444 replies to this topic

[zebulon]

Ok, so I have spent almost a day researching parts lists, parts supply houses, etc. Thanks to the gov't of the country I live in, I can't get the price of the components down below $65.00 each on an order of 10 boards. That means that for me to assemble the board would be $75.00 plus shipping. I'm still willing to ship bare boards to those with a source for cheaper components at $15 per board or $25.00 for two.

If I can get a firm 10 board order together, I'll order the parts.

Thanks for the interest everyone.

[russdx]

may i ask where you get your pcbs made?

[Darkfall]

Zeb!

This looks awesome! (I'm just hearing about this now - I've been sort of "head down" for a few weeks, while I deal with a large client that just came on board)

It looks like I'll be building another cabinet in the summer, and a set of the 16 output boards would totally simplify the build, and probably make for a nicer build, too, with the optos instead of the board full of little mechanical relays.

Nice work!

I'll be in touch as soon as I have word on whether the new build is going forward (it's for a friend - kind of a thank you for landing my business a massive sale - and I mean massive! - thus the "head down" mode lately) I expect it'll happen, though. He's pretty excited about owning a virtual pinball cabinet with all the goodies.

In terms of the price, considering this gets rid of the cost of buying resisters, relays, boards to mount them on, and the dual H-bridge for the shaker, not to mention the time to assemble all that stuff, all while providing a better overall solution, your price is pretty reasonable. In the grand scheme of a $4000 pinball cabinet, $75 each for a pair of these to enable all 32 outputs on the LEDWiz quickly and easily is pretty much a no-brainer in my eyes.

I am curious about the Arduino solution that PixelMagic was talking about, too. Something that reduces the latency issue with the LEDWiz would be pretty spectacular. In this thread is the first I've heard of such a solution. I wonder if it's close to being available? The LEDWiz is an ok product, but honestly, it's not everything it could be. It seems to me that the stuff from Ultimarc is better engineered, but support isn't as solid in the PinMAME world as it is in the MAME world, unfortunately. An Arduino solution, though, would be the apex of perfection, if it were available and supported by the community. Support of the community is the key.

Edited by Darkfall, 18 March 2012 - 03:02 AM.

[zebulon]

Zeb!

This looks awesome! (I'm just hearing about this now - I've been sort of "head down" for a few weeks, while I deal with a large client that just came on board)

It looks like I'll be building another cabinet in the summer, and a set of the 16 output boards would totally simplify the build, and probably make for a nicer build, too, with the optos instead of the board full of little mechanical relays.

Nice work!

I'll be in touch as soon as I have word on whether the new build is going forward (it's for a friend - kind of a thank you for landing my business a massive sale - and I mean massive! - thus the "head down" mode lately) I expect it'll happen, though. He's pretty excited about owning a virtual pinball cabinet with all the goodies.

In terms of the price, considering this gets rid of the cost of buying resisters, relays, boards to mount them on, and the dual H-bridge for the shaker, not to mention the time to assemble all that stuff, all while providing a better overall solution, your price is pretty reasonable. In the grand scheme of a $4000 pinball cabinet, $75 each for a pair of these to enable all 32 outputs on the LEDWiz quickly and easily is pretty much a no-brainer in my eyes.

I am curious about the Arduino solution that PixelMagic was talking about, too. Something that reduces the latency issue with the LEDWiz would be pretty spectacular. In this thread is the first I've heard of such a solution. I wonder if it's close to being available? The LEDWiz is an ok product, but honestly, it's not everything it could be. It seems to me that the stuff from Ultimarc is better engineered, but support isn't as solid in the PinMAME world as it is in the MAME world, unfortunately. An Arduino solution, though, would be the apex of perfection, if it were available and supported by the community. Support of the community is the key.

Thanks Darkfall, I'll have some ready for shipping soon. Let me know when you need them.

[Darkfall]

Zeb!

This looks awesome! (I'm just hearing about this now - I've been sort of "head down" for a few weeks, while I deal with a large client that just came on board)

It looks like I'll be building another cabinet in the summer, and a set of the 16 output boards would totally simplify the build, and probably make for a nicer build, too, with the optos instead of the board full of little mechanical relays.

Nice work!

I'll be in touch as soon as I have word on whether the new build is going forward (it's for a friend - kind of a thank you for landing my business a massive sale - and I mean massive! - thus the "head down" mode lately) I expect it'll happen, though. He's pretty excited about owning a virtual pinball cabinet with all the goodies.

In terms of the price, considering this gets rid of the cost of buying resisters, relays, boards to mount them on, and the dual H-bridge for the shaker, not to mention the time to assemble all that stuff, all while providing a better overall solution, your price is pretty reasonable. In the grand scheme of a $4000 pinball cabinet, $75 each for a pair of these to enable all 32 outputs on the LEDWiz quickly and easily is pretty much a no-brainer in my eyes.

I am curious about the Arduino solution that PixelMagic was talking about, too. Something that reduces the latency issue with the LEDWiz would be pretty spectacular. In this thread is the first I've heard of such a solution. I wonder if it's close to being available? The LEDWiz is an ok product, but honestly, it's not everything it could be. It seems to me that the stuff from Ultimarc is better engineered, but support isn't as solid in the PinMAME world as it is in the MAME world, unfortunately. An Arduino solution, though, would be the apex of perfection, if it were available and supported by the community. Support of the community is the key.

Thanks Darkfall, I'll have some ready for shipping soon. Let me know when you need them.

Will do, Zeb.

I'll go eyeball PM's stuff, too - see how it'll all fit together *grin*.

Thanks, Zeb.

[russdx]

if you want to get around the latency issue id go with a PIC32 micro controller the ones with the built in FULL speed usb2. commands would be sent EXTREMELY fast!

PIC32-USB + loads of ULN2803's + dual H-bridge for the shaker would make a sweet little driver board.

[Darkfall]

if you want to get around the latency issue id go with a PIC32 micro controller the ones with the built in FULL speed usb2. commands would be sent EXTREMELY fast!

PIC32-USB + loads of ULN2803's + dual H-bridge for the shaker would make a sweet little driver board.

My concern was the load USB puts on the CPU. USB is a pig when the port is being used heavily.

There are PCI based controller boards out there that have a bunch of TTL outputs you could interface with a driver board to run everything.

The other option is using the LAN port and sending data to a controller that could decode commands quickly. The problem is, something like an Arduino is too slow to handle fast network traffic with a heavy stack like TCP/IP. You'd need something more like an ARM chip based controller. LAN communication would be less taxing on the CPU, since most LAN chips offload the CPU entirely.

Lots of ideas - no time to execute any of them! LOL.

[russdx]

ah yes

Ethernet is a cool idea i like that , most new LPC arms come with built n Ethernet so wouldn't be much work to get that up and running receiving commands, but would it be easy to set up? it would have to be connected to a router?

I still think using the right usb controller you can get it fast without cpu load

there are loads of solutions some one just needs to spend some time researching them all hehe

[Darkfall]

ah yes

Ethernet is a cool idea i like that , most new LPC arms come with built n Ethernet so wouldn't be much work to get that up and running receiving commands, but would it be easy to set up? it would have to be connected to a router?

I still think using the right usb controller you can get it fast without cpu load

there are loads of solutions some one just needs to spend some time researching them all hehe

No need for a router. A crossover cable would do the trick, if you were just connecting the motherboard and controller. If you also wanted to connect to a network or the Internet, then you'd need a switch between the motherboard, controller, and router to the Internet - but nothing too terrible. Some motherboards even have a second network port you could dedicate to the controller.

[russdx]

ah im with you, yeah i was thinking along the lines of if the machine was networked as well.
iv never really worked with Ethernet peripherals on microcontrollers before, do you just give it a fixed ip address and then the pc just connects to that and just starts sending data packets?

[zebulon]

So I spent some time and created a test bed since my g/f has a hard time with all the gear laying around the computer desk like so much shrapnel.....



Hopefully I'll be able to score a webcam somewhere to put up some youtube videos of it in action.

[russdx]

thats cool!

[zebulon]

Some videos in operation.....

Edited by zebulon, 19 March 2012 - 01:03 AM.

[Dazz]

Please put me down for one.

[zebulon]

Please put me down for one.

Sure thing Dazz, thanks

[zoltar420]

Ok I had read thru this thread and I am still kind of confused. The board you are making hooks up to the led wiz and runs various toys, I understand that part. Whats the difference in the 3 power difference boards? Why 3 different types? Do I need all 3 or will 1 board work for shaker, knockers, and leds? Which board will best suit my needs? Sorry for the noob question but seeing as how the current setup with h bridge and all the other parts looks a bit complicated, this looks interesting

[Darkfall]

ah im with you, yeah i was thinking along the lines of if the machine was networked as well.
iv never really worked with Ethernet peripherals on microcontrollers before, do you just give it a fixed ip address and then the pc just connects to that and just starts sending data packets?

Yeah, that's how it should work. Set an IP on the PC and an IP on the microcontroller all on the same subnet (say something like 192.168.0.1 and 192.168.0.2), and just start firing packets back and forth. Not that I've ever done that with a microcontroller, but networks are my business, so that part I know *grin*.

Some videos in operation.....

Working real good, Zeb. Awesome work!

[maxxsinner]

Looks great Zeb. I just wanna see my Crees at 700 mA.

For that matter, you will prob be able to see my Crees from your place

Will this be next if we are using TCP/IP one day?


The future!

[zebulon]

Looks great Zeb. I just wanna see my Crees at 700 mA.

For that matter, you will prob be able to see my Crees from your place

Will this be next if we are using TCP/IP one day?


The future!

Yeah, I've been following that one....

Ok I had read thru this thread and I am still kind of confused. The board you are making hooks up to the led wiz and runs various toys, I understand that part. Whats the difference in the 3 power difference boards? Why 3 different types? Do I need all 3 or will 1 board work for shaker, knockers, and leds? Which board will best suit my needs? Sorry for the noob question but seeing as how the current setup with h bridge and all the other parts looks a bit complicated, this looks interesting

The one board handles higher power toys better (shaker, solenoids, gear motor, 5w crees), the other is basically just a beefier version of what you have with an ledwiz already. the small one would be more for thaose that just want a few outputs to be higher power handling.

If you run 5 RGB crees, a knocker, a shaker, and a gear drive, you probably want 2 of the high power boards. The crees take up 15 outputs alone.

[zoltar420]

5 cree LEDS take 15 outputs? Also do you have a list of the parts required for the high power 16 output board assembly? I got a local electronic surplus store I would like to try and price parts out at. Thanks for your hard work!!