PCB bulk orders are killing the future MBHP develo

Miscellaneous
1

Since people now thinking about big bulk orders at professional PCB manufacturers just to save a little money, I have to say something about the impact for the future development of the MIDIbox hardware platform.

I started with the unified MBHP last summer after I got a chance to receive free prototype boards from Mike - the deal was that I can send him as much new layouts as I want when he is allowed to sell the boards in his online shop. He sells the boards for low-profit, and the prices are much better compared to low-quantity orders at one of the big manufacturers like PCB-Pool, so I was very satisifed with this solution. Mike is one of the last guys who sees his profession for supporting especially DIY people with well made and cheap PCBs, and this has to be rewarded.

Some weeks ago also SmashTV asked me for permission - I approved after I noticed how much effort he spent for some PCB layout improvements. The new boards are better to solder, components from the US now fitting perfectly, and some of the parts have been changed so that they are easier to order outside Europe. The new PCBs and the appr. Mouser/Reichelt partlists will be available for public after I’ve tested the boards - the new hardware will be 1:1 compatible to the existing solutions! Don’t hesitate to order boards from Mike, they are also ok!

In the future Mike will provide premade PCBs especially for Europe. It isn’t clear yet if Chriss will sell kits again after his hospital stay, but as a new alternative Tim aka SmashTV will offer premade PCBs, MBHP kits, a free PIC burning service and maybe also the possibility to get customized boards. In the last time he gave me a lot of tips, how I can improve my designs. And he started to create the layout of the USB module for us! So I think that this effort has also to be rewarded.

If you now start to make big PCB orders at other manufacturers, the effort and investions which have been made by Mike and SmashTV will not be profitable anymore — they possibly have to discontinue their offerings — and I will not be able to design new hardware when I don’t have the possibility to get free prototypes (example: SmashTV will send me some PCBs so that I can complete the Quad-SID firmware, and he will send me the USB prototypes for testing). In fact this will impact all of us!

Please keep this in mind if you plan to order PCBs somewhere else.

Best Regards, Thorsten.

P.S.: this doesn’t mean that you are not allowed to start bulk orders for components.

2

Since people now thinking about big bulk orders at professional PCB manufacturers just to save a little money, I have to say something about the impact for the future development of the MIDIbox hardware platform.

I started with the unified MBHP last summer after I got a chance to receive free prototype boards from Mike - the deal was that I can send him as much new layouts as I want when he is allowed to sell the boards in his online shop. He sells the boards for low-profit, and the prices are much better compared to low-quantity orders at one of the big manufacturers like PCB-Pool, so I was very satisifed with this solution. Mike is one of the last guys who sees his profession for supporting especially DIY people with well made and cheap PCBs, and this has to be rewarded.

Some weeks ago also SmashTV asked me for permission - I approved after I noticed how much effort he spent for some PCB layout improvements. The new boards are better to solder, components from the US now fitting perfectly, and some of the parts have been changed so that they are easier to order outside Europe. The new PCBs and the appr. Mouser/Reichelt partlists will be available for public after I’ve tested the boards - the new hardware will be 1:1 compatible to the existing solutions! Don’t hesitate to order boards from Mike, they are also ok!

In the future Mike will provide premade PCBs especially for Europe. It isn’t clear yet if Chriss will sell kits again after his hospital stay, but as a new alternative Tim aka SmashTV will offer premade PCBs, MBHP kits, a free PIC burning service and maybe also the possibility to get customized boards. In the last time he gave me a lot of tips, how I can improve my designs. And he started to create the layout of the USB module for us! So I think that this effort has also to be rewarded.

If you now start to make big PCB orders at other manufacturers, the effort and investions which have been made by Mike and SmashTV will not be profitable anymore — they possibly have to discontinue their offerings — and I will not be able to design new hardware when I don’t have the possibility to get free prototypes (example: SmashTV will send me some PCBs so that I can complete the Quad-SID firmware, and he will send me the USB prototypes for testing). In fact this will impact all of us!

Please keep this in mind if you plan to order PCBs somewhere else.

Best Regards, Thorsten.

P.S.: this doesn’t mean that you are not allowed to start bulk orders for components.

3

Hi,

I made contact today with Mike to try and order the PCB’s to make the Mackie Clone. The problem is that Mike only accepts either a bank transfer (costs a lot!) or physical cash in the mail!

He does not accept paypal or similar. If he did then I believe many people would be happy for him to send them PCB’s.

4

Hi,

I made contact today with Mike to try and order the PCB’s to make the Mackie Clone. The problem is that Mike only accepts either a bank transfer (costs a lot!) or physical cash in the mail!

He does not accept paypal or similar. If he did then I believe many people would be happy for him to send them PCB’s.

5

For some reasons Mike is not able to open a PayPal account, but if you don’t want to send him the money on the old-style method, just wait for SmashTV’s alternative offer

Best Regards, Thorsten.

6

For some reasons Mike is not able to open a PayPal account, but if you don’t want to send him the money on the old-style method, just wait for SmashTV’s alternative offer

Best Regards, Thorsten.

7

Hi,

I understand. Thanks for the reply.

Mike could always supply me with a stock of PCB’s and I could accept Paypal on his behalf!

Regards

8

Hi,

I understand. Thanks for the reply.

Mike could always supply me with a stock of PCB’s and I could accept Paypal on his behalf!

Regards

9

Thanks so much for the kind words Thorsten!

I have to say that working on the MBHP has been a welcome diversion from everything going on around me, from the Tornadoes to my wife’s grandfather breaking his back to finding out last week that my 6 month old son (who loves to sit here on my lap and help dad design boards) needs surgery on his skull (the “soft spots” have hardened prematurely).  It gives me more work to concentrate on, since my production company’s schedule only requires me about once a week.  It’s really uplifting to see a community like this, reminds me of the old BBS days.  8)

Not trying to lay my sob story on everyone, just wanting to relate why I’m so thankfull to everyone for something new to read every day, something else to think about… :slight_smile:

Selling the boards, kits, and programmed Pics won’t be a profitable venture for me in terms of money, my costs to produce a board average around $6 per.  Running the etch tank and NC drill full tilt will give me an average of 5 boards per hour, so a $7 board makes me a whopping $5 per hour if I keep my costs at $6 by not screwing up a few.  

Sure there are cheaper processes, but not having to work with all of the usual bad chemicals (I make the boards in my garage), and not being tied to plates or screens so that a change in design can be done in minutes comes with a price.  But that will work to everyone’s advantage when someone wants to design a new module, get a custom board to mount control buttons, etc.  No other process will allow me to take any Eagle file and make ONE board (or many) out of it for less than $10.  So naturally that service will be available also, only to Midibox builders, after the initial rush on the module boards is over.

I get the same fun as everyone else from tinkering with the MB, but I also have a lot of fun with the engineering and manufacturing of boards.  I would however consider my time on the layouts wasted if people start having bulk runs of Thorsten’s designs made up.  Building some for your friends is one thing, profiteering from someone else’s hard work and generosity is another.  

My production company pays my bills, so the fun, community, and learning is why I’m doing this, and unless the next twister takes me with it, I’m not going anywhere… :slight_smile:

Have fun!

Tim Ellis aka SmashTV

10

Thanks so much for the kind words Thorsten!

I have to say that working on the MBHP has been a welcome diversion from everything going on around me, from the Tornadoes to my wife’s grandfather breaking his back to finding out last week that my 6 month old son (who loves to sit here on my lap and help dad design boards) needs surgery on his skull (the “soft spots” have hardened prematurely).  It gives me more work to concentrate on, since my production company’s schedule only requires me about once a week.  It’s really uplifting to see a community like this, reminds me of the old BBS days.  8)

Not trying to lay my sob story on everyone, just wanting to relate why I’m so thankfull to everyone for something new to read every day, something else to think about… :slight_smile:

Selling the boards, kits, and programmed Pics won’t be a profitable venture for me in terms of money, my costs to produce a board average around $6 per.  Running the etch tank and NC drill full tilt will give me an average of 5 boards per hour, so a $7 board makes me a whopping $5 per hour if I keep my costs at $6 by not screwing up a few.  

Sure there are cheaper processes, but not having to work with all of the usual bad chemicals (I make the boards in my garage), and not being tied to plates or screens so that a change in design can be done in minutes comes with a price.  But that will work to everyone’s advantage when someone wants to design a new module, get a custom board to mount control buttons, etc.  No other process will allow me to take any Eagle file and make ONE board (or many) out of it for less than $10.  So naturally that service will be available also, only to Midibox builders, after the initial rush on the module boards is over.

I get the same fun as everyone else from tinkering with the MB, but I also have a lot of fun with the engineering and manufacturing of boards.  I would however consider my time on the layouts wasted if people start having bulk runs of Thorsten’s designs made up.  Building some for your friends is one thing, profiteering from someone else’s hard work and generosity is another.  

My production company pays my bills, so the fun, community, and learning is why I’m doing this, and unless the next twister takes me with it, I’m not going anywhere… :slight_smile:

Have fun!

Tim Ellis aka SmashTV

11

Who else was going to make PCBs besides me and smashtv? Also, I wont profit hardly at all on kits, and will only sell around 60 or less (100 total, but 30 for me and 10 for friends). If this bothers anyone, please let me know. The kit (core) will not have a power supply or midi sockets or pic chip, and will be priced around $10 and only availible to US residents.

12

Who else was going to make PCBs besides me and smashtv? Also, I wont profit hardly at all on kits, and will only sell around 60 or less (100 total, but 30 for me and 10 for friends). If this bothers anyone, please let me know. The kit (core) will not have a power supply or midi sockets or pic chip, and will be priced around $10 and only availible to US residents.

13

Ok, fine.  It bothers me.  I have spent countless hours working over the US layouts, buying parts that I don’t even need for my MB projects just to make sure they fit the US layouts, talking with Mouser in order to get them to stock certain parts needed, all for a FREE project.  Only for you to come along and ask me for my orderlist before it is released to everyone, so you can sell kits.  And that’s just me, not anywhere close to a fraction the amount of time Thorsten and others have in this FREE project.  

Dont you think Thorsten will think twice about releasing anything new when he knows someone is selling his work without his permission (profit or not)?

I personally won’t be working on the DMX-512 module again until this issue is resolved, I won’t pour any more time into anything that is going to be SOLD by someone else, when I give it up for free.  So your persistence in this has already had an effect on development.

Take a step back, read the FAQ where it says:

All the applications of www.uCApps.de are non-profit projects which are not for sale. The purpose is to follow the spirit of Open Source in order to allow people to rebuild, modify, improve or just learn from my projects. Many features that can be found here are not my inventions, but suggested by users from all of the world. On this way we are creating what we have ever searched for and I myself can enhance my experience with electronics and MIDI (makes really fun! :slight_smile:

As everything is free, am I allowed to bring the stuff to market?

No, you are not allowed to sell any stuff of this website for profit.

Enjoy this for what it is, the last free no strings attached really cool project on the net that is not completely infested with lamers.  Don’t ruin it.

And yes, I’m selling boards and parts at slightly above cost.  My costs fluctuate so I have to.  Thorsten and I have agreed on all pricing.  Thorsten won’t accept any money (I tried!, but I totally understand why he won’t) so that extra plus some money out of my pocket can pay for proto boards for new modules that others can design.  (get your layouts ready, I want to sponsor new modules in development and send test/proto boards made at no cost to the designers after the initial rush on the MB boards when they release).

And on that note, Thanks to everyone for the positive encouragement, I know everyone is anxious and I promise we are days away.  The parts order lists are done, the proto boards are done, the ordering script is up, all that is left is a bit more testing to be sure that it works right when you build it.  There is even a prototype USB board etched and waiting for me to drill and send to Thorsten.  When the site opens my address will be there for you to send your PIC for free burning if you don’t want to build a JDM.  I’m hyped!

Tim

14

Ok, fine.  It bothers me.  I have spent countless hours working over the US layouts, buying parts that I don’t even need for my MB projects just to make sure they fit the US layouts, talking with Mouser in order to get them to stock certain parts needed, all for a FREE project.  Only for you to come along and ask me for my orderlist before it is released to everyone, so you can sell kits.  And that’s just me, not anywhere close to a fraction the amount of time Thorsten and others have in this FREE project.  

Dont you think Thorsten will think twice about releasing anything new when he knows someone is selling his work without his permission (profit or not)?

I personally won’t be working on the DMX-512 module again until this issue is resolved, I won’t pour any more time into anything that is going to be SOLD by someone else, when I give it up for free.  So your persistence in this has already had an effect on development.

Take a step back, read the FAQ where it says:

All the applications of www.uCApps.de are non-profit projects which are not for sale. The purpose is to follow the spirit of Open Source in order to allow people to rebuild, modify, improve or just learn from my projects. Many features that can be found here are not my inventions, but suggested by users from all of the world. On this way we are creating what we have ever searched for and I myself can enhance my experience with electronics and MIDI (makes really fun! :slight_smile:

As everything is free, am I allowed to bring the stuff to market?

No, you are not allowed to sell any stuff of this website for profit.

Enjoy this for what it is, the last free no strings attached really cool project on the net that is not completely infested with lamers.  Don’t ruin it.

And yes, I’m selling boards and parts at slightly above cost.  My costs fluctuate so I have to.  Thorsten and I have agreed on all pricing.  Thorsten won’t accept any money (I tried!, but I totally understand why he won’t) so that extra plus some money out of my pocket can pay for proto boards for new modules that others can design.  (get your layouts ready, I want to sponsor new modules in development and send test/proto boards made at no cost to the designers after the initial rush on the MB boards when they release).

And on that note, Thanks to everyone for the positive encouragement, I know everyone is anxious and I promise we are days away.  The parts order lists are done, the proto boards are done, the ordering script is up, all that is left is a bit more testing to be sure that it works right when you build it.  There is even a prototype USB board etched and waiting for me to drill and send to Thorsten.  When the site opens my address will be there for you to send your PIC for free burning if you don’t want to build a JDM.  I’m hyped!

Tim

15

outta interest, what is this ‘DMX-512 module’ mentioned ???

keep it nice…

Dan

16

outta interest, what is this ‘DMX-512 module’ mentioned ???

keep it nice…

Dan

17

I am in complete agreement with Tim on this. My only reasoning behind providing kits from Tim to other European users was to cut down the wait time. Also, stocking Mike’s PCB’s was another way of me helping those users who like me want to start building their MB’s as quickly as possible and don’t want to start having to etch their own boards.

I have now given up on this idea as I can see that the kits and / or boards would end up being resold at a profit by other users and this is simply not something that I would want to participate in.

18

I am in complete agreement with Tim on this. My only reasoning behind providing kits from Tim to other European users was to cut down the wait time. Also, stocking Mike’s PCB’s was another way of me helping those users who like me want to start building their MB’s as quickly as possible and don’t want to start having to etch their own boards.

I have now given up on this idea as I can see that the kits and / or boards would end up being resold at a profit by other users and this is simply not something that I would want to participate in.

19

outta interest, what is this ‘DMX-512 module’ mentioned  

keep it nice…

 

Dan

hehe…sorry to growl a bit in that last post, but it needed said. :slight_smile:

The DMX module I’m working on will give the MB a standard DMX-512 output, that can be used to control stage lighting equipment.  It’s the standard used worldwide to control everything from fog machines to dimmer packs to automated lighting fixtures.  

It’s not something the typical MB user would have a need for, but if you play live and use lights or DJ and use lights then you probably have use for this, and you probably want it.  8)

It is still in a very early stage in development, borrowing heavily from work I have already done with designs for my production company’s use.  It is AVR based instead of PIC, but AVR’s are easily self-programmed in circuit if you design the hardware right, with no programmer or even bootloader required.

After the first rush on boards I plan on dividing my tinker time between the DMX module and full Mac support for the MB, assuming the board/kit issues are resolved.

I would also love to do something with digital potentiometers on the MB, so all things analog with knobs can be controlled.  I can see an old Bandmaster amp with full MIDI preset control, or a small motorfader box laying on my live mixer that controls the subgroup VCAs, the aux sends, AND the effects in my outboard rack…Sweeeet…;D

Comments?

Smash

20

outta interest, what is this ‘DMX-512 module’ mentioned  

keep it nice…

 

Dan

hehe…sorry to growl a bit in that last post, but it needed said. :slight_smile:

The DMX module I’m working on will give the MB a standard DMX-512 output, that can be used to control stage lighting equipment.  It’s the standard used worldwide to control everything from fog machines to dimmer packs to automated lighting fixtures.  

It’s not something the typical MB user would have a need for, but if you play live and use lights or DJ and use lights then you probably have use for this, and you probably want it.  8)

It is still in a very early stage in development, borrowing heavily from work I have already done with designs for my production company’s use.  It is AVR based instead of PIC, but AVR’s are easily self-programmed in circuit if you design the hardware right, with no programmer or even bootloader required.

After the first rush on boards I plan on dividing my tinker time between the DMX module and full Mac support for the MB, assuming the board/kit issues are resolved.

I would also love to do something with digital potentiometers on the MB, so all things analog with knobs can be controlled.  I can see an old Bandmaster amp with full MIDI preset control, or a small motorfader box laying on my live mixer that controls the subgroup VCAs, the aux sends, AND the effects in my outboard rack…Sweeeet…;D

Comments?

Smash