Strange behaviour of LTC or box

Sasha · July 14, 2006, 8:38am

I spend meny days troubleshooting MB64E for alalog usage and here is the results (question)

I made LTC module and instllaled Roland drivers

sucsessfully changed ID with change ID application

uploaded reasambled MB64E aplication with enabled analog input and multiplexer

Problem is… when I am using LTC vith MB64 everything works OK

When I am using it with MB64E it is jittering. I clamp all inputs to mass… still jittering ???

I switch to the MB64 again without touching enything… works fine!?

I tried it also with Yamaha drivers - same result

What is very strange is that jittering could be seen on the LCD but not all jitters activateing LTC MIDI out LED and also not apearing on the MIDI Ox MIDI input monitor screen.

When I disconect LTC from PC, pots and encoder movement are looking OK on the LCD shoving proper parameter value. This seams wery strange to me. What else should I check?

T.K · July 14, 2006, 5:43pm

Problem is… when I am using LTC vith MB64 everything works OK

Are you using the LTC with another MIDIbox, and this one doesn’t send jittering values?

Only your MB64E based MIDIbox sends “unwanted” MIDI events?

Or did you upload the MIDIbox64 application on your MIDIbox64E, and this one doesn’t send jittering values?

Are these values which are beeing sent completely random? Do they change when you touch with your fingers over the analog pins of CORE:J5 and the analog inputs of your AIN module?

Or do these values toggle between two numbers. For example, a CC value is changing between 1 and 2, but you never see random jumps like 16…34..2…98…23…4

What is very strange is that jittering could be seen on the LCD but not all jitters activateing LTC MIDI out LED and also not apearing on the MIDI Ox MIDI input monitor screen.

Have you assigned MIDI events to all pot inputs (regardless if they are connected to ground or not), or are some slots “empty” (no MIDI events defined) - in this case, the empty parameter wouldn’t sent anything via MIDI Out, but the LCD would display, that the value has changed.

When I disconect LTC from PC, pots and encoder movement are looking OK on the LCD shoving proper parameter value. This seams wery strange to me. What else should I check?

There could be a ground loop between the PC and the PSU you are using for your MIDIbox64E. When you disconnect the RS232 cable, the loop won’t exist, and therefore no jittering values will be sent.

Have you already tried the PSU of your MIDIbox64?

Please answer all my questions, they are important for us to get an overview about the issue

Best Regards, Thorsten.

Sasha · July 17, 2006, 8:30am

I will answer all when I test everything again acording to your questions.

Sasha · July 18, 2006, 7:36am

Are you using the LTC with another MIDIbox, and this one doesn’t send jittering values?

Only your MB64E based MIDIbox sends “unwanted” MIDI events?

Or did you upload the MIDIbox64 application on your MIDIbox64E, and this one doesn’t send jittering values?

I am using LTC on a same test setup configured for LTC and just switching the aplication from MB64 to MB64E.

MBox 64 with doesn`t jitters
MBox 64E with disebled AIN doesn`t jitters.
MBox 64E with enabled AIN jitters

I see where could be one of the problems but not sure how to fix it. I Update all slots with some value so there is no empty analog slots with my syx after MB64E aplication but same…

Are these values which are beeing sent completely random?

Yes. On the LCD I can see Pitch Band and A. Tch. with different values

Do they change when you touch with your fingers over the analog pins of CORE:J5 and the analog inputs of your AIN module?

When I disconnect AIN module LTC MIDI out LED flicker very fast but seams reacting on the touching. Before that jitter was only on the LCD.

Or do these values toggle between two numbers. For example, a CC value is changing between 1 and 2, but you never see random jumps like 16…34..2…98…23…4

No, they are showing Pitch Band and A. Tch. with few more different values.

Have you assigned MIDI events to all pot inputs (regardless if they are connected to ground or not), or are some slots “empty” (no MIDI events defined) - in this case, the empty parameter wouldn’t sent anything via MIDI Out, but the LCD would display, that the value has changed.

All unused pins in mios_tables are terminated with “MT_EOT”. Analog inputs I defined in “ini” but it dont work properly when I uploade reasembled “syx” I want to use only two encoders on SR8 so I configured it like this"

MIOS_ENC_PIN_TABLE
	;; encoders 1-16
	;;        SR  Pin  Mode
	ENC_ENTRY  8,  0,  MIOS_ENC_MODE_NON_DETENTED	; V-Pot 1
	ENC_ENTRY  8,  2,  MIOS_ENC_MODE_NON_DETENTED	; V-Pot 2
	ENC_EOT
	ENC_EOT
	ENC_EOT
	ENC_EOT
	ENC_EOT
	ENC_EOT
	ENC_EOT
	ENC_EOT
	ENC_EOT
	ENC_EOT
	ENC_EOT
	ENC_EOT
	ENC_EOT
	ENC_EOT

Have you already tried the PSU of your MIDIbox64?

My PSU is old one i am using it for a long time.

I really dont know proper way of using my MB64 configuration on new MB64E based box. I just want to add 2 encoders, and use all DIN inputs for buttons as it was on my MB64 box. I Tried to disabled special buttons in the main.asm But after reasembling seams are still functionall. So is it LTC sabotageing or my PC or my configuration - probably. I`m not sure.

T.K · July 18, 2006, 7:33pm

As mentioned in this posting: http://www.midibox.org/forum/index.php?topic=7104.0, you’ve propably uploaded an old .syx file, because the conversion lead to an error message. So, maybe your results will be different when you are trying a new .syx

Pitch Bender/Aftertouch Events: maybe the MIDI-Ox parameter “SysEx delay after F7” is not high enough, in this case it can happen that invalid data is written into flash. This is a general problem when no BankStick is used (writing into flash takes much longer, and interrupts must be disabled, therefore new data cannot be received).

There is a very simple solution (I know this sounds stupid, but it’s the easiest one): upload the .syx 2 or 3 times, until it works.

A better solution: write a software which waits for the SysEx response from the PIC before sending the next block… just want to say: nobody maintains SysEx upload tools anymore, anybody else has to do this in order to make the configuration more user friendly…

As for the jitter: I think it is either related to your PSU (try the one of your MB64), or it is related to the wiring to the core. Maybe you could try out more and report new details, this could lead to a new idea what could go wrong…

Best Regards, Thorsten.

Sasha · July 19, 2006, 8:29am

This is a general problem when no BankStick is used (writing into flash takes much longer, and interrupts must be disabled, therefore new data cannot be received).

I have one bankstick which I dont need since this is dedicated controler so I dont need different setups. If I connect it I coult than avoid speed problem

A better solution: write a software which waits for the SysEx response from the PIC before sending the next block… just want to say: nobody maintains SysEx upload tools anymore, anybody else has to do this in order to make the configuration more user friendly…

First when I read MIOS Studio on the menu I couldn`t wait to download it and see it. Acording to name “Studio” I was expecting all-in-one support for MIOS aplications and main functions wich a lot of us needs very much. It is good and usefull aplication but I was missing some more things. It would be great to see some MIDIBox Studio. :P It could probably save posts like this one and maybe Testing/Troubleshooting category would be unnecessery. It surely takes much time, but maybe somebody could improve existing Serges editors. I would like to do such thing, but dont know a sh## about programming. :-[

stryd_one · July 19, 2006, 8:49am

It surely takes much time, but maybe somebody could improve existing Serges editors. I would like to do such thing, but dont know a sh## about programming. :-[

You could always learn

When I started getting into this community, I knew a little about programming (lots of scripting and a couple of VB and project apps), and very very little about electronics hardware (at the component level, only highschool and some cables and a theremin)… But I had a strong background in IT and music, so I took the knowledge I had and read a LOT and I think I’ve improved a great deal. My progress is slow, but it’s still progress. Trust me, anyone can do it if they want to

Sasha · July 21, 2006, 8:33am

You could always learn

When I started getting into this community, I knew a little about programming (lots of scripting and a couple of VB and project apps), and very very little about electronics hardware (at the component level, only highschool and some cables and a theremin)… But I had a strong background in IT and music, so I took the knowledge I had and read a LOT and I think I’ve improved a great deal. My progress is slow, but it’s still progress. Trust me, anyone can do it if they want to

Sure I can learn, but takes so much time. I never had any experience with programming of any kind, no scripting no VB no asembler… I heard about PIC first time on ucapps. For me, programming is compleetly new world, so I have to give up everything else and sart learning. I love hardware stuff so much I could give up and start with programming.

T.K · July 21, 2006, 9:09am

It seems that the upload of .syx configuration data doesn’t work with your setup (don’t know if it is related to the LTC module, to the PC, or to the application).

But since you are able to upload the application itself, you could also do the configuration directly in mb64e_presets.inc and rebuild a new .hex file, so that mk_syx doesn’t need to be used

Best Regards, Thorsten.

Sasha · July 25, 2006, 7:43am

I finaly give up using LTC with MB64E. Have no Idea what was wrong. I will leave it aside for some MB64 projects and continue troubleshooting MB64E aplication using standard MIDI connections. Thanks you all for help.