Help needed again!

[Twin-X]

Sorry Jef,

Your English is much better than my Dutch :-)

Well my dutch is to cry for as well ;)

OK, are you using PCB's from Mike or Smash or home made ??

Mike's

I would check all the links are fitted first, don't forget the links on the track side of the board.

I have not all links. I will add them.

Then with the chips removed, could you check that all the inputs are at 5V (they are pulled up by the 10K's)

Can you explain this a bit more in detail?

Do you mean that every 10K resistor must have a voltage of 5V

Cheers,

Jef

[Dave_Wheeler]

Hi Jef,

OK, links missing = not good :-)

The 10K resistors should be connected to 5V at one end and both the input pin and the 74HC165 at the other. The way this works is the inputs are normally held at 5V through the 10K, when the input is activated the input to the 74hc165 goes low (the other end of the switch is connected to 0V)

When the switch is pressed the 10K will have 5V accross it and good old ohms law tells us that 0.0005A will flow through the resistor

With logic circuits floating inputs are bad news (some micros like PIC's have soft pulls on some ports so external pulls are not needed)

I think that with the rest of the links fitted you will see very different results.

L8R

Dave

[Twin-X]

Hi Dave,

I have tested. All buttons give 5,14V on pull up.

All rotary encoders give values that go to 4,something the voltage varies when i twist a knob.

I soldered in the links but i still have the same issue only when i press button 1 of J3 i get diffrent display. Nothing happens on lcd when i twist or press rotary or buttons.

??? ??? ???

Cheers,

Jef

[TK.]

Hi Jef,

one possible reason why the DINs are not captured correctly could be a short between SCLK and RCLK - the RCLK triggers the load input, and the SCLK (shift clock) shifts the pin states through the shift registers. If for example the SCLK is not working, you will always see the status of the first DIN.

How to check this - it's difficult without a scope. But you could do a simple electrical check: remove all ICs from the DINX4 modules as well as the PIC18F452 from the core module. Then switch your multimeter to "ohmmeter" (or however it is named) and measure the resistance between the CLK and the LD pin of each 74HC165 socket. It should always be "high impedance" (no connection between these pins).

If you measure 0 Ohm, then you know that there is a short, and this means that you have to visually check your PCBs at the bottom - maybe the two tracks for RCLK and SCLK are to near together.

For reference the DINX4 schematic:

http://www.ucapps.de/mbhp/mbhp_dinx4.pdf

The MIDIO128 application is nice for testing the DINs and DOUTs. You can upload it without any danger. Each DIN should trigger a MIDI event.

Best Regards, Thorsten.

[Twin-X]

YAY It was indeed a short!

Now the unit works. Well asside from some more little faults i have made. Like led's etc.

Dave and Thorsten thank you for helping me out finding the HUMAN bug :):):).

I will post if i find more things i cannot figure out.

thx again

[Dave_Wheeler]

Well done Jef,

Now we are all waiting for some serious retro tunes ....LOL :-)

Now is probably a good time to ask about the filter caps you are using for your SID's, have you just taken the 470pF value as read or have you checked values. Even poly caps are generally 5% tolerance which gives a possible 10% between caps, the filters will sound quite different if the values are too far apart.

You can always 'tweak' things once you are fully up and running.

Well done again,

Dave

[Twin-X]

Thanks for the tip Dave. I use the standard 470

If i don't like it i will tweak it.

Well now to put in the three other sid's i only have the 6581 but i hardly have noise. Maybe i have my system not loud enoug.

The only thing that needed to be done were switching buttons and led's +  - . So i made alot of mistakes.

I only find that my lcd display is flickering on occassions. And the sync led is very weak but not when i add normal power to it.

p.s. the sid has a huge tweak factor in sound i luv it :)

[pay_c]

Yeah!  ;D

The sound is ***********  :o ;D

For the flickering and stuff: That´s most common with either to much power consumption and/or to little PSU. But as you used the PSU of TK, that should not be it.

So: Recheck your current what goes in there (total into the master core). And if it´s constant or changing. The 78xx can cause some changing voltage if it´s on high currents.

But that´s just minor probs.

It runs it runs!!! YEAH! Greetz & Congrats!!

[Twin-X]

Well i am trying to get the last 3 sids to work.

I do seem to have a problem.

I click link button. I upload mios modded to 0X01 and after that i upload sid slave 1 link button is still on No reboot after upload. The slave does not work?

Am i doing something wrong? Is there a other way to get software on?

EDIT* i just used the code to open the link and then uploaded! Now sid 2 works :P.

But let sid 2 play link button must be enabled is this right?

[pay_c]

Yepp.  :)

You might want to change the behaviour of that button. There is a marker in the main.asm for that. If you put it to 1 (it´s standard is 0) the link is enabled as you turn on. That way you don´t have to click it always as you turn on.

[Twin-X]

Yepp.  :)

You might want to change the behaviour of that button. There is a marker in the main.asm for that. If you put it to 1 (it´s standard is 0) the link is enabled as you turn on. That way you don´t have to click it always as you turn on.

Thanks for the tip i will look for the documntation on the main.asm.

All sid's WORK woohooo. Thank you everyone. Time to wrap things up.

Only 1 question remains. If i wish to use the sid player app how do i load songs? Does it mess up the main sid program?

thanks

[moebius]

Only 1 question remains. If i wish to use the sid player app how do i load songs? Does it mess up the main sid program?

Hi,

SIDplayer is another application, that can't coexist with MidiboxSID.

And you don't download, but play SID's on your computer with PlaySID or other ASID protocol compatible  player which then sends SysEx to control SIDplayer.

Bye, Moebius

[Twin-X]

Hi,

SIDplayer is another application, that can't coexist with MidiboxSID.

And you don't download, but play SID's on your computer with PlaySID or other ASID protocol compatible  player which then sends SysEx to control SIDplayer.

Bye, Moebius

LOL ok that clears things up. Thanks,

Jeffry

[Twin-X]

Is it Possible to get more juice to my backlight for my lcd.

Adjusting the pots only make things darker  :'(

[pay_c]

??? ??? ???

That´s weird as the backlight is overrated on the core... The normal layout + resistors on the core make the LCD backlight going to the max of about 300 mA. Try following: If u put backlight to full output, measure the current going into the master core (+/- 5 Volt). It should be at 300 - 500 mA. Is it is, that´s likely the max you can get outta there, more would fry your 78xx perhaps...

If it´s under there (lets say @ 200 mA or less) there is still plenty of room and you could change some resistors on the master core to accomplish more backlight.

Just try it and tell and then lets see...

:)

[Twin-X]

Thanks pay-c,

I was on holiday so excuse my late responce.

The power is enough indeed so i will go for a new lcd.

Now that i am done with the unit (THANKS EVERYONE) i have the following if i make a patch i cannot save it. It is just being resetted to the int. What am i doing wrong?

I have 1 bankstick installed. On starting up id did the beep in a ladder sounds.

Thanks in advance,

Jef

[Twin-X]

Anyone?

[Guest Gurgalax]

This is a fantastic Thread...gained lots of knowledge from it....

-Felix

[Twin-X]

Sorry to bring back this topic again.

I wanted to try out the 303 software of Thorsten and upgrade to sid v 1.7.

I used Serge Soft to do this but it had no result. So i decided to format all my Chips.

Since i have a new computer i had to reinstall all software.

I programmed 1 Chip (i pulled out all the others) with strap and id 0X00

My midi interface led blinks every two seconds. But for some reason i get no data in Serge or in Midi - OX This means i can't get the MIOS on the Chip.

I am positive that midi in works since i could play notes before i formatted my Chip. I have the m-audio midisport 4x4 as midi interface.

Anyone got an idea on where to look? (the programming of bootstrap went ok since i get nice line of blocks on my LCD)

[moebius]

My midi interface led blinks every two seconds. But for some reason i get no data in Serge or in Midi - OX This means i can't get the MIOS on the Chip.

Hmm.. have you tried any other midi devices on that particular midiport? Can you see midi data in midi-ox if there's something else than midibox connected?

Trying to figure out, if it's computer/driver/interface/configuration problem or something to do with the midibox ;D

Bye, Moebius

[Twin-X]

Trying to figure out, if it's computer/driver/interface/configuration problem or something to do with the midibox ;D

Bye, Moebius

Yes i think there is a problem here. But it is hard to find grrr.  ;D. I have my mpc4000 attached and send a clock signal. It took a while before there was signal to midi ox. I am gonna try first on another pc i think.