ris8_allo_zen0

Hi all, for some unknown reasons, my master keyboard only works (i.e. no timeouts, no hanging notes) when the receiver's optocoupler has a ca.700ohm pullup resistor instead of 1.2kohm. I did this on my home-made midi/gameport adapter and now I need to do the same on the core of my MBSID. The component I'm talking about is R6 in the Core schematic. I don't know the electrical effects of this mod, so I'm asking you if I risk something or what else... However, it still reads data from PC correctly. Many thanks!!! Enrico

Hi all! Some months ago I and a friend of mine played a semi-live performance of MBSID in an exam of "audio engineering" - now here's the video bootleg on YouTube! The audio is crappy because of reverb, the melody isn't that much (also the bassline is inaudible) and the drums are in fact looped samples... but we enjoyed a lot and we got the maximum mark (30 cum laude)!! I'm the one on the right messin' around with a step A surface in a cd-player box ( ), while my friend is driving the loop sampler at the PC. The whole song lasts about 4 minutes but the camera ended its memory - we also lost the original files :( That performance was the second part of our work, the first part was to describe the fundamentals of music synthesis, with regard to 8-bit music. Perhaps it was the coolest exam at the Politecnico di Torino :D

I used a double-row header, 10-pin IDC (I found one in an old serial port riser cable). Then I separated each wire and joined both even and odd wires to two separate 5-pin SIL connector. Then, in this Y-shaped cable, I guessed which was the DIN and which was the DOUT :P Best regards, Enrico

Hello, maybe I've not searched very well on the forum, so I couldn't find an answer to my question: if one has an optimized PSU, what about powering the LCD backlight from the unregulated 9V, between the rectifier and the 7809? I don't think the backlight requires stabilized voltage, and this would reduce some heat from the stabilizers... Tell me! Best regards, Enrico

Also my pics were added ;D Flickr is great!

Here is the stuff! Please double/triple/quadruple check the wirings... I take no responsibility if you see some smoke from what you built from this schematic!! Best regards, Enrico psu_bs.zip psu_bs.zip

Hello mat_s, I'm planning to make a schematic for PSU and two banksticks... no DIN, sorry :( and the board layout is quite unusual: it's triangular shaped, but it should be easy to place the components as you need. Is it good the same for you? A question for the others: is it possible to use the Bankstick connector (J4) to also carry power to the Core? The schematic lets me think so, but who knows...

:-[ :-[ :-[ :-[ :-[ :-[ :-[ :-[ :-[ :-[ For the approach I used in the troubleshooting I'd never discover this... I always kept my eyes on solderings, wires and the PDF schematics...

Hello, after *SEVEN* days figuring out what was wrong with my DIN built on protoboard, I discovered the problem: I didn't know, and it wasn't written anywhere (could you confirm it?), that J1 is for INPUT and J2 is for OUTPUT! I'm really stupid for not being able to see such obvious thing, but... IMHO it's not such obvious!! So, is it possible to edit the PDFs of DIN and DOUT schematics to add these texts near J1 and J2? J1 --> INPUT (to Core or lower-numbered DIN/DOUT) J2 --> OUTPUT (to higher-numbered DIN/DOUT if present) Many thanks! :) Best regards, Enrico

Referring to my little experience, you could try to re-design the whole schematic with SMD. But: - need to have good experience and tools for soldering SMD; - replacing components would be extremely difficult, especially if the victims are ICs; - need to find SMD equivalent of all ICs and components. You couldn't find some bigger capacitors; SID has no SMD version, and it's not wise to solder directly on PCB because it's not so easy to find another one if you blow it! - the heat produced is the same; in the small space of an iPod, heat depletion is more difficult; - the PCB must be double-sided to better exploit the space; Has anyone managed to connect an LCD iPod to a microcontroller? I don't think the SID chip and the whole MIDIbox thing was design with power consumption in mind... I'm sorry I'm so pessimistic about your idea, but I think it's VERY difficult to realize and I explained you why. Don't hate me :D I know it's not what you're dreaming, but what do you think about this? http://www.midibox.org/forum/index.php?topic=8416.0 Best regards, Enrico

Now I'm plenty of good names to choose from for this box :P

So, after two nights of work, here's the result!....

Thank you for the good advice Wilba! I've seen your professional layout... great work! nothing compared to mine... I knew what you mean because that's what I planned to do :) So I did... but because of the poor precision of drilling I had to adjust each LED, using the leads on the back side of the veroboard, to let it find the appropriate hole! I did this for an entire row, then fixed the veroboard, solder & cut the leads... a long and patient work, but very satisfactory! Even the grid isn't as bad as I figured... You we're also right about the auto-alignment... I'm proud to have LEDs soldered to perfectly fit on my "errors" :D I'll add the photos in this post when I'll come back home. Best regards! Enrico

I don't know if this is useful to the cause, but in the pattern I can see the truth table of the expression W=A XOR B (where W is 1=working/0=nonworking) In other words, the pot works only when A and B have different levels... I'd say there's a wiring problem between those lines but I can't explain the nature (short? pins swapped with some other pins?)

Thanks TK for the advice. I tried 5 ms, 10 ms, 20 ms... nothing better. The best result I can achieve is to set CS_MENU_USE_DETENTED_ENCODER to 0... not perfect but surely better: 2 or 3 detents to navigate into menus can be confusing, but at least I have no jumps forth and back! Now it's time to try all the other encoders for the other serious problem... I thought it did... well, I had a good chance to know a little more about MIOS code 8)

I managed to solve the checksum errors: suddenly my Midisport Uno adaptor ceased working (strangely, this happened exactly when I tried to upload the modified MIOS). With my old homebuilt MIDI-to-gameport adapter the communication was now OK; however I had to re-burn with the bootloader because it was somewhat corrupt... After all this mess... the encoders (at least the one of the menu, the only currently connected one) behave exactly as before!!!! I'm quite angry.....

I think the first it's the correct one. I'd also say: "Only after you've done the initial hardware checks, and ensured the red and yellow LEDs are off, you can plug the PIC into the socket." It sounds more positive ;)

Hi all, I'm waiting for the last set of components by Mike's shop to have all the stuff needed to complete my "Step C in a candybox" (or "PHAT-BOX-SID" or "Copper Rocher"...). This involves making the modulation matrix. What I can't say is what's easier: to glue each of the LEDs to the surface (bending the 56*2 = 112 legs to make an orthogonal grid) or to solder them in a PCB where the alignment is guaranteed (but height will not as easily)? (note that I've already drilled manually the holes... and they're far than perfectly aligned :( ) Please explain me... thanks! Best regards, Enrico

PANIC!! The 'impossible' happened... I had a look at the MIOS source, found the code that handles the encoders and just added a 'xorlw' to invert data. When I was re-uploading the new code with MIOS Studio, I noticed a checksum error. So I did the upload again, but the errors were more. The more the retries (also starting less than 2 seconds after the upload request), the worse the behaviour. The resulting errors are similar to those of this thread: http://www.midibox.org/forum/index.php?topic=7699.0, with the difference that my board always worked fine until now! Now I see the PIC sending an upload request, then displaying "READY." on the LCD, but it doesn't respond to any MIDI/Sysex event. So I can't upload anything. I don't know whether to re-burn the bootloader (i have to rebuild my DIP40 adaptor) or not... But what makes me worry is WHY all this happened. Bad upload procedure? Bad compile? (I used gpasm on linux with the macro correction script) I'm clueless... Thanks & best regards Enrico

C64 already HAS onboard audio ;D

If I really have to do with inverted levels, I think about three ways to solve this: 1) connect central pin of each encoder to VDD instead of GND --> impossible, I've already soldered them with the LED cathodes which must be connected to GND! 2) modify MIOS to invert all input signals for encoders before using --> working enough to make a "DETENTED3" (or DETENTED_INV ) mode! 3) throw away those encoders and buy new ones --> unsolder, pull, glue, resolder... solution 1 is easier! If there are no other simpler ways, I'd prefer the solution 2: I like to code, and it could be helpful to those who bought the same encoders. Please stop me if there's something like INVERT_ENC_INPUTS to be set somewhere :D That's exactly what I wanted to say :) sorry, my English is far from perfect... Best regards, Enrico

Thank you for all the help! In the wiki I've found no mention of my encoders' model, as the Murphy's law says ;) I've tried all the NON_DETENTED, DETENTED and DETENTED2 modes, but they behave nearly the same (always some glitch). Now I had a further look at the graph and at the one of the datasheet of my encoders, model AER24C24P-S, found here: http://sales.xonelectronics.com/Stock%20Data/p138.pdf... and it looks like it's similar to the DETENTED one, but mirrored upside down. In the datasheet "ON" is up and "OFF" is down, but which are where in the image in the wiki? (please note that IMHO in the datasheet graph the dashed line is for the "click", not for inc/dec) If the levels are inverted as I suspect, this could be the origin of the problem because the "clicks" are supposed by MIOS to be at wrong places, leading to an unstable reading when the encoder is not rotating. Am I right? Excuse me for the many (and maybe unclear) questions... Best regards, Enrico

I removed all encoders and kept just one DIN, the datawheel encoder and four buttons (revert to Step A). Now it seems to work fine, the encoder only skips by +1 or -1 (*), which is not a great problem when sweeping but it is when selecting menu items... can this problem be solved with some configuration values? Uhm, I just discovered the CS_MENU_EncSpeedSet function... should I tweak its constants to try to solve this? When I'll have more time I'll do some other tries with it, as well as with the other buttons/encoders. (*) Maybe because of a poor quality encoder? I got 50 of them on ebay for 46 AU$, and the "ticks" are of different strength: some are so weak to be considered non-detented >:( Best regards, Enrico

Done. All the voltages measured on each chip go no far than 5.02V... What next?

Hello! I've a strange problem using my MBSID step C: the encoders will sometimes skip some values (... 32, 33, 35, 36...), sometimes go back (... 32, 33, 28, 29, 30...). "Less" sometimes, all the interface goes crazy: it's like all the buttons and encoders were pushed/turned randomly in very little time, messing up all my current configuration. And "more less" sometimes this happens for several seconds, until I press something: the effect is quite visually appealing, but perfectly useless... I've made a video during such behaviour, I'll post a link whenever I can. I suppose I have two problems, not just one (one in the encoders and one in the DINs)... but I'm clueless for both! What/where should I check for? Thank you very much for the help!! Enrico