Jump to content

MIDIbox of the Week (MIDIbox FM of Xavier)


Ixox
 Share

Recommended Posts

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).

IxoxFm06.jpg

First the core, the 4x20 LCD and the back side connections to the Opl3 module.

IxoxFm10.jpg

IxoxFm11.jpg

The Opl3 Module...

IxoxFm08.jpg

IxoxFm09.jpg

the DIN4, DOUT4 and the additionnal DIN and the bank eeproms.

The 3rd DOUT has the ouput connector to the matrix rows.

IxoxFm07.jpg

IxoxFm05.jpg

The Matrix :

IxoxFm01.jpg

The Operators/instruments selector :

IxoxFm02.jpg

The 8 select button, escape, config and main encoder.

IxoxFm03.jpg

The 4 encoders :

IxoxFm04.jpg

Now i have to build the box... I'm afraid the matrix will be hard to put inside...

I'll see....

Xavier

Link to comment
Share on other sites

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.

IxoxFm12.jpg

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....

IxoxFm13.jpg

Remarks or suggestions are welcome,

Xavier

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

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.

IxoxFm14.jpg

(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.)

IxoxFm15.jpg

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.

IxoxFm16.jpg

And the whole set...

I'm waiting for some 2,5mm screw to be able to fix the LCD.

IxoxFm17.jpg

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

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thanks....  :)

with that screen, did you have to do any software changes to mios?

No change at all !

Line 1&3 corresponds to line 1 of a 2x40 LCD.

Line 2&4 to line 2.

I may try to change something but i'm afraid that will not be simple :

It is that when you scroll the menu with the main encoder all the screen scrolls and it's weird... It would be much nicer to have only the second line scrolling.

The main page also is weird with the '|' at the end of the first line (you can see it in the first post) ... Removing this "|" and putting 2 spaces instead of 1 between the instruments would be nicer.

Xavier

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 weeks later...

I received the transformer to replace the noisy wall adapter and it is much much better.

But i ordered a 7,5V transformer and after 2,5 weeks of waiting and many emails i received my order with a 12V transformer inside...

I will never order to alscomposants.com again... French people, avoid that site...

With 6 diodes before the 7805 and a heatsink, it seems to be OK.

My midibox FM is finished...

I spent many houres of fun... It was very interesting... Thanks again thorsten.

Here are the last pictures :

Before closing the boxes.... All the wires were uselessly too long exept 2 which were really too short....

Next time i'll spend more time trying to cut them at the right length.

IxoxFm18.jpg

Closed....

This big box to control the tiny OPL3... strange...

But i like very much how it sounds !!!

IxoxFm19.jpg

IxoxFm20.jpg

IxoxFm21.jpg

;D

No back to my "little surface, maximum control" SID...

And then maybe i'll do some music again.

Xavier

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hey... I'm glad and proud to see my midibox here... thanks Thorsten.  ;D

There seem to be very few Midibox FM compare to SID... Too bad...

In fact the 4x20 LCD works rather well.

The 2 rows of 4 buttons bellow the LCD is intuitive. no problem to find immediatly which button to press.

The more weird is the scrolling of parameters with the first menu of the second line which become the 4th of the first line when you scroll right...etc... difficult to get used to.

Concerning the main page "Instrument view" is not nice but "full view" (see CFGmenu) is really perfect...

Can be specified as default in the main asm file

#define CS_MENU_DEFAULT_VIEW_MODE 0

Xavier

Link to comment
Share on other sites

great design!

some questions:

1) can you explain how you built the case? i mean the wooden box. i am not shure what would be the best way to make a stable box.

>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.

2) what tool did you use to cut the holes?

3) in the light areas of the panel... is the lazertran transparent (that you can see the metal) or is it more whiteish opaque?

4) do you have a closer pic where i can see the joint between the lazertranpapers?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thanks... I'm happy you like it....  :)

Answers:

1 - the case is a teko 364... Arround 20 euros in france.. plastic box + aluminium surface.

Available every where...

I painted the plastic part in black... The original color is not very sexy.

I also added some feet to make it nicer and more stable :

11330-opt.jpg

2 - What is the english word for that : a "cutter" in french...

CUTTER.gif

It took me about half an hour for all the wholes.... But it was not perfect.

3 - Lazertran (ink jet) becomes totally transparent (where there is no ink) after the second coat of varnish.

4 - No.... I can do it tomorow with the light day if required.

If you mean the joint just at the left of the matrix... it is not very nice...

Xavier

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 - the case is a teko 364... Arround 20 euros in france.. plastic box + aluminium surface.

Available every where...

I painted the plastic part in black... The original color is not very sexy.

I also added some feet to make it nicer and more stable :

hm, ok i'm building with wood so this is something different

2 - What is the english word for that : a "cutter" in french...

CUTTER.gif

It took me about half an hour for all the wholes.... But it was not perfect.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
 Share

×
×
  • Create New...