These are the first attempts at 'where will everything go' for a PIANA consisting of a Pi, a 3D printed base, a Behringer UCA202, a Not So Teeny Tiny TV, a laser-cut plywood base, a laser-cut acrylic top, and some 3cm spacers.
The little notch in the top left in the first shot is to give me a bit of headroom to attach a small heatsink to the 1117 regulator. From this perspective +12v and MIDI enter at the left, and the cables for NSTTTV pass down the hole behind it to connect to the Pi. The +12v feed up to NSTTTV isn't very conveniently placed, I may have to rework the PCB to get it to exit nearer the GPIO connector.
And that's what this experiment is about - before the PCB gets committed, is it sane in the context of the physical placement of everything else? For sure I need to measure how tall a MIDI DIN connector is, 3cm may be too short for the spacers ...
I may actually have one of these within the next two weeks, which would be pretty great.
p.s. mustn't forget to order from Shapeways the 3D printed spacer to keep the Pi and the PIANA PCB apart.
how long till release of something?!
ReplyDeleteI want to get copies to early adopters (ideally schools) as soon as possible. As soon as possible meaning -
DeleteVerify Player PCB as working good
PIC code on Player thoroughly debugged and finalized
Finalize laser cutting templates for base and lid
Ship 'Gold Master' to Seeedstudios (Player with regulator but identical PIC configuration)
Build up 3-4 PIANAs and one Chamber Orchestra
This will be at least 2 weeks as the PCBs just shipped from China today overland, so in reality I'd expect the first time it leaves the building to be in somebody else's hands for evaluation will be no earlier than 1st April, more likely mid-end April given my other commitments.
Glad to hear its getting close to being let out into the wild. What program are you using for those lovely renders? How are you getting 3d models of your pcbs? And BTW its MR Analog Monster ;-)
ReplyDeleteAlways good to know the gender of the monster you're conversing with!
DeleteI only use Cheetah 3D, every other modeler / renderer I've used in the last 30+ years has driven me insane, Cheetah just works and is for me very easy. The Pi component model is something I found (maybe on the Pi site, I don't recall), the PCBs are just boxes with a texture applied, and the texture is either grabbed out of Eagle CAD or it's a photo of a physical PCB from Seeedstudios. Because I have actually manufactured the 3D printed base I am 100% confident of its dimensions, so building out from that I should be good to make laser cuts with accurate holes.