85 replies to this topic

[MikePinball]

I am pleased to announce the Pinscape V2 All-in-One (AIO). It is 100% compatible with Pinscape V2 and contains all the functionality of the Pinscape main board, power output board, and chime board integrated into a single circuit board. The only changes are the addition of 3 power indicator LEDs and the use of pluggable screw terminal blocks (for a total of 128 connections). Here is a picture:

 

 

See my recent append "Why Pinscape". At the end I list some areas of improvement that are addressed by the Pinscape All-in-One:

• Single, integrated board with all the Pinscape V2 function
• Improved and more flexible connector instead of crimping 0.1 headers
• A ready-built tested and supported product that eliminates the effort and headaches of DIY PCB soldering (which can cost ~$190 for everything you need).

My objective is to provide a solution for people who want to upgrade their older setup to use the more modern pincab controller or for newbies just getting started. I have also provided a user guide that explains all of the connections on the board. The full kit contains the following items as shown in the picture below:

• 6.8” square circuit board with Pinscape V2 functionality and serial number label (as shown in the picture above)
• 16 pluggable screw terminal blocks used for the 128 on-board connections
• 4 PCB standoffs with associated screws
• 2 TSAL6400 IR LEDs
• 1 TSOP38238 IR receiver                                   
• Original KL25Z box and short USB cable

 

An important aspect for any product is that it is fully tested before being shipped to customers. The picture below shows my testing rig which I use to test every input and output on each the Pinscape AIO board.

 

 

Edit: Fix to a font problem only for better readability on a phone.

Edited by MikePinball, 09 August 2019 - 02:22 AM.

[MikePinball]

Hopefully I have got some people interested in Pinscape AIO. I think this is first significant advancement to Pinscape since MJR introduced Pinscape V2 3 years ago. Certainly he deserves our continued praise and admiration for the great job he did.

 

The price for the Pinscape AIO is $200 $240 not including shipping. I can ship USPS priority mail to the USA. I can use first class airmail to the rest of the world to keep down costs (unless you are willing to pay extra for international priority mail). I cannot ship to Italy (sorry) or any country on the US embargoed or sanctioned list.  

 

Feel free to append comments here about what you think and your interest level for this type of integrated solution (send me one now, next 3 months, next 6 months). If you want one of these early boards, please email me at o a k m i c r o s at austin dot rr dot com rather than using messaging on this forum.

Edited by MikePinball, 07 February 2021 - 04:52 PM.

[BorgDog]

interesting product and I'm sure many could find useful, especially the no assembly part.  for me the modularity of the originals is a bonus.  I actually don't need a power board, but I do need 2 chime boards for all the timed circuits I need so I just bought what I needed (although is all still in a box waiting to get to the top of the list of projects).

 

I'm not sure how much of a "significant advancement" this is however.  I see a change in form factor and easier connections and pre-assembled, but what has been added that advances Pinscape beyond convenience? 

[MikePinball]

It is true that there are no technology advances here, per se, as I wanted to stay 100% compatible with the original design. This is in fact my third Pinscape board design. Here are the other two which I currently use in my MikroController cabinet:

• Power output board with fuses

• Pinscape main board with Teensy support

As you correctly stated the Pinscape AIO board is all about convenience and reducing the barriers to entry. Perhaps it was hyperbole on my part to call it a significant advance but not everyone has the skills and experience to solder their own boards. The other product out there has problems that have nothing to do with Pinscape and which could turn someone off the whole Pinscape concept. I want to turn this around so that more people can utilize Pinscape for their cabs.

 

BTW Bravo Dan on your real Pinball solenoid cab.

[mjr]

interesting product and I'm sure many could find useful, especially the no assembly part.  for me the modularity of the originals is a bonus.  I actually don't need a power board, but I do need 2 chime boards for all the timed circuits I need so I just bought what I needed (although is all still in a box waiting to get to the top of the list of projects).

 

I believe this design still includes the connectors for additional boards, so you could (for example) still add more chime boards as needed.  That of course doesn't let you remove parts you don't need, but it at least lets you add extra things you do need.

 

I talked with MikePinball a little bit while he was working up this design, and it sounded like the a single combined board was the only way to get it manufactured at a reasonable cost.  It sounded like it would have been considerably more expensive to manufacture it as three separate boards.

 

 

I'm not sure how much of a "significant advancement" this is however.  I see a change in form factor and easier connections and pre-assembled, but what has been added that advances Pinscape beyond convenience? 

 

You're right that it's the same in terms of functionality (although I like to think the functionality was already pretty good! )  But I think "fully assembled" is actually a pretty big feature for a lot of people.  It's obviously appealing to anyone who's not all that comfortable with DIY electronics, but even a lot of DIYers might like the idea of saving the time required to do all the parts sourcing, soldering, and troubleshooting of a scratch build.

[STV]

Wow.   

[wrd1972]

This is a really fantastic 1st step forward for folks that want to avoid the tedious process of building a Pinscape controller, from the bare boards. It also totally makes sense that in order to have a reasonable cost, there would have to be a single board such as what has been announced. No way around that.

 

Also when you take into account the cost of individual components, the time to build the boards, and how much better it performs than everything else on the market. The cost of $200 is a VERY reasonable price for this board.

 

One question. Is the board using the pair of "old TI chips", like are found on the power board?

[MikePinball]

Thank you for the positive comments so far. Obviously STV has been left speechless To answer a couple of questions:

 

1. Pinscape AIO does support the 10-pin expansion headers for adding additional power output or chime/digital boards. See the light blue area in the picture below.

 

2. The  "old TI chips" reference needs to be explained. This refers to the TLC5940 16-channel LED driver with PWM. Obviously the through-hole version didn't do so well and is now only obtainable through sites like ebay. Eventually that stock will dry up. However, the Pinscape AIO board uses a surface mount (SMD) version of that device, which is still being actively sold by TI. For example, Mouser has more than 9500 in stock. There are 2 of these chips on the main board and 2 on the power output board. As expected, the Pinscape AIO board has 4 of these chips indicated in red on the picture below.

 

[blietzkrieg]

Shut up and take my money!

I for one, do not have the time, patience or soldering / electronic skills to endure the tedious task of building one myself. For that reason, I went down the road of purchasing from German Gaming Supplies (who I believe before now were the only ones who sold the boards pre-assembled?). Well what huge mistake that turned out to be!

After 2 months of waiting with no reply from GSS, my board finally arrived - but it didn't work. IC1 and IC2 on the power board were soldered the wrong way around causing none of the 32 power outputs to work. The Opto-coupler (OK4) on the main board was soldered the wrong way around causing 4 of the 5 flasher outputs to not work. The soldering in general was obviously done by hand and was very sloppy. Some points needed re-soldering to fix. As stated earlier, I didn't rate my skills high enough to attempt fixing this lemon board myself, and I was getting zero support from Dominik from GGS (he said he would replace, but never did & then refused to answer any of my PM to him on Facebook), so I had to send it away to be repaired - incurring yet more costs. After six arduous months of my initial purchase, I FINALLY had a working board - minus 3 of the 32 power outputs. To make matters worse, It appears that I certainly was not alone in my experiences with GGS - as many others have reported of similar woes.

Unfortunately for me, this fantastic improvement to the original design came too late to save me from the headache of going down the German Gaming Supplies road, but now that problem is solved via this beautifully reworked version of the already incredible Pinscape + Expansion board.

I truly congratulate Mike in acknowledging the above issue and taking the considerable time and effort to pro-actively do something about it - by re-working and improving on the original design, by getting it professionally manufactured and then offering it for sale at an incredibly reasonable price. The quality looks superb - not to mention the quality control and should get snapped up by prospective cab builders.

I hope your efforts get recognised and praised in full by the members of these forums and the general pinball community at large as I personally feel that you deserve some sort of award in recognition of your efforts. For anyone in the process of building a cabinet, do yourself a favour and get one of these boards already - I cannot recommend this product any more highly.

[ludovids]

This gives me hope that I can have a more linear and consistent plunger as part of my cab system. I have to do some more reading to make sure Pinscape is the way for me to go, but it looks to be from what I have read so far. This will be a Winter project, so I expect I will be wanting to purchase one of these boards in 3 to 6 months.

 

Thanks MikePinball for all your effort with this. It looks like a solid product. And thanks to mjr for all the work you have done with Pinscape and other VP projects.

Edited by ludovids, 13 August 2019 - 07:19 PM.

[Outhere]

For $200 you get what's in the picture?

How does one way or this up?

What voltage can be used And what is the maximum amperage?

 

 

[Slydog43]

+1 shutup and take my money, seriously great job and want to know more and price.  This could really help out a lot of new people coming into VP

[MikePinball]

For $200 you get what's in the picture?

How does one way or this up?

What voltage can be used And what is the maximum amperage?

 

I would refer you to the first 2 posts in this thread and also chapter 3 of the Pinscape AIO user guide. In summary for $240 you get following:

• Pinscape All-in-One which is 3 Pinscape boards combined into one and has 73 outputs and 24 inputs not including plunger support and TV remote control
• 16 pluggable screw terminal blocks used for the 128 on-board connections
• 4 PCB standoffs with associated screws. Board mounting holes are on 6.5” centers.
• 2 TSAL6400 IR LEDs
• 1 TSOP38238 IR receiver                                   
• Original KL25Z box and short (20") USB cable

As mentioned above MJR has quite a good writeup on his website of the Pinscape functionality. You can also see a full description of all of the outputs in chapter 4 of the user guide. In summary you get the following:

• 16 small RGB LED outputs each of which are current limited to 20mA i.e. no resistor is needed. These outputs have PWM capability and can be used to control LED brightness. Each output is connected to the cathode of the LED. The anode of the LED is typically connected to the appropriate positive voltage such as 5V, 12V, or up to a maximum of 18V.
• 16 flasher RGB LED flasher outputs. These outputs have PWM capability and can be used to control LED brightness. Each output is connected to the cathode of the LED and can support up to 1.5A per output. The anode of the LED is connected to the appropriate positive voltage such as 5V, 12V, 24V, or up to a maximum of 50V.
• 32 power outputs that use MOSFETS. These outputs have PWM capability and can be used to control motor speed or LED brightness. Each output is connected to the “low-side” of the device and can support more than 4A continuously per output. The “high-side” of the device is connected to the appropriate positive voltage such as 12V, 24V, or up to a maximum of 50V. The high-side can be daisy-chained back to the power-supply.
• 9 timed power outputs that use MOSFETS. These outputs can only be on or off. A hardware timer is used to ensure that the output only on for 2 seconds. Turning off the output resets the timer. Each output is connected to the “low-side” of the device and can support 4A continuously per output. The “high-side” of the device is connected to the appropriate positive voltage such as 12V, 24V, or up to a maximum of 50V. The high-side can be daisy-chained back to the power-supply.

I don't understand your second question.

Edited by MikePinball, 07 February 2021 - 05:00 PM.

[MikePinball]

+1 shutup and take my money, seriously great job and want to know more and price.  This could really help out a lot of new people coming into VP

 

Per the second post in the thread, the price is $240 not including shipping. I suggest you also review the user guide for more details.

 

This was exactly my idea. Provide a solution for new people to get them started quickly. Even people who have existing cabs could quickly upgrade to a Pinscape solution like this. The screw terminals make rewiring a snap. No fiddling with crimping headers trying to figure out which pin is which and then struggling to move wires around - it is not so easy to remove wires from a crimped header block. Lastly the screw terminals can be unplugged from the board, 8 at a time making it even easier to move things around i.e. much better than traditional terminal blocks in that you don't have to remove wires from the pluggable block unless you want to.
 

Edited by MikePinball, 07 February 2021 - 05:01 PM.

[Outhere]

Sorry

I don't understand your second question.... How does one hook this up?

Obviously I need to start where in my glasses more often

[MikePinball]

How does one hook this up?

 

This is Pinscape in just a different form factor and so essentially it is the same as Pinscape except that the connectors are in a different place and they are pluggable screw terminals. At the risk of repeating myself, see MJR's detailed information about Pinscape and also the Pinscape AIO user guide.

 

I will gladly answer any detailed questions you have (and I'm sure MJR will chime in as appropriate too).

[Outhere]

I have never worked with Pinscape

If I read everything right it will hooked up like an LEDwiz with the negatives come from the Pinscape and the positives can go to the power supply

I use all real Pinball parts

It says - can support More than 4 amps continuously, Some of my solenoids pull 6 amps ( 43v ) When they're stuck on

Edited by Outhere, 14 August 2019 - 03:58 AM.

[Outhere]

 

How does one hook this up?

 

This is Pinscape in just a different form factor and so essentially it is the same as Pinscape except that the connectors are in a different place and they are pluggable screw terminals. At the risk of repeating myself, see MJR's detailed information about Pinscape and also the Pinscape AIO user guide.

 

I will gladly answer any detailed questions you have (and I'm sure MJR will chime in as appropriate too).

 

Obviously I need to start where in my glasses more often...

I put this statement in their because I missed the information in the 1st post Not because my Question did not make any sense ---  I did not expect you to reply to it - sorry

[MikePinball]

It says - can support More than 4 amps continuously, Some of my solenoids pull 6 amps ( 43v ) When they're stuck on

 

Yes 6A is a lot.

 

The Pinscape AIO uses the same width output traces for each MOSFET as the original boards from MJR and this limits the maximum continous current otherwise the traces get too hot. The ground trace for the MOSFETs on the AIO board is actually over 3 times wider than MJR's original boards.

 

The MOSFET itself is rated up to 60V @ 9.6A continuous so that it is not an issue.

 

I think your feedback is good. At the time of manufacturing this first batch of boards, I had thought about using thicker copper on the PCB (which increases the cost). Double thickness copper would effectively double the rating to 8A and would be easily suitable for real Pinball solenoids. I will definitely look at this for the next batch.

 

It is also worth getting input from Borgdog who is using the original Pinscape Chime boards with his real Pinscape solenoids. Certainly having a 2 second timer to ensure a solenoid is not on too long helps decrease the heat from a high current. Using a fan for cooling the traces on the board would also help a lot.

 

Pinscape also now has a software timer so you can turn off via software an output after some number of milliseconds. The original motivation was to allow recovery time for a Chime but there is no reason not to use this for your solenoids. After all, it only needs to be on to make the noise and then it can turned off i.e. the heat generated for 6A @ 100ms is less than 3A for a second. I'm just suggesting that 6A may still not be totally out of bounds.

 

MJR probably has more experience on high current devices and may be able to give some insights as well

Edited by MikePinball, 14 August 2019 - 05:40 PM.

[Outhere]

Thank you for your Responses and looking forward to the heavy duty board