Hi! I'm new here and really psyched about midibox. I've built a core module. In the process, I've had a few firsts: First time etching my own board First time using a microchip pic larger than 16 pins First time trying to load software via MIDI I do, however, have experience soldering, testing, and buying components (which can be a chore). Which is to say, I know what a good solder joint looks like, and I know how to use a volt meter and to test for continuity. I've hit a wall with progress. And I'm hoping that someone might be able to point out something that I missed. Here's my situation: I built the midibox core module, went through the voltmeter tests, which showed me the same voltage at all of the points except on IC1, pins 25 and 26 are "5V when nothing is sent". What does that mean? My readings on those are around .3V dc, when everything When I feed 9v dc from my bench supply to J1, the voltage is 4.9, rather than 5. Does that indicate a problem with the regulator? Or is 10% voltage loss ok? If I put a regulated 5v dc power supply on j2, do I need to desolder/remove the regulator or can I just run a regulated 5vdc feed to it? I've followed the instructions in the asm file in the picstart plus workaround to burn the pic. I intend on making a few Midibox devices so I have purchased 2 4520 and 2 4620 pics. I have a Picstart Plus from 2005. I've updated the OS a few times, so I think its current. I've got the Picstart Plus hooked up via RS232 to my Windows XP machine. I burn 12f629 and 12f683 pics on a daily basis with no problem, so I know that it works in that capacity. I followed the workarounds for changing the end address from 7fff to fff and burned the mios bootloader to the pic. I tried this with the 4520 and the 4620 pic. After testing the voltages, they all matched at the test points except for IC2 25,26. I've hooked up Midi out to the midi in of my keyboard and midi in of the mbhp core modules to the midi out of the keyboard. The keyboard is an m-audio axiom 61 key keyboard. it provides a midi interface via usb. If I plug another keyboard into the midi in port on the axiom keyboard, I see the commands coming from that keyboard. Then I have mios studio open. I set up the routing according to the instructions. In the input monitor, I see commands and notes from the axiom keyboard, but nothing from the bios bootloader. Esentially my problem is that either the bootloader is not loaded on the pic becuase of my picstart plus being funny, or the midi interface isn't letting the sysex messages through. There is, of course, the possibility that my midibox core module wasn't built correctly, but it looks good. :D Should I build a pic burner to use IC-Prog? Can I use IC-Prog with the Picstart plus to avoid the MPLAB programmer workaround? IF so, what programmer should I set it to? I haven't found the answer to this question. Any answers or commentary are welcome.
