Blog Archive

PCBs!

Saturday, 2 May 2009 8:05pm

I've been working on my GSSL Control project lately. I've designed a PCB for it, and got it back from fabrication. I managed to solder all the SMD stuff without incident so far. I've got a debug LED flashing, which is a good start. I'm using an AT90USB1287, and was planning on just using the DFU bootloader from Atmel, but it turns out that the USB bootloader can't program the fuse bytes. I had to dig out my USBasp and do some dodgy wiring to program the fuse bits to turn of the CLK/8 bit. Now I've done that though, the USB bootloader should be fine. I'll try and update the project page when I get some time.

Housekeeping!

Saturday, 28 March 2009 3:15pm

It's been a while since I posted an update. I've been super busy working on the game with Glenn. We've frantically coding the 0.04 release. Check out where we're up to at codetactics.com.

I've tidied up some of the projects in my project page. I haven't been working much on my audio electronics projects, they tend to be expensive and at the moment I'm saving for a holiday. Working on Apollonia is a much cheaper hobby!

I've been playing a bit of PS3 lately, so I've added a project page that shows my gamer card. You can now check out my trophy collection and keep up with what I'm playing here.

Projects!

Thursday, 29 January 2009 2:21pm

Glenn and I are coming up on the second release of our game, version 0.02. We've been managing the project through Assembla, which is amazing. Make sure you check the codetactics site for updates on that.

I'm going to start documenting my SSL compressor control project, so I've made a project page for that. Once I get started, it'll have all the design, and requirements etc. Should be cool.

Release!

Sunday, 11 January 2009 4:09pm

Glenn and I have finally released the first version of the game. You can go and download it from codetactics.com. Any feedback would be good!

Happy New Year!

Thursday, 1 January 2009 9:13am

I managed to trade in my Digidesign 001 recording interface for a brand spanking new 003 Rack Factory with Music Production Toolkit. It was a bit of a mission getting the paperwork in order, but I'm super happy. This included a free update to Protools 8, which I've downloaded, but haven't managed to install yet so that'll be a cool late Chirstmas present when I can get it installed.

I also got a new guitar for Christmas (partly from myself, partly from Laura). Its a Fender Richie Sambora signature Stratocaster. 1996, Lake placid blue, rosewood neck, Floyd Rose double locking tremolo, humbucker in the bridge. I'll get some photos up when I can.

Lately I've been working a lot on Glenns helicoper game. He's aiming for a release pretty soon. We've got a domain, codetactics.com, so it'll go up over there when it's done. The first release will be for Linux, Mac OS X and PSP. Should be good.

Compressor Progress!

Sunday, 16 November 2008 9:30pm

I've finally gotten around to working on my SSL compressor clone. I managed to mount some of the controls on the front panel. I have been putting it off because I was pretty sure mounting the meter was going to go terrible, it needed a square hole, but didn't have a lip around it so the hole needed to be pretty much perfect. I decided I'd just go for it! It worked out ok - you can check out some of the photos over at the project page. Just photos at the moment, I'll type up some descriptions later.

I also managed to update my hackintosh to 10.5.3 as well, which went really well. Boot times are faster, and my graphics card and sound still work!

More Hackintosh!

Sunday, 9 November 2008 8:58pm

I finally got the graphics card working on my hackintosh! I tried NVinject so many times off the Kaylway CD, but it didn't work and just made everything unstable. Finally I found an all in one installer gf5200.zip that works really well, so now everything is hardware accelerated. After I got that working, I thought I would go for broke and enable the onboard sound and ethernet, and just see what happened. Surprisingly, everything just worked! Awesome. Made some room on an external hard disk and got time machine going! It's taken all weekend, but it's so worth it.

Hackintosh!

Sunday, 9 November 2008 3:08pm

I've spent pretty much all weekend trying to install Mac OS X on my recording computer. (Don't worry, I have a family license for Leopard, so its as close to legit as you can get!) The computer is pretty old and a mishmash of parts, so I was expecting to do a bit of trial and error, but it ended up being harder than I thought it would be. It's a P4 3.0GHz and Asus P5P800S motherboard. At first I couldn't even boot off the install disk - after hours of tracking it down, it turns out the graphics card (GeForce 2 MX 400) wasn't compatible. $50 later, I have a brand new nVidia 5200 FX which allowed me to boot the installer!

I've done the install 10 times trying to get the graphics card to work in a higher resolution that 800x600. Gladly, the graphics card is the only piece of hardware I need to get working, everything else should be basic. I've turned off the onboard networking and sound, I won't need them. Hopefully I can get the graphics sorted out tonight. Remind me to take an backup disk image when everything is working right...

Updates!

Monday, 3 November 2008 3:22pm

I finally got around to finishing up the wiring on my balancing project last night. Its fantasitic to finally finish something! I've taken some photos, which I'll upload tonight when I update the project page. Now I'm going to be able to focus more on the SSL Compressor clone automation project. I've got a good idea of what I'm going to do, but I have to finalise the features and then

Lately I've been working on a whole bunch of stuff that I haven't got project pages for, Glenn's helicopter game, a little PSP game of my own as well as Project Euler. At the moment I've done 37 problems, which isn't a small achievement.

Wow!

Tuesday, 16 September 2008 8:59pm

It's been ages since I posted an update! I haven't done much on my projects, unfortunately. But what I have done is play some Playstation :P Ratchet and Clank: Quest For Booty was amazing. Laura and I 100percented Lego Indiana Jones which was awesome. I played the demo for the new Civilization game and I'm super keen to grab it - I'm just afraid I'll like it too much.

Organisation!

Thursday, 7 August 2008 1:34pm

I've been organising my recording gear, tidying up the cables etc, as well as moving the racks to under my computer desk to make more room in the spare room. I can't use the massive server rack I got from work any more, so I decided I'd get a 3 space rack case. I ordered one from Cases.com.au, and I can't recommend them enough. very good prices, super quick shipping, and the case is very good quality. So everything is a lot cleaner now, I'm happy.

I'm thinking about rewiring my SSL compressor clone to be MIDI controlled, and writing a VST plugin that sends messages to it over the MIDI. It won't be too hard, but I'm still trying to think of the best way to handle the controls that are currently potentiometers. I haven't started cutting holes in the front panel of the case it's in, so it's not too late to decide. Need to decide if it should have an LCD display or not...

Power Supply!

Sunday, 20 July 2008 8:16pm

I've finally finished building the power supply I've been working on for a while. It's good to finally 100% finish a project. And it's a prerequisite to finishing my balancing project. I've started a project page for it, and writing it up. I took some photos before I screwed the box up, so I'll be able to put those up too, as well as some photos of the finished product. Awesome!

RSS!

Sunday, 20 July 2008 10:55am

I've just implemented an RSS feed of my blog! I've never used an RSS feed before, so I'm not sure if my implementation is particularly useful. Dominic was asking me for one so he could syndicate my blog over at Something Emporium. If you want to check out this awesome feed, it's over here.

Fixed!

Saturday, 19 July 2008 9:35am

When Dominic updated our server to Symfony 1.1 earlier in the week, the project details page stopped working. It was a really minor error on my part, but I finally got around to fixing it. I had to upgrade my development environment, and get it all working before I could track down the problem. Everything is good now though. I hope my whole weekend is as productive as it's started out!

Games!

Sunday, 13 July 2008 8:35pm

I'm pretty slack, I haven't done much on my projects. My bro has been staying, so the last week or so has been pretty busy.

I have been really enjoying some video games. The Playstation 3 has just introduced this concept of 'Trophies', which I'm really excited about. The only game I have that supports it is Super Stardust HD, so I'm trying to get all of the trophies in that, but unfortunately I need a lot more practice!

Finished!

Saturday, 28 June 2008 10:10pm

I've finished mixing the 3 tracks for Taken By The Silence! I guess the last song will uploaded to their myspace in the next couple of days.

I've actually done some work on some of my other projects as well. I built a power supply for my balancing boards - I build a +-15V and 48V supply based on schematics from JLM Audio. I'll put the power supply in a box tomorrow and give it a project page of its own. But I did fire up one of my balancing boards using it, and everything worked fine! I took some measurements using RMAA and I'm pretty impressed with the results. I'll upload more information about that as I get time.

As well as mounting the power supply in a box, I'm planning on mounting more parts of my SSL compressor in it's box tomorrow as well. It should be productive and I should have lots to report on Monday!

I've been working on programming a game with my mate Glenn. I'm really enjoying it. It's a helicopter arcade type thing. It's cool to collaborate on something like this, I've been meaning to write a game for a while. We're focusing on making it multiplatform, and have so far got it working on Mac, Linux, and PSP. Windows is planned, and should be too much trouble. I'll post more information about this as we develop it - watch this space!

Waiting!

Friday, 13 June 2008 5:03pm

So I'm still waiting for my order of THAT chips from Farnell. I guess they're out of stock here and they're coming from England. In the mean time, I've been playing the Penny Arcade game, which is pretty good fun. I'm also almost finished mixing the second song for Taken By The Silence, which is coming along pretty well. Just some final tweaks, and it'll be done. Then it'll go up on thier myspace which is here. Check it out!

Progress!

Sunday, 8 June 2008 9:08pm

For the first time in ages, I've made some progress on my audio balancing project. One of my workmates picked up some stuff from Jaycar for me. I managed to pull together enough parts to populate one of the boards, with everything except the main IC (the THAT 1646 which is really the brains of the operation). It was a pretty tight squeeze (I used sockets in place of the ICs), the board is packed pretty tight. I've also just placed the order for the ICs so they should be showing up soon, and I'll be able to try these boards and see if they work, or if I'm a failure.

Fish!

Monday, 2 June 2008 1:31pm

On Saturday we went and got a fish tank, as well as some furniture from Ikea to put it on. On Sunday we went out and got some fish! We got 2 goldfish and a catfish. Totally awesome.

Lately I've been working on mixing some songs for a local progressive rock type band called Taken By The Silence. One of the songs is done, and up on their myspace, 2 more songs to go. I'll post a link when I find the myspace link.

Monday!

Monday, 26 May 2008 1:32pm

I've been really busy lately, although I can't remember what I've been doing. I was sick for a couple of days last week, and I'm still not feeling 100%. On the weekend we saw the new Indiana Jones movie, which was pretty cool.

During the week I managed to mount some stuff in the case of my SSL compressor, which is good. I still need to screw in the IEC connector, but I cut a hole for it and mounted the power switch, as well as rewiring the power supply to use the switch. I can now put the top of the case on, and just have the front panel board sticking out the top, which works fairly well.

My PCBs arrived from China. They look really good! I'm going to place some orders for parts when I get the time.

Dreamworld / Big Brother!

Monday, 19 May 2008 1:09pm

Yesterday we went to Dreamworld, and spent the whole day there. We had some free tickets to the filming of the Big Brother sunday night Eviction show, so I figured while we're down in Dreamworld for the Big Brother show, we should go early and spend the whole day there. It was a really great day. Watching the Big Brother filming was really interesting. So I didn't manage to get too much done on my projects.

The prototype PCBs are fabricated an on thier way from China, which is cool. I'm expecting them Wendesay or Thursday. I have to some time place an order from Farnell to get the chips I'll need to use those boards.

I managed to get to Jaycar on Saturday and pick up some of the stuff I need to finish up my SSL compressor, like the power switch. Hopefully I'll have some time this week to get stuff mounted in the case I have. I'm doing some mixing that I hope I can use this compressor on, so that is some good motivation.

Web Updates!

Sunday, 11 May 2008 7:52pm

Well, I've managed to do some website stuff, and now the contact page is up and working! Also, now the main page only shows the last 5 blog posts, and there is a new blog archive page that shows all blog posts ever! This system may get unworkable, and I'll have to paginate the archive. This will work for a while though.

I drilled some holes for the TRS jacks on the back. It was good fun. I went out and got some files from Bunnings Warehouse today, so I can tidy up the holes. With the files I can also make the odd shaped holes for the IEC connector and the meter. I'll still need another size drill bit to drill the holes to mount the pots. But before I do that, I'm going to have to figure out what sidechain circuits I'm interested in. But progress!

Audio Drive!

Sunday, 11 May 2008 2:14pm

So although I thought the problem was the removable tray, the audio drive failed. I was totally kicking myself, because even after suspecting it was on it's way out, I didn't back up any of the data that was on it... and then it stopped working in the middle of something, and windows told me the disk is no longer formatted, and asked me if I would like to format it now. Long story short, I managed to get the data off of it, and onto a better, newer disk.

In other news, I got around to ordering the PCBs for my balancing project. While pricing my order, I found that getting 20 boards printed costs the same as getting 1 printed. So even though I only need 3, I got 20. If they work well, I'll sell some spares to anyone who is interested, just let me know... but to do that, you're going to need the contact page to work. I'll try and get that up tonight.

DVD Drive!

Tuesday, 6 May 2008 4:53pm

Some of the things I got out of storage in NZ and crammed into my suitcase to bring over to OZ were some computer parts - Some hard disks and DVD writer. I have been meaning to upgrade my recording computer with a DVD reader/writer for ages. I could have just bought one here in OZ, but couldn't bring myself to spend the extra money knowing that I already owned a perfectly decent one that was sitting in storage in NZ. So I brought the DVD drive over and put it in yesterday. It was way harder than it needs to be, and I struggled for ages to get it to play nicely with the other hard disks on the IDE ribbon. The problem turned out to be the removable drive bay thing I have one of the disks in, which seems to have stopped working. For a while I was worried it was the disk (it has all my audio data on it), but luckily it was just the removable bay. I eventually got it working, now I have a DVD reader.

This is my 11th blog entry, I'm hoping to sometime soon change the blog page to only show the last 10 entries, and put the others in some kind of archive. We'll see I can get time to do it between Assassins Creed and other projects.

Back in Oz!

Sunday, 4 May 2008 6:52pm

I've been back in NZ for the last the last week or so. I'm back in Oz now, recovering from the frantic rushing around we did. The reason we went back was for my graduation, which went really well. I am no longer Justin Latimer, from here on I'm now known as Justin Latimer BE MECH (MECHATRONICS). Having been away, I haven't done anything on my projects. I did pick up a whole bunch of studio stuff from storage. I grabbed a whole bunch of cables and a rack mount graphic EQ as well as a couple of computer hard drives I've been missing. While back home I got given Assassins Creed for PS3, and it's absolutely amazing. I might hold off on my projects for a bit while I finish it.

Rack Case!

Wednesday, 23 April 2008 9:03pm

Today my rack case arrived from Altronics! I'm very impressed with the service and the quality of the case. It looks really good, I can't wait to have my SSL compressor mounted in there. I have to figure out the best way to mount the toroidal transformer, and the best way to do the labels for the controls. Its nice to have the parts sorted though. I still have to decide what to do about building a sidechain mod. Lots to do!

Website Backend Updates!

Monday, 21 April 2008 12:40pm

I did some website backend updates last night. I didn't get around to sorting out blog post archiving, but I did SEO the project details URLs and change the projects so that they can be assigned to multiple categories. I found a better way of managing the database upgrades - using MySQLDiff. This handy tool diffs 2 databases and generates the SQL you need to run to make the schema the same. So I ran it on my development server vs the prodction server, and it generated the SQL necessary to run on the production sever, so I can update the schema without losing data. I'm pretty pleased with how it worked, it's pretty easy.

Pics!

Sunday, 20 April 2008 7:24pm

I finally got around to taking some pics of my SSL clone. They're up on the projects page. I've done a bit of work on my balancing circuits as well, but nothing to go on that project page. I'm going to have to do some website backend work, as I'm going to have to start archiving the blog posts. I'm also looking at the ability to assign projects to multiple categories, and maybe even change the project details urls to text. Lots to do!

New Project!

Thursday, 17 April 2008 1:24pm

I've put up a new project, some more audio stuff, just a PCB for converting unbalanced outputs to balanced. I haven't really done much on this project yet, so the write up is pretty much up to date. I'm hoping to find some time on the weekend to tidy up my SSL and then I'll put some pictures up.

Web Updates!

Tuesday, 15 April 2008 10:07pm

I've made a small update to the projects section introducing the concept of categories. Since there is only one project at the moment, its not really going to make much difference, but when there are more hopefully it'll help. I also managed to save all my data this update, unlike last time. I'm still trying to figure out the best way to do this with minimal downtime. This one wasn't bad though.

Slow Progress...

Tuesday, 15 April 2008 12:38pm

I'm slowly adding details to my project page for my SSL Compressor. It's slow gowing, I'm finding myself quite short of time. I'm adding details as I can remember them. It will be way more interesting once I put some photos up, but there are some things I need to rewire to tidy up before I'll feel comfortable with photos of my average work online. In the mean time, I'm saving up to buy the case. While I'm waiting for that though, I'm thinking about adding a sidechain filter to it. We'll see what happens. I don't want to have to modify the case once everything is mounted, so I'm going to try and have everything complete electronically before I start on the case.

Compressor!

Saturday, 12 April 2008 9:59pm

I finally got around to building the last connector cable I need to try out both sides of the SSL compressor clone I've been working on. Until now, I've only been testing one side (It's a stereo compressor). A bit surprisingly it worked first time! Not that I don't have faith in myself, I just know how these things go... This means I can finally tidy all of the electronics crap off of the dining room table!

All thats left now to totally finish it is to get it into a case. That might take a bit longer, I don't have any tools here yet, which makes the metal work hard. I'll have to wait and see what happens. In the meantime, I'll have to get to work designing a small output balancing board to turn the unbalanced outputs of my interface into balanced connections. I'll update the projects page with some more details and pics as I have time.

Oops.

Wednesday, 9 April 2008 10:02pm

So through some minor teething problems, I accidentally managed to wipe the database a couple of times! Hopefully it's all sorted, and it won't happen again. Got to work out a better way of migrating old data when I change the schema, something that is a weakness in Symfony.

On the plus side though, I've uploaded some project information for my first project, the SSL Mix Buss Compressor. More information to come!

Welcome!

Sunday, 30 March 2008 11:21am

This is the launch of my new website. Everything is still in progress, but it's a start. As I have time, I'll get more features and more information up. In the mean time, there is some awesome placeholder text to look at.