Laserharps Pre-order!

[colouredmirrorball]

All of the IC's have a half circle notch at one end and same for the sockets. The notch should be at the top of the IC socket if you hold the PCB with the word LASER HARP at the top.
The little black transistor at the bottom should have the flat face facing down to the edge of the PCB and the blue pots have the adjusters to the top.
If you just follow the Photo in the instructions you should be on the right track.

I hope this is of help.

I've just finnished populating my PCB. Just to sort out the case and get an enclosure for the sensor.

Carl

Ah great then I did it right.
I'm stripping an old data wire for the cables. Colours will not be as the standards prescribe, but again I'm not an engineer, so I don't care LOL

[GoolGaul]

can someone send me the manual? it got sent to my wife (her paypal acct) and she got it and deleted it, not knowing what it was...

paul at thinksystems dot com

thanks!

[Things]

Sent

Cheers,
Dan

[GoolGaul]

Dan

u rule. thanks.

[colouredmirrorball]

So I hooked up all the parts that should make the board work without a laser. I assembled everything that could be assembled, connected the sensor, pot, display, midi and power connectors and left galvos, rgbled, laser modulation, switches and icsp unconnected. I hooked up the midi exit to my laptop and recorded some strange noises. I expected to have some random notes as the light sensors would pick up the light from the environment, and I actually got that, but not exactly what I expected... I got random notes varying from C# -1 (yeah they have negative notes apparently) to Eb -1 (or notes 1-4), so only four different notes, while I expected notes from the range about ~C0 to C1 (as those are the notes shown in the first bank of the screenshot of your program in the pdf, C0 equals to note value 12). Could I have done something wrong and are those notes actually noise? Because that might become an issue, I don't want random low notes in my music!

The LCD display lighted up but did not show anything. The LED on board was not working. Do the switches have to be connected for it to work or output MIDI signals? I need to look out for a solution for those so I hoped I didn't have to add those yet for testing.

Overall I'm happy with my progress, I got much further already than I would have expected. Also those fucking crimp terminals are mean bitches. I can never cut them close enough to let them fit! Oh well it seems like they work so I'm happy...

I'm gonna quit for today and think of a solution for the switches and a case... maybe I'll have to DIY.

Included is a midi file of the output I get, seems to be a repeating pattern. Strange and weird and I don't like it.

[Things]

1. Yes, the switches must be connected. The switch inputs are looking for a change in voltage state, so if you don't have them connected, the voltage on those pins will be floating, and you'll be opening/closing the harp. changing the notebanks rapidly and causing all kinds of chaos.

2. Maybe you could send a pic of how your LCD is wired, and I'll just quickly check over it for you. The LCD is connected directly to the MCU, so either your MCU isn't in properly, or you've mixed around a connection on the LCD itself (More likely)

3. The LED on the board lights when the sensors receive signals, it should not light if the harp is in the closed state. When the harp is in the open state, and you trigger beams, you should see the LED light up as you trigger them.

4. That MIDI output is indeed weird. Did you wire up the +5V pin as stated in the manual? Any possibilities of ground loops? Also, I had a similar issue with my board as well, I found that elevating it slightly from the surface it was on fixed it. It could also be related to the switch issue. That noise you hear may be the harp opening and closing all the time (Which I assume you can't see yet, as you don't have the lasers or galvo connected.

In software, it is set to output notes 1 to 4 when opening/closing. Maybe they are what you're hearing?


Let me know how you go.

Cheers,
Dan

[colouredmirrorball]

OK, indeed, I assume the notes are from the harp opening/closing. They are on channel 2, right? I'm gonna check on which channel the notes are, I just set the input to all channels.
I don't think I misconnected a wire in the LCD, but I'm gonna recheck my connections. What should be displayed when idle?

Another question arose: the board outputs + G - for blanking, but my galvo amp inputs X G Y. It looks like I can't just connect that as the blanking signals are for one scanner only but those are three wires, and to control one scanner the amp only needs two... What should I do?

(edit) so indeed, the notes are only on channel 2. Problem solved! Only the LCD left, and the scanner connection.
The connections on the LCD look like they could be better. Frickin' crimp terminals!

[Things]

Yes, the opening and closing notes are on channel 2.

When you first turn it on, the LCD should display a row of white boxes, then change to displaying the laser harp code version.

If it stays on the white boxes, that usually means that something isn't connected properly and it's not being initialized. Make sure you haven't got the main power wires on the LCD reversed too. Pin 1 on the LCD is -, pin 2 is +.

I'm not quite sure what to do about the galvo inputs, I've never seen them like that before. All the ones I've seen have a differential input for each scanner.

If you know how to wire it to an ILDA connector, I'm assuming you can just do the same. For example, X is pins 1 and 14 on the ILDA connector, and pin 25 ground.

You'd connect pin 1 to the + on the board, pin 14 to the -, and pin 25 to G.

Cheers,
Dan

[colouredmirrorball]

Dammit, it's not going to be that simple! I have to connect X to pin 1, Y to pin 2 and G to common ground, pin 25 on an ILDA connector.

[Things]

Well, you don't have to use an ILDA connector, was just using it as an example