MIDIBox64 building doubts

MIDIbox HUIs
1

Yo Dudes :slight_smile:

Long time no talk. I’m missing the lurking days anyway I still without internet access from my new home (erm, its just a room but I’m paying for that 1/5 in bills I was paying in my old home :slight_smile: )

Life’s going , somethings bad, somethings good. The good is, I’m finally back to my workbench. Whee :slight_smile:

So I’m building another MB64 to use as foward point with another Midibox64 that I have. Many doubts are poping. Sorry if they are the old same questions (I’m really having just little time online to search info here) but if you have some free time to answer them, many thanks!

1- Well, as aways I bought crap pots for the project. The good is, all the pots are alive, showing some resistance on the meter. The bad that some are showing ~11.5 / 12K of resistance. Anyone thinks it may cause some random events or it will just affect the MIDI CC values? I mean, for instance if I turn the physical pot to the middle, the virtual pot/parameter will not jump to middle exactly, I guess. Have you guys think that have a way I can fix that? (whitou buy new pots :slight_smile: )

2- Other thing I was facing. I have a nice case for the project but the 2200 uF cap from the core module is to bigger for that. Do you guys think I can place this capacitor horizontally without problems? In this way, the core will fit nicely on that case.

3- Another doubt. Do you guys think I can kill a LCD while soldering the cable on that :P?

4- On the LCD area. I noticed I can print LCD messages via Sysex (?). I’m think to use that to control some Synthmaker made VSTs, so in this way the VST will talk with my box further I will not need to look to computer screen to choose stuff , like functions, etc (The deal is to use the LCD instead the computer screen to use the VST). The use of the Sysex thing to print messages on the LCD could affect the performance of my box?

Thats it, I have other few questions that I will post later.

Hope to see you guys in soon on the lurking lair :stuck_out_tongue:

2

Hi Knoball,

1.) I dont know, never used crap pots.

2.) As far as i know that shouldn´t be a problem. I did so because i am trying to build as small as possible and its working fine when mounted horizontally.

3.) You can kill everything when soldering depending on your temperature and the time you place the iron on the pads. But normally the pads of the lcd are located

at the border of the pcb so that shouldnt be a big problem with a lil reading about soldering and the equipment needed.

Hope someone can answer q4 since i never tried that. :slight_smile:

3

1- Well, as aways I bought crap pots for the project. The good is, all the pots are alive, showing some resistance on the meter. The bad that some are showing ~11.5 / 12K of resistance. Anyone thinks it may cause some random events or it will just affect the MIDI CC values? I mean, for instance if I turn the physical pot to the middle, the virtual pot/parameter will not jump to middle exactly, I guess. Have you guys think that have a way I can fix that? (whitou buy new pots )

  • Linear pots or faders are required for MIDIbox !

  • so close : ~ 12k value are not so critical. Will be OK.

2- Other thing I was facing. I have a nice case for the project but the 2200 uF cap from the core module is to bigger for that. Do you guys think I can place this capacitor horizontally without problems? In this way, the core will fit nicely on that case.

You can place this capacitor in any direction.

3- Another doubt. Do you guys think I can kill a LCD while soldering the cable on that :P?

I think , No !

May be missing connections or some shorts .

The bigger enemy is static electricity.

Regards,

Janis

4

hey Janis, phunk, thanks for these help dudes!

Yes , the pots are linear (not sure if the electonics shop seller from here know the diference to those logs :)). I already have built a mb64. Surely I was worried about the pot’s resistance due it’s already mounted on the panel (or something that you could call it. I still thinking the hard part of a DIY project is to get a nice professional-look front panel for cheap)so the potentiometers are ready for soldering.

The LCD I think was killed due the soldering iron because I had to solder the cable 2 times after I got wrong datasheet from it. Also I friend gave me a LCD that is just showing squares in the display even in that application made to test the LCD interconnection. So i think my soldering iron is geting too hot or so :).

I have another question. Maybe stupid a bit. It is possible to use push-buttons in a AIN module? I have etched a DIN module and already have soldered all the parts on it, but I have a spare AIN module and it is from the SmashTV shop and surely I’d prefer use a high quality instead mine homemade PCB :slight_smile:

5

I have another question. Maybe stupid a bit. It is possible to use push-buttons in a AIN module? I have etched a DIN module and already have soldered all the parts on it, but I have a spare AIN module and it is from the SmashTV shop and surely I’d prefer use a high quality instead mine homemade PCB

I think it is not possible to use push-buttons in a AIN module.

But in the MBHP core section which refers to J5 port , you can find a some more info about usage of this port :

" There are also some application which use this pin as digital in- or output (mostly described in REAMDE.txt or setup_*.asm file)"

Regards,

Janis

6

I think it is not possible to use push-buttons in a AIN module.

No… it is possible to use push buttons on an AIN Module instead of POTs… It just means that they read as a pot turned either full on “0 Ohms” or full off “10K Ohms” and you can then set up your control to read them as a switch simply by setting everything above a pre chosen level as ON and everything below that pre chosen level as OFF.

It’s easiest to set those up using DPDT push switches. That way you have the pin either connected to ground, or to 5V and this gives you the “on / off” state.

Take a look at the MiniMoog controller built by “ALKEX” That’s how his switches work.

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Best Regards,

Julian (Fozzy The Bear)