Buying a Midibox sid?

[Olorin]

Hi.

Not sure this is the right place for this thread but it seems less wrong than the other forums.

By chance I stumbled upon a midibox sid for sale. Never heard of it before but it seems way cooler and more to my liking than Sidstation. I have now been reading a few threads about is and understand that this is a non profit project and you are if you excuse me a bit fundamentalistic about it. So I wonder - will you accept a person that has bought his unit in your forums and help out if(heaven forbid) it will be defective or need repairs one day?

To the obvious question - why don't you build one on your own - my answer is. I want to spend my time making music and my skills with a soldering iron is only good for fixing broken lamp cords. Some people are ment to make things - I am sadly not.

And of course what is a fair price to pay?

[Futureman]

I genuinely feel quite attached to this group of DIY'ers and builders & programmers... I feel that the gift that TK has given us is very special... where else can you make a synth that PISSES all over the sid station... absolutely pisses all over it, and then flushes it down the toilet after it's done a crap on it.

You say you want to spend your time making music instead of working with a soldering iron... thats a shame.. You have a very supportive community here... many people here "Shock horror" actually make things & then make music with them...

I know I do.. I've built 2 MB-Sequencers & Finishing up my super SID synth..

I could use your argument for plenty of things... I don't want to spend my time learning scales.. I want to make music... I don't want to spend time practising my beats, I want to make music... It's ALL making music... even if you are reading about composition... even if you are dreaming about fancy ways that you can use your MB-6582 Synth with 8! Sid chips in it... it's still making music.

You will find plenty of people on here that have never picked up a soldering iron before joining here.... so you're already ahead of them.

How much is a fair price to pay? I don't think anyone will dignify that with an answer..

I look forward to hearing from you when you tell the seller to go F@#k themselves and start asking about stuff like Mios & Cores.

Regards

Mike

[nILS]

If you buy an mbSID on this forum, it's not sold for profit, but due to a lack of time or the likes on the side of the person who started building it in the first place. That's ok. Shit happens. Change in interest happens, too :-)

Any price that's being asked for on this forum is gonna be ~ the price of the parts. So whatever is being asked here is fair.

Without wanting to start another arguement about it (pretty please, if you (and by that I mean anyone who reads this) feel tempted to reply regarding this, don't.) let me just say we're a bit "fundamentalistic" because this is a lot of people's hard work that a lot of people put in this for free, just to help others make really cool stuff. If you give a teddy bear to the neighbor kiddo you wouldn't want him to turn around and go sell it for, say, crack, now wouldya? Fairly simple, ain't it? :D

Would we accept someone here who bought a box on this forum? No. We'd welcome him aboard :-)

edit: beaten. dammit.

Futureman: Hold you horses. Olorin isn't necessarily talking about buying a SID in some evil place, but here:

will you accept a person that has bought his unit in your forums

Could be read either way. I just hope he meant the good one :D If your box has a lexan panel, you probably won't get much support.

[Futureman]

oops.. horses held back..

I mistakenly thought you meant buying it from ebay or some evil place.

Regards

Mike

[Twin-X]

The Awnser is simple:

A good price to pay is the cost for the materials not for the job done.

Do you have a picture of this SID or link so we estemate the price?

Regards,

Jeffry

[Max Romantschuk]

We're not fundamentalist. We're just respectful of the MIDIbox license.

The creator of the platform doesn't want other people to manufacture his designs commercially, and that's his call to make.

Like other people said, if you're paying only for the materials/parts it should be OK. If someone is building and selling MIDIboxes at a profit then it's both a violation of the license on their part and supporting someone doing this on your part.

[Olorin]

I was kind of hoping you would like to hear a song or two made on your creations.

If I am to make a song on a Midibox I am totally realistic about the fact that I will have to buy one since I don't steal stuff:)

It is nice of you to have hopes of me making one, but that is just as likely as me winning Wimbledon in tennis. I would love to, but I just can not do it - I do not have that talent either.

I did not build my car, my fridge, my tv, the PC, nor any of the synths I use and I guess you all use stuff you have not made too. If I am incorrect please add pictures of your cars and houses :)

Maybe I missed the right thread here, but I don't see any Sids for sale here. If there are any point me to them cause I would definitely prefer to buy one here. The one that set me off is on ebay(guess that is the vile place you speak of), here is the link:

http://cgi.ebay.de/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&item=250349072951

There is not much info about it, maybe you recognize it...

[Goblinz]

Anybody should be able to build a midibox SID, even if they haven't used a soldering iron before (There's plenty of examples of people having done this). Smash sells kits for all the modules that you need. Bulk buys are organised on here for the SID chips themselves, LCDs, etc, etc.

As for learning to solder; Buy a cheap flashing lights kit or something from ebay and practice on that.

It may seem daunting, but all the information you need is on the ucapps website and the wiki, as well as threads on this forum and the people on here will go all out to offer you help, advice and any information you need. We have a chat room too and the regulars will be more than happy to talk you through things you are having problems with.

At the end of it all you will have a synth that you have built and looks the way you want it to look, nothing is better than that.

The spirit of this community is that we all work at building our own projects (and help others). This is what it takes to get an amazing synth that's not available elsewhere or at a comparible price. Everyhting you need to know is offered here on a plate, what else could you want?

There's been several threads about MBSIDS being offered on ebay, have a look through the forum and you'll see how much it upsets the people here. I can't speak for Thorston or the others online, but I think I personally would have reservations about helping someone out with support, whilst being aware that they had knowingly assisted in the license being breeched by buying an MBSID from ebay.

[Olorin]

At the end of it all you will have a synth that you have built and looks the way you want it to look, nothing is better than that.

All my experience tells me I am useless with electronics.

This is what I have tried so far:

- building a joystick from instructions in a commodore magazine. I think I got the wrong components or something cause I could make more than half of them fit. Gave it up and bought a TacTwo = failed!

- replacing an eprom in my Doepfer regelwerk. The instructions were inconclusive and left me three options, I took a chance and i broke the whole thing. I have no clue what died in there, but dead it is and just sits gloomily in my closet. Failed!

- Replacing wallplug for some lamps = success!

- Changing PCI-cards in my PC = success!

- Jacking in modules in my Doepfer-case = success!

I have come at peace with the fact that I can not do this. Can you honestly say that building a Midibox Sid like Wilba mkII is any easier than anything what I have failed before?

I assume I will most likely end up with a pile of useless components, burned out or something. I guess it would be like two or the boards looking ok, but not working and I will have no clue what so ever which components are dead and which are not. It will end up on the recycle center. Wouldn't that just be a waste of good components?

I see the point that TK would take it as an insult if a company picks up the designs and makes profit. But if somebody want to sell one of their creations(not to start a business) to make another, just cause they are bored with it or whatever... what is the harm?

[stryd_one]

Can you honestly say that building a Midibox Sid like Wilba mkII is any easier than anything what I have failed before?

Well, did you have the designer and several other knowledgable experts and a few thousand experienced people helping you last time? Extensive documentation? Realtime chat support?

In case you can't tell, that's a "YES!" ;)

I guess it would be like two or the boards looking ok, but not working and I will have no clue what so ever which components are dead and which are not.

That's why we have troubleshooting guides and applications, if it comes to that. Most of the time, it doesn't, because of the hard work of people like TK and SmashTV and Wilba. That's the same hard work that it's frowned upon to profit from.

It will end up on the recycle center.

Unlikely. I think that's only happened to like two people, and only then because they refused to take the advice they were given (ie, they were told "do this, to fix it", and they refused). Occasionally something gets fried, but it's rarely a drama to find the problem and fix it.

I see the point that TK would take it as an insult if a company picks up the designs and makes profit. But if somebody want to sell one of their creations(not to start a business) to make another, just cause they are bored with it or whatever... what is the harm?

What is the harm? Well, that would be a question only TK could answer, and so that person should Request his permission to make the Sale, in an appropriate forum, like say, Sale Requests (You are HERE)  :D

You said you don't see any for sale here, and that's because there aren't any for sale.. with this one unpleasant exception. Really, the only reason to not ask TK's permission, would be if you knew you weren't on the level, and would be denied. Usually, it's encouraged to sell the box here. If this person only wants to sell the box at cost-price, and is happy to sell it on the forum, historically that is the kind of thing TK has given his approval to do. You can find a few examples on the forum here - although there aren't many, because people tend to hold on to these things if they've invested the effort in creating one ;)

[Goblinz]

The MB-6582 was my first big project. Before that i'd done small electronics projects with GCSE at school. I now have a working base-board and am working on debugging the control surface.

is the minimal setup for a SID, There's a couple of extra boards needed to add some knobs and lights for nicer looking Synth.

As you can see they are simple modules, nothing too hard to build.

The problems you have had are from lack of support... the wrong componants and dodgy documentation. The kits from Smash have the right tried and tested componants and you have all the information/instructions on this site.

Trying something twice and giving up is a bad way to do things.... Do you ride a bike?

[Olorin]

is the minimal setup for a SID, There's a couple of extra boards needed to add some knobs and lights for nicer looking Synth.

As you can see they are simple modules, nothing too hard to build.

The problems you have had are from lack of support... the wrong componants and dodgy documentation. The kits from Smash have the right tried and tested componants and you have all the information/instructions on this site.

Trying something twice and giving up is a bad way to do things.... Do you ride a bike?

No they look complicated to me. At least far more complicated than replacing that Eprom in the Regelwerk(which I managed to kill).

Speaking of the kits I did sift through those pages and I could not see a "midibox - kit" just a lot of boards and loose components. I don't think I would even manage to order the right stuff to build a Wilfa box :) Don't take this the wrong way but I don't think your information is very pedagogical. It is written by technicians for entusiasts, if this is all about making ever dumbwitted bum learing to build a synth it needs to be a whole lot easier to follow. Like a step-by-step guide.

How-to

1. Order this packet.

2. Buy these tools

3. Order one of these cases

4. Read these instructions EXACTLY

But really is this what it is all about, teaching soldering to idiots?

As for riding a bike it is the wrong comparison. You surely must mean digging up the iron ore, melting it, pound the iron, welding and building a bike. No never tried to do that :)

I am not a builder I am a user - give me car and I will drive it, give me a camera and I will take pictures or give me a synth and I will play it.

Anyway, seeing how you feel about it I am now pretty certain that I will not bid on any Midiboxes on the web - that doesn't feel good at all now.

[Olorin]

BTW did anybody of you recognize the Midibox on the ebaylink I provided?

[stryd_one]

1. Order this packet.

2. Buy these tools

3. Order one of these cases

4. Read these instructions EXACTLY

All that is here, just a few clicks away. It takes a little time to read it all, but it's there. There's also a big overhaul of our wiki documentation underway, to give an end-to-end set of instructions.

But really is this what it is all about, teaching soldering to idiots?

I think it's more about enabling anyone (even idiots) to teach themselves, and each other.

I didn't recognise the box. I did recognise a few features which have been designed by end-users in here, and secretly taken without so much as a thankyou. I think it's cool that you've decided to do the right thing. That auction is a real slap in the face for a few people around here.

[Olorin]

All that is here, just a few clicks away. It takes a little time to read it all, but it's there. There's also a big overhaul of our wiki documentation underway, to give an end-to-end set of instructions.

I think it's more about enabling anyone (even idiots) to teach themselves, and each other.

I didn't recognise the box. I did recognise a few features which have been designed by end-users in here, and secretly taken without so much as a thankyou. I think it's cool that you've decided to do the right thing. That auction is a real slap in the face for a few people around here.

Ok. I don't think I will ever get tools and stuff, fail and come and bitch you all to death for persuading me into it, but I will wait and see it the overhaul seems understandable anyway out of curiosity.

So you did not recognise that box. Do you mean that this is not a midibox-project but some "commercial clone"?

[nILS]

Ok. I don't think I will ever get tools and stuff, fail and come and bitch you all to death for persuading me into it, but I will wait and see it the overhaul seems understandable anyway out of curiosity.

You have managed to find this forum and you're obviously capable of logical thinking. More is really not needed ;-) A soldering iron, some soldering tin and a pair of pliers is really all you need to get your SID up and running. Well, maybe the people around here if you run into some problems ;-)

So you did not recognise that box. Do you mean that this is not a midibox-project but some "commercial clone"?

It is a MIDIbox SID beyond any doubt. It just seems that noone on this forum has seen this particular box before (or at least doesn't wanna talk about it) ;-)

[Olorin]

Don't want to talk about it... sounds interesting, is this some kind of infamous Midibox?  ??? Do you have a blacklist?

[stryd_one]

LOL! No that was just a joke :D (see, he made a smiley)

[Olorin]

I saw his joke and I agree. I don't need to be smarter. I need to abandon reason for madness to even try it ;)

[Olorin]

Maybe you like to know. I passed on bidding on the Midibox on ebay, but it sold for 401 euro. Did he make a profit?

[Goblinz]

Probably.

Are you going to be joining us then, there's more than a few people here willing to help you get a MBSID off the ground.

[Olorin]

No, that would be a bad idea for all of us. You will get crazy and think "why doesn't he ever make it right, how on earth could he break that, what is wrong now..." . And I will blame you all for dragging me into something that will only cost me time and money and never work.

So I guess I will lurk around and see if there will be any legitimate sales of units here on the forum, and pounce on that.

[Max Romantschuk]

Well, if you're sure you'll fsck it up it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy... ;)

Of course, some people are better suited for stuff like this than others. But I still think you'd be able to learn all you need if you really wanted to do this. But I'm guessing it's just not your thing. For me building stuff is just as fun as making music. Sometimes more fun than making music, in fact. :)

[Olorin]

Well, if you're sure you'll fsck it up it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy... ;)

Of course, some people are better suited for stuff like this than others. But I still think you'd be able to learn all you need if you really wanted to do this. But I'm guessing it's just not your thing. For me building stuff is just as fun as making music. Sometimes more fun than making music, in fact. :)

Thumbs up, finally one here that understands! I am bad at it, I don't like it and it goes on in a downward spiral :D

[nILS]

Hahaha :-) And that makes you choice even more respectable!