Help Design a community pedal (Shimmer - Reverb.)

[Ark Angel HFB]

I'll post a link on how to do it later.

Please do!

I recently signed up to the Spin Semiconductor forum and have read some of your posts. Very impressive stuff!
I have a great interest in utilizing the FV-1 for certain builds but have no idea where to start.

Any help would definitely be appreciated!

I'm in the same boat....

I have a buddy who is trying to get me to build him a tap tempo delay but he is low on cash... with this chip, I might be able to do it for him for a great deal less.

[slacker]

Here's the link http://www.spinsemi.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=348. If you use a USB to serial convertor make sure it has connections to TXD, CTS, RTS and DTR. I'd guess the type that are a cable to an actual 9 pin D connector will have all these but you can also buy ones that just break the connections out to PCB headers, designed to talk to Arduinos and the like, and some of these don't provide all the connections.

[Ark Angel HFB]

Here's the link http://www.spinsemi.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=348. If you use a USB to serial convertor make sure it has connections to TXD, CTS, RTS and DTR. I'd guess the type that are a cable to an actual 9 pin D connector will have all these but you can also buy ones that just break the connections out to PCB headers, designed to talk to Arduinos and the like, and some of these don't provide all the connections.

Hey Slacker how you been..

Anyway I'm looking at the link and I see it was posted last September... but has no follow up on it.

1) Have you tried it since then?

2) Did it work?

3) would this work for the needs of programming eeprom? http://www.ebay.com/itm/USB-Port-24CXX-EEPROM-Programmer-Reader-Writer-to-24C1024-for-XP-VISTA-WIN7-/300932129884?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item4610f3e45c

[slacker]

Yeah it works, I never got round to trying to program the eeprom when attached to the FV-1 but for programming them on their own it works great. Using the serial port takes about 5 minutes, using the USB to serial cable I bought takes about half an hour. I deliberately bought the cheapest USB to serial cable I could find on Ebay, figuring if they worked then they all should, so better quality ones might be faster.
That thing you linked to looks like it should work, can't say for sure though. Another option that definitely works is the Microchip Pickit2, the newer pickit3 is no good though.

[deadastronaut]

I'll post a link on how to do it later.

Please do!


I have a great interest in utilizing the FV-1 for certain builds but have no idea where to start.

Any help would definitely be appreciated!

me too, i'd like to know what i would need e.g. a list of  hardware/software/ to start messing with this amazing FV-1 stuff..

but with no knowledge whatsoever.....but i do have a soldering iron and a breadboard..

[Digital Larry]

The easiest, though certainly not cheapest way to get started with the FV-1 is to buy their development board.  It's more than $100!  On the plus side it connects directly to your Windows PC on USB for programming.  It has RCA in/out and needs a buffer to work well with guitar.  Input impedance is about 100k ohms.

Next would be to get one of the SKRM modules from Experimental Noize (Spin's distributor).  You'll have to mount this to a PCB (though I got mine working on Veroboard) and hook up some other stuff like an input buffer if you wish to hook it directly to guitar.  To program it (which you'll need to do) you'll have to get something like a PICKit 2 programmer.  I don't have this documented at this time but I'm pretty sure that echotapper documented it in the instructions for his FV-1 project.

For software, Spin offers a development environment, but in my opinion learning Spin ASM is very difficult.

Shameless plug dept.

Please check out my "SpinCAD Designer" FREE software (currently in beta; follow the link in my signature) which aims to make patch development for the FV-1 much easier.  I'm working with slacker to add the tap tempo capability to this program.

[Ark Angel HFB]

So I looked into the thing on ebay that seemed promissing... this was the reply.

     "sorry .it canont .thank you
        May God bless you and your family
          wish you have happy life !
            have a great (nice) day
             best regards
              YAYA
               honesty and trustworthiness "

With a response like that I'm almost sad I'm not buying something from these dudes. XD

[puretube]

DIY-SPIN-craze started here...

[artifus]

no - sorry, missed it. nearly had a puretube post there - sorry guys. he's just so elusive!

[Ark Angel HFB]

Here's the link http://www.spinsemi.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=348. If you use a USB to serial convertor make sure it has connections to TXD, CTS, RTS and DTR. I'd guess the type that are a cable to an actual 9 pin D connector will have all these but you can also buy ones that just break the connections out to PCB headers, designed to talk to Arduinos and the like, and some of these don't provide all the connections.

I went ahead and made a vero for the programmer...

[Ice-9]

Thought I would post a picture here of the FV-1 i'm working on at the moment, I have had some pcb's fabbed to play with. I have left the pots off just so you can see the pcb properly, it is mono in/out with a std pot to control a pic chip for patch selection of the external Eeprom. The Eeprom can be programmed in situ so this can be used as a FV-1 dev tool as well. I am away for the weekend but will post a demo of it working when I get back, (I have it doing a great SHIMMER VERB which is what this thread is about).

[deadastronaut]

superb..look forward to hearing this. 

[Ice-9]

Ok , I stuck some potentiometers on it and did a rough youtube vid, erm very rough !! Some work still to be done but has to be after the weekend as I'm off up to the lake district to ride some good roads on my motorcycle, so for now and  is a little clip of it.

[deadastronaut]

excuse my language..

that is f.... nice...

excellent work man.

[armdnrdy]

GREAT JOB!

I looked all over the board and could not find where you hid the midget string section! 

Can't wait for the project files!!

[Ice-9]

GREAT JOB!

I looked all over the board and could not find where you hid the midget string section!  

Can't wait for the project files!!

Little nanobot dudes run around under those pots with there nano strings. I think. 

I will definitely get something posted after the weekend. There are 2 PCB's for this project, one of them is home etchable and singe sided, the other is the one I have had fabbed in the pictures. (use one or the other).
I also have all the pictures for the cheap photoresist PCB etching that I mentioned to you a couple of weeks ago as well. (I didn't forget, but my time management is useless).

[slacker]

Very nice Mick, looks like you'll beat me to the punch releasing an FV-1 design. Are you using my PIC code for the patch selection?

[Ice-9]

Very nice Mick, looks like you'll beat me to the punch releasing an FV-1 design. Are you using my PIC code for the patch selection?

Hi Ian, Aye that code for the pic 12f683 you wrote is excellent, and I thank you for that.  I notice that you used  'rrf new,w   ;move 1 step to the right bits 5,6,7 now in positions 0,1,2' command to change the bit significance once over. I presume the rrf command be used again to set for 4 positions on the pot instead 8 etc.

I have put some pads on the pcb so that a toggle switch can be wired in instead of the pic chip. This way something like reverbs could be switched Room/hall/ plate or some other combination of effects.

[slacker]

Cool, yeah you could shift the bits to the right again to get 4 settings.

[deadastronaut]

just curious, could it do a low octave shimmer too?.