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Reply 221 of 895, by Mu0n

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sofakng wrote on 2021-12-21, 13:22:

OK - No problem... I found an extra 6.8K resistor for R10 and I was also able to desolder a DB15/VGA connector. Getting ready for first power on!

I think you misread me. R10 has to stay unpopulated. R19 also has to stay unpopulated.

1Bit Fever Dreams: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9YYXWX1SxBhh1YB-feIPPw
DOS Fever Dreams: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIUn0Dp6PM8DBTF-5g0nvcw

Reply 222 of 895, by sofakng

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Mu0n wrote on 2021-12-21, 14:35:

I think you misread me. R10 has to stay unpopulated. R19 also has to stay unpopulated.

Mu0n wrote on 2021-12-21, 05:38:

Only 2 pairs of pads aren't populated. R10 associated with the EEPROM and R19, part of the "pc speaker" signal.

Sorry, my mistake (again). However, the BOM.xls lists R19 and R21 as "DO NOT POPULATE". It also lists R10 but only has "NP" in the Comment field. Are you saying R10/R19/R21 should all be unpopulated or just R10/R19 (and R21 IS populated)?

EDIT: I'm still learning electronics but it looks like this is a pull-up resistor enabling write-protect (which we don't want I'm assuming to be able to flash the EEPROM). However, the datasheet says it should be connected to Vss (GND) so should there be a pull-down resistor or a direct connect to GND from this pin?

If I do need to populate R21, can I use a 6.8K resistor (ie. the one labeled for R10) instead of the specified 4.7K resistor?

Reply 223 of 895, by sofakng

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One more question (in addition the ones above)...

How difficult would it be to make a revision of the mainboard to make a few changes?

1) Add 2x serial ports (from the SoM)
2) Add 3.5mm line input (from the Crystal sound chip)
3) Add a USB hub chip (ie. Terminus FE2.1
4) Increase power input (DC barrel jack with ~3A) ?
5) Move wave blaster header to allow for larger cards (ie. Dreamblaster X2 GS or WP32 McCake)

I wish I knew enough about PCB design because I think the slight increase in size would be definitely worth it.

Reply 224 of 895, by Mu0n

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sofakng wrote on 2021-12-21, 14:49:

Sorry, my mistake (again). However, the BOM.xls lists R19 and R21 as "DO NOT POPULATE". It also lists R10 but only has "NP" in the Comment field. Are you saying R10/R19/R21 should all be unpopulated or just R10/R19 (and R21 IS populated)?

EDIT: I'm still learning electronics but it looks like this is a pull-up resistor enabling write-protect (which we don't want I'm assuming to be able to flash the EEPROM). However, the datasheet says it should be connected to Vss (GND) so should there be a pull-down resistor or a direct connect to GND from this pin?

If I do need to populate R21, can I use a 6.8K resistor (ie. the one labeled for R10) instead of the specified 4.7K resistor?

Here's a picture of my working board. Details around the EEPROM gave me a fit as is evidenced around page 6 of this thread (past post 100) Tiny Vortex86-based DOS gaming PC - weeCee.

QiLhGM6.jpeg

U2: after trying to debug it for a while, I ended up using a
24AA16T/SN https://www.mouser.ca/ProductDetail/Microchip … wGuBpH2wVfivrT0
R9: 3.3 kOhm
R10: nothing
R19: nothing
R21: a 4.7 kOhm. This is explained on p91 of the CS4237B datasheet and is used as a pulldown in the mono in of the pc speaker beeping sound as it's mixed in with the general audio

sgxu7JU.png

as for your other questions about extending/improving the circuit, I'm sorry to say I'm not the one to ask, I haven't gone through a basic tutorial in PCB designing yet. I'd love to learn more but time is such at a premium in my life atm.

1Bit Fever Dreams: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9YYXWX1SxBhh1YB-feIPPw
DOS Fever Dreams: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIUn0Dp6PM8DBTF-5g0nvcw

Reply 225 of 895, by sofakng

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Thanks so much for the information. Everything seems to be working perfectly on my weeCee.

However, I ordered a CR2032 battery and it's definitely too big. Amazon seems to only have CR1616 (as the smallest size with tabs), so I might give that a try but what size battery did you use? (if any?)

Reply 226 of 895, by Mu0n

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sofakng wrote on 2021-12-29, 19:24:

Thanks so much for the information. Everything seems to be working perfectly on my weeCee.

However, I ordered a CR2032 battery and it's definitely too big. Amazon seems to only have CR1616 (as the smallest size with tabs), so I might give that a try but what size battery did you use? (if any?)

I'm using a CR2032 battery on my other unit - I still have to add it to the unit I posed in my previous post. Here's what unit #2 looks like with it:
Re: Tiny Vortex86-based DOS gaming PC - weeCee

Here's a more complete shot:
fiwvAR1.jpeg

Last edited by Mu0n on 2021-12-29, 19:32. Edited 1 time in total.

1Bit Fever Dreams: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9YYXWX1SxBhh1YB-feIPPw
DOS Fever Dreams: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIUn0Dp6PM8DBTF-5g0nvcw

Reply 228 of 895, by Mu0n

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sofakng wrote on 2021-12-29, 19:30:

Does it fit inside the case with the solder tabs still attached? In your picture it looks like the top tab is broken off.

The fit inside this case is definitely very tight!

It fits okay. I used an already low profile battery holder, ditched most of the casing and kept the strict bare minimum battery tabs I needed to make contact to the battery. I first soldered the tabs to my wires and everything is held by electric tape. Very inelegant, but otherwise functional.

(I updated my previous post with a new image)

1Bit Fever Dreams: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9YYXWX1SxBhh1YB-feIPPw
DOS Fever Dreams: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIUn0Dp6PM8DBTF-5g0nvcw

Reply 230 of 895, by weedeewee

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seems like, with some room on the pcb, a surface mount battery holder could be used.

Right to repair is fundamental. You own it, you're allowed to fix it.
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Reply 231 of 895, by Mu0n

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If you want to collaborate on this online sheet document I started, let me know sofakng

bPGLAP9.png

1Bit Fever Dreams: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9YYXWX1SxBhh1YB-feIPPw
DOS Fever Dreams: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIUn0Dp6PM8DBTF-5g0nvcw

Reply 232 of 895, by NachtRave

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I don't know if this helps any but I also am taking a whack at making one of these, and wanted to just post my BOM alternates that I've used, since lots of things are out of stock due to chip shortage.

12-30 Alternate BOM (copy/paste into excel)

Designator Quantity Suggested Part Number Used Part Number Description Comment
C1, C2, C3, C4, C5, C36 6 06035C104K4T2A same CAP CER 0.1UF 10% X7R 0603 100nF
C11, C12, C27, C28 4 C1206C102K5RAC same CAP CER 1nF NPO 1206 1nF C0G
C13 1 12065A272FAT2A C1206C272F5GACTU CAP CER 2700PF 50V 1% NP0 1206 2.7nF
C14, C17, C18, C19 4 06035C102KAT2A same CAP CER 1nF X7R 0603 1nF
C15, C16, C38, C39 4 GRM31CR61E106KA12L TMK316AB7106KLHT / GRM319R61E106KA12D CAP CER 10UF X7R 1206 10uF
C20, C21, C22, C23 4 06031C562KAT2A same CAP CER 5.6nF X7R 0603 5.6nF
C25, C26 2 1206YC106KAT2A same CAP CER 10UF X7R 1206 10uF
C30, C35 2 GCM31CR71E475KA55L same CAP CER 4.7UF X7R 1206 4.7uF
C6, C29 2 12065C105KAT2A 12065C105KAT4A CAP CER 1UF 10V Y5V 0603 1uF
C7, C8, C24, C31, C32, C33, C34 7 12065C104KAT2A same CAP CER 0.1UF X7R 1206 100nF
C9, C10 2 CC0603JRNPO9BN220 same CAP CER 22PF NPO 0603 22pF
F1 1 0603L100SLYR same PTC 1A/1.8A 0603L100SLYR
FB1, FB2 2 BLM31PG601SN1L BLM31KN601SH1L FERRITE 1500 mA 1206 FERRITE
J1 1 48204-0001 same CON USB A 48204-0001
J2 1 5747845-4 same CON D-SUB 15POS 5747845-4
J3 1 5749231-1 same CON MINI-DIN 6 POS 5749231-1
J4 1 634-015-263-032 same CON D-SUB 15POS HIGH DENSITY 634-015-263-032
J5 1 MEM2061-01-188-00-A same CON MICRO-SD MEM2061-01-188-00-A
J6 1 35RASMT2BHNTRX same CONN JACK STEREO 3.5MM SMD 35RASMT2BHNTRX
J7 1 7499010211A same (digikey) CON RJ45 INTEGRATED MAGNETICS 7499010211A
J8 1 10118194-0001LF same CON USB MICRO-A FCI 10118194-0001LF
J9 1 TSW-113-08-G-D same CON PIN HEADER 2.54 26POS 13X2 WAVETABLE
R1, R2, R3, R4, R5 5 TNPW06034K70BEEA ERA-3AEB472V RES 4.7K 0603 4.7K
R10 1 DO NOT POPULATE NP
R12, R13, R14, R15, R16, R17 6 ERJ-3GEYJ473V same RES 47K 0603 47K
R18, R28, R29, R30, R31, R32 6 ERJ-3GEYJ330V CRCW060333R0JNEAC RES 33 0603 33
R19 1 DO NOT POPULATE NP
R20 1 ERA-8AEB473V RG3216P-4702-BT5 RES 47K 1206 47K
R21 1 CRCW12064K70JNEA ERJ-8GEYJ472V RES 4.7K 1206 4.7K
R22, R23, R24, R25 4 ERA8AEB49R9V RT1206BRD0749R9L RES 49.9 1206 49.9
R26, R27 2 ERA8AEB102V same RES 1K 1206 1K
R33, R34, R35, R36 4 CRCW12066K80JNEA same RES 6.8K 1206 6.8K
R6, R7, R8, R11 4 ERJ-3GEYJ222V same RES 2.2K 0603 2.2K
R9 1 CRCW12063K30JNEB RES 3.3K 1206 3.3K
U1 1 SOM304RD52VINE1 VIBE1 (special) SOM VORTEX86DX SOM304RD-VI
U2 1 24LC16B/SN 24LC16B-M/SN IC EEPROM I2C 24LC16B/SN
U3 1 CS4237B-JQ CS4237B-KQ (special) IC AUDIO CODEC
U4 1 LDL1117S33R same (special / eBay) IC LDO 3.3v LDL1117S33R
X1 1 ABLS-16.9344MHZ-B4-T same CRYSTAL 16.9344MHz 16.9344MHz

Last edited by NachtRave on 2022-05-05, 00:36. Edited 2 times in total.

Reply 233 of 895, by Mu0n

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I sent out the face plate gerbers to JLCPCB to get a cheaper price going on top of 2 other boards for an unrelated mac project (RGB2HDMI) and the files that made the cut in PCBWay did not make the cut for JLCPCB. The instant chat help person was enigmatic in his tips. It's so messy how not easy this process is between a circuit program and PCB fab houses.

Here's what I got as feedback:

JjMLSxn.png

sUoed98.png

After this, I loaded up the project again in altium circuit maker 2 and exported the gerbers again from a current-day project status, hopefully this is enough.
Their circuitmaker365 platform exhibits strange behavior: I can't open the back face plate (only the front one and the main board) from the website portal.
Once I'm in the desktop app, I can open all 3 designs, but when created gerbers, only the front plate is output. I had to delete the front and main board in order for the program to finally output the gerber+drill files, only to the 365 platform thing (it no longer produces local files like in CM1.x).

Still, after all these steps, the board outline isn't present. This mirrors my experience when I tried to output files for PCBWay - I jerry-rigged something with the outline creation tool and they seemed to accept it (after all, I got my boards back in June). But, for JLCPCB, this confuses them because layer gm1 and gko contains complementary information apparently.

1Bit Fever Dreams: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9YYXWX1SxBhh1YB-feIPPw
DOS Fever Dreams: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIUn0Dp6PM8DBTF-5g0nvcw

Reply 234 of 895, by rasteri

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GKO shouldn't be needed (it's presumably the keepout layer?)

These are the final released gerbers, do they work?

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Reply 235 of 895, by Mu0n

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I just redownloaded the final files of my PCBWay order and just plopped them up into JLCPCB and kept in instant chat contact with a new person a few hours later. They didn't seem to have info split in 2 layers then and it went swimmingly. Fingers crossed that they actually drill the non-circular holes well (the preview image still show these port holes as a solid color) but it was semi-clear that they understood they were for ports.

1Bit Fever Dreams: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9YYXWX1SxBhh1YB-feIPPw
DOS Fever Dreams: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIUn0Dp6PM8DBTF-5g0nvcw

Reply 236 of 895, by sofakng

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Does the Crystal chip have onboard MIDI capabilities or does it require a wavetable board?

I have a Dreamblaster S2 coming but I was wondering if I could switch between the onboard and wavetable (using DOS) and test the difference? If so, how do I switch between them?

Reply 237 of 895, by rasteri

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sofakng wrote on 2022-01-08, 03:02:

Does the Crystal chip have onboard MIDI capabilities or does it require a wavetable board?

It has MIDI output but no internal wavetable. You have to use an internal waveblaster (S2/mcfly) or an external midi module (SC55 etc)

Reply 238 of 895, by Mu0n

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sofakng wrote on 2022-01-08, 03:02:

Does the Crystal chip have onboard MIDI capabilities or does it require a wavetable board?

I have a Dreamblaster S2 coming but I was wondering if I could switch between the onboard and wavetable (using DOS) and test the difference? If so, how do I switch between them?

Here's how I do things:

Config A: nothing attached - you'll get adlib-like fm synth for midi
Config B: S2 Dreamblaster attached - you can now access GM MIDI mixed together with the rest of your sound
Config C: nothing in the wavetable header, but joystick cable to Roland MT32 through Serdshop's DB15MIDI, you can now access MT-32 midi-ish sound, provide your own sound mixing (I use a passive 4in 1out to a powered set of speakers (otherwise it's too soft)) if the game happens to ALSO have sound blaster sound effects - this is kinda rare BTW. Games such as Ultima VII did sound effects through MT-32 instruments anyway. Some games need community /obscure patches to output both MT-32 and sound blaster sfx (ie Space Quest III, Willy Beamish, etc). Companies back in the day did not expect people to mix MT-32 and SB themselves; either would assume that your device was the only one you had.
Config D: nothing in the wavetable header, joystick cable to Roland SC-88ST - this thing also has audio in so the weecee audio out (sound blaster sfx) goes into audio in of the SC-88ST and the mixing occurs there for a combined out to headphones or speakers
Config E: if the S2 Dreamblaster is attached and a joystick cable to a Roland MT-32 is plugged in and your crystal audio config sets a non-0 volume to MIDI, you'll get both devices trying to deal with MIDI data and probably get a proper cacophony oftentimes.

I wish I could do config E and somehow disable the wavetable header for those games who are specialized for the MT-32, but the traces would need a switch to the wavetable header. Therefore, I have to resort to unscrewing the case and detach the S2 dreamblaster.

Having 2 units of Weecee and only 1 S2 Dreamblaster helps me compartmentalize their vocation between 1) earlier DOS + all midi data ported to external Roland devices through the gameport 2) later DOS + Win98se that use general midi, the S2 dreamblaster makes it portable for when I don't want to lug around my SC-88ST.

1Bit Fever Dreams: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9YYXWX1SxBhh1YB-feIPPw
DOS Fever Dreams: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIUn0Dp6PM8DBTF-5g0nvcw

Reply 239 of 895, by sofakng

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Thanks for that detailed information!

I've actually just received my DB15MIDI and Dreamblaster S2 a few minutes ago in the mail. I also have a bunch of other devices that I experiment with:

* MT-32 (real hardware)
* MT32Pi
* SC-55mkII (real hardware)
* Dreamblaster X2GS (coming soon in the mail)
* WP32-McCake (coming soon in the mail)
* RetroWave OPL3

(the Dreamblaster X2GS/WP32-McCake are two reasons I wish the weeCee had a slightly bigger case...)

Most of them are connected to my modern PC and I use a MX51s Mini-Mix 2 mixer.

However, I'm still learning about wavetable cards and how everything works. Are you saying that having the Dreamblaster S2 plugged in causes the GAMEPORT to have corrupted/different data? I would have expected raw MIDI data sent to both the S2 and GAMEPORT and you could just mute (or don't connect) the Crystal output?

By the way, if you have experience with PCB design and want to try modifying rasteri's design please let me know. If you design anything I'll pay for boards myself and test them. (I also offered rasteri but I understand he's very busy and his goal seems to be shrinking the PC as much as possible instead of expanding I/O; obviously this is perfectly OK but my goals/wishlist is a bit different) 😀