USB Audio DAC mod + LaserBoy Correction Amp

[allthatwhichis]

I'm not talking about you and your blood. I'm talking about seeing if when you hook this up to your laser projector, anything smokes or not!

James.

Those are easy pass, just study well. I have smoked many things in my projector, therefor failing the smoke test you are refering to... Performing that test on the board you gave me is making me nervous.

[James Lehman]

Those are easy pass, just study well. I have smoked many things in my projector, therefor failing the smoke test you are refering to... Performing that test on the board you gave me is making me nervous.

That's what meters and O-scopes are for !!!!

PM me your address and I'll send you a DB25 connector with all the little pins on the other end.

When you get it, ask a lot of questions in this thread and we'll both know a lot more about the whole thing!

James.

[dar303]

It's alive!





This is my ghetto projector with USB dac and correction amp displaying James autograph!

I have some blanking issues but I'll bring it over to my lab and check the levels with my oscilloscope.

Another weird thing is that I have to run one channel inverted to display the picture correctly...but anyway, it works!

I have generated a few waves with laserboy and also exported some ilda-files to Spgetthi but I'm not friend with those two programs just yet...
I don't know how to set the programs to generate green only blanking, I may end up just AND-ing the blankings with some diodes until I have more colours on the projector.

James , Laserboy is great but pleeeeease, make a version with mouse support and normal menues!
Yes, i'm damaged by countless years of micro$oft...!
Is there a manual for laserboy or it it just trial, ask & error to learn?

/d

[carmangary]

It's easy to set everything to green in Spaghetti. Just go to Scanner Settings and set all the "Map To Laser" values to Green. This will make everything that is red, green, or blue be sent to your green laser. This is assuming you have it connnected to the G pins on the ILDA connector. If you have it connected to the I pins it will also work but not as well.

[James Lehman]

It's alive!

This is my ghetto projector with USB dac and correction amp displaying James autograph!

dar303, I love you!

If you are in the USA, I will call you and tell you what you need to know in a matter of minutes. Conversation is a great thing. Better than a one sided manual, at least for now. It is hard to write a manual for a moving target. Once you see the light, you will be able to help other people, in your own way too.

If you only have green and it's TTL, use the fourth color channel out of the LaserBoy wave. It is for TTL of no particular color. To get the blanking right, you must also understand how to use LaserBoy to shift the samples of the wave to align the TTL signal to the scanner signals. Scanners are electrodynamic and the image you see is actually delayed from the signal that drives it.


James.

[dar303]

Carmangary: Thanks! I tried that but I think I must check my output levels from the card before it will work.

James: Thanks!
I'm in Sweden so that will really be long distance!
I'll read through some of the Laserboy threads and try to understand som more about it.

My laser has analogue blanking so TTL works just as well. The fourth channel, Intensity?
I would like to make som waves with a one colour spinning circle or something that are just R, G & B each on for 30 seconds or so with maximum brightness so I can test and tweak eaverything properly!

[dar303]

Carmangary: I got it to work!
The "maximum level" sliders got to be set a little over halfway to make the soundcard output a positive blanking signal with maximum amplitude, when set to low all sorts of strangeness occurs and the blankings cancel each other when some go negative.

James: I inverted the waves and now it works!
You should make the "invert wave" option globally setable so you set it once and then every wave you make is inverted.

I may invert the blanking channels directly in the hardware instead, spaghetti has invert as an option in the setup menu for the hardware.



I'm a bit surprised no one else has had these problems and asked these questions, am I the only one actually using these two programs with this DAC?
...or is it me = stupid?

[carmangary]

I just ordered one of DrLavas sound card mods so I'll have one up and running soon and will be able to test it live and work out all the kinks. It is entirely possible that I am not sending the correct values.

I hardly ever get any bug reports for Spaghetti. I think that most people find a bug and just figure the software is crap and don't use it. All they have to do is report it and I'll probably fix the bug the same day if I can. I recently found out that the RIYA driver flat out didn't work for several months. I was lucky enough that RIYA sent out a DAC to me to test with so that I could get it working, though.

[dar303]

I used my oscilloscope and it was quite easy to see what I had to do.

Can I make a suggestion? Please add a white circle with maximum size to your "test frames" along with the ILDA test fram and the others, that would be a good way to set all the channels of the soundcard easily.

Thanks for creating Spaghetti for all us cheap/poor wannabe laserists!

[James Lehman]

James: I inverted the waves and now it works!
You should make the "invert wave" option globally setable so you set it once and then every wave you make is inverted.

I'm a bit surprised no one else has had these problems and asked these questions, am I the only one actually using these two programs with this DAC?
...or is it me = stupid?

In LaserBoy, hit the 'u' key from the main menu. Choose option 'd' to invert all wave output from LaserBoy. [Esc] back to the main menu. Choose option 'o' to save a file out. Choose option 'i' to save the LaserBoy system settings file. The next time you open LaserBoy it will be set the way you just saved it.

You are one of a few pioneers, my friend!

James.