other encoders ? I let the current numbers which are SR that i don't have (3 and more) except the filter cutOff and Res. that i put on SR 2.. Is it OK ? Is MIOS_ENC_MODE_DETENTED2 OK with Voti encoders ? Thanks for the answers, Regards, Xavier

Thanks again TK and the others who worked to make this possible. :) My box is finished and contains what i wanted. - one SID - 2 banks - Control surface step A + filter - PSU included and a on/off switch. I made all the possible mistakes while making the control surface... The worst one was i understand after having drilling all the big holes why it was so hard and so long : my machine turned in the wrong direction..... An other one can be seen, the filter in inverted !!!! that was not a choice.... ::) It's far from being the nicest one arround here but i did it, it's mine and i love it !!!! Here are the final pictures : Now i have to work on the FM box... Thanks again !!! Xavier

Thanks Thorsten... I did not post the back side of my proto board to make people think it's clean ;) Xavier

Still a lot of work to do, but here is some new pictures... A home-made proto board which contains 2xDin + 1xOut + 1 bankstick... (I'll add an an other bankstick) The power supply... The big one for the core 9V 560mA and the little one for the SID 12V 170mA. Every thing fit well in the little box. Controle surface step A ready.... and working Bankstick recognized, formated and ready to be filled... Thanks again for this great project....LOTS OF FUN..... ;D

Thanks... ;D Puddingbrumsel, i'm trying to switch to Sonar (after more than 3 years of use) because Tracktion does not work properly with my AMD X2 3800. But for simple stuff such as trying my MIDIBox SID, Tracktion is perfect... Wilba, yest it works...

Hello, First thanks a million TK and others for this great forum and these fantastic DIY projects. I introduce myself now even if i already posted my first stupid question and one or 2 other posts. My name is Xavier I live in Paris. I'm a software engineer and make some music, not very often currently. Some stuff i made (music and VST plugins) can be found here : http://ixox.net I gather some pieces from all over the world (Australia for the SID, USA for the PCBS (SmashTV), nederland, france) to build a Midibox SID. I got my first sound tonight so i thought it's time to post some pictures. I have in mind to build a mono SID synth with a "custom" Control surface, that would be like step A + the filter part of step 3. I love when others do it... So here are my pictures (even if most of the pictures i saw are much more impressive than mine). The 2,5 Euros (8V 600mA) Wall adapter i found. Here it is outside its plastic box... I may change it for a clean transformer. The parts... One side of the nice SamshTV core PCB. The other... The 6$ LCD from SmashTV... With its cable. MIOS uploaded... I didn't take pictures during the soldering of the SID. But here it finished. It is powered by its own transformer. My first sound... Emotion.... ;D http://xhosxe.free.fr/pic/SID/Ixox_SID.mp3 I think now the quickest part is done. I have to plug a bank stick, build the control surface and a nice box for this... Thanks again for these projects, I'll try to update this thread when i have more things to show. Xavier