I was looking around for the SID, but...

[tlaskows]

I found this instead! I think this will sound better.

Something something Oddysey oscillators and MS-20 filter. The most important part (the MIDI PIC) is there. It's just missing few trim pots and such. The tempco is there. I don't understand why I didn't finish it. This is from, uhhh, about 15 years ago

The SID is probably in the garage. Good thing there's an archive of these old manuals online from EFM.



and this is the manual:

http://www.synthdiy.com/files/2003/madm ... mplete.pdf

Should I finish her and try to remember what real analog sounds like?

It will probably want me to sell my Scope, just joking...

-Tom

[tlaskows]

Found the SID! She looks like new. I take good care of my chips. I also found a bunch of pots, knobs, resistors, transistors, regulators, and a whole lotta logic chips.

This is the newer one with a fixed filter so it sounds a bit different than the original.

Best 1$ investment ever!



-Tom

[tlaskows]

Boys, let's get to it.

This arrived from Mouser this morning then I fell asleep for a few hours.

This is about 200 Euro worth of parts to finish the Mad Mouse Pro and the MidiBox SID v1.

I am a little bit upset that I forgot hookup cable! And probably few capacitors. I took me some 4-5 hours to find/order all the parts about 2 days ago. I don't understand how these companies can find all the parts and package them and ship them in less than 2 days



-Tom

[Nestor]

Wow, what a jurney, I want to hear it!

[tlaskows]

I'll even do an impulse response on the MS-20 filter if anyone here can model it!

The SID won't be ready anytime soon, I'm still waiting for some few parts for it like a nice blue LCD.

-Tom

[kensuguro]

SIDs are awesome man. I always liked the sound, and know of hardware boxes with actual SID chips in them, but didn't want to give up the convenience of being in the box.. a conundrum, really. And sadly I don't think I've seen VSTi emulations that does it justice.

On a deeper level though, I think I also like the arrangement philosophy behind C64 music.. to a degree common with other chiptunes.. and have opted to adopt (digest) the arrangement aesthetic instead of pursuing it on the sonic or sound generation front. (a much more involved pursuit)

Another one of these special chips is the 1st gen Gameboy.. I've heard rumors, and also see that they are sold at a premium. I didn't know how powerful it sounded compared to subsequent board revisions on the Gameboy or the GB Advance until I plugged in my headphones direct and listened to my friend's 1st gen Gameboy.

[astroman]

I recently sampled the Tetris theme melody ... it's a cool synth
still got a HardSID quattro on the shelf that never got engaged - unfortunately it's the pre-PCI slot format
and of course a real C64 somewhere in the corner

cheers, Tom

[tlaskows]

I always kind of liked the GB sound. Lol.

This SID will be able to do stuff that no SID inside a C64 is. See, the PIC is running at 40MHz, so it has additional modulations at the least.

I already drew the logo in Photoshop CS3. Found the C64 logo and the C64 font. I have a buddy that does signs for a living so I can get it printed for free or 2 bucks on transparent vinyl.

I am just waiting for a blue LCD 2x20 chars from China. There's a reason for the blue. it's my fave colour and it will say "Blue SID" on it.

Cheers guys,

-Tom

[tlaskows]

Got some parts and drew a simple logo in about 5 minutes. For some reason my phone couldn't take a proper picture, so I used my digital camera. It looks about right. Oh, my favourite colour is blue





If I manage to get half a day free on the weekend, I can start soldering

-Tom

[tlaskows]

The core Midibox is done. That's a few dollars in parts and an hour worth of work. I don't make mistakes unless the schematics have mistakes.

Next, program the free PIC with a free programmer and wire up the LCD display to see if she boots up. I need to edit 2 or 3 lines of the source code to tell it which parts I'm using.



Enjoy gear pr0n!

-Tom

[tlaskows]

Aye,

The brain is ready. It was kind of confusing. First I had the PIC programmer hooked up wrong, so that's a waste of 2 hours.

Then it's kind of complicated. It has a bootloader when you program it. Then you upload the MIOS using MIDI (thank you Scope MIDI ports) that can run any Midibox apps. Then you upload a specific app like SID in my instance. It's actually quite flexible and this is the old V1 MIOS.

Anyways, everything was soldered properly, no mistakes.

SID board won't take long to populate. I hope I have that working tomorrow. The control surface is just like 6 buttons and an encoder...



Time to get some sleep grrrr!

-Tom

[yayajohn]

Are you going to make that into a Eurocrack module?

[tlaskows]

Haha no.

I have no idea what eurorack is. If its modular, this thing is all digital except for the filter.

I am not happy that the creator of this project is being taken an advantage of.

All these new devices like the beatstep are either using his ideas which is fine, but i hope they didnt use his code.

[tlaskows]

Aye,

The SID Core is all finished. Just need to hook up to the Brain and connect power and audio out.

There was a small glitch. I ordered audio grade film capacitors for the SID for some reason. They didn't quite fit, but I made it work.

Next step, hook up the wires apply power and see if it makes sound. Then wire up some bank sticks (flash chips) to store patches.





Not my best soldering job, but I am just starting to get back into it. Oh yeah, I still use the good old stuff with lead. It sticks to everything. I think I tried to solder with lead free stuff and it just didn't work out so great

-Tom

[tlaskows]

Time to celebrate with a tea or coffee or something... I had one wire hooked up wrong.

Of course it sounds great because it's going through Scope

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mySqz845-u8

[tlaskows]

Sorry for teasing you guys. But why have an emulation when you can have the real thing. Programmed my 1st typical 3 detuned saw patch that responds to velocity, aftertouch, and mod wheel. 20 minutes worth of work without even ever used a real C64 chip.

I think I better get some sleep soon

I can help if anyone wants to build one, but you'll need to be able to read some schematics and solder. The project is very well documented.

http://www.thomaslaskowski.com/wp-conte ... -SID-1.mp3

Oh, this patch is called "Blue SID ".

G'night,

-Tom

[garyb]

good job!

[Nestor]

Super cool!

[tlaskows]

Thanks guys,

It's not complete yet. I have to add some bank sticks to save patches and a panel panel. The whole project build will be on my website with little things I found to make it work. There was at least once discrepancy between the schematics and the PCBs, but they're mostly pretty good.

Oh, this was a good example where I used 2 Scope MIDI ports. The editor is written in Java and it talks to the SID box using one MIDI port then you have to select another for a master keyboard to hear your changes.

The possibilities are quite amazing. There are 6 LFOs (I think these are CPU generated). Each oscillator has it's own AMP envelope. Oh and there are two 'general' envelopes (pretty sure also CPU generated). In the oscillator you can select multiple waveforms at once (I don't think it mixes them but it uses some kind of a digital OR, XOR, or AND. I can't remember). I will just show you guys a picture to see how programmable this thing is. This is the old version 1. I have no idea what the more fancy v2 is capable of, but this is more than I can handle for now .

Of, I forgot about wavetables and audio in. Not bad for a toy computer sound chip that was designed around 1982.



Time for my morning coffee

-Tom

[tlaskows]

Had half a day today to build a prototype panel. It will have white vinyl overlay printed by my buddy on it. I scratched it all up



Oh yeah, it now has 1024 patch locations

Cheers,

-Tom