www.megadrum.info

Hey dudes.

Hey I reckon my edrum, edrum and megadrum should 'join forces' and release all source code so we can make an ULTIMATE Roland ass kicker of a drum!!!

I'm sure with all our brains put together and those in this community, we can! Our hardware is basically the same. I'm sure we'll all say our own design is the best... but... i really do think we could write some modulated software which can be loaded on any three of them (just use compile time switches to correspond with the hardware).

by the way, here is source code for an edrum. It was based off an AVR Mega, but its now been ported to a more argubly powerful MSP430. It's written in C.
Check out the source @
http://lad-drum.googlecode.com/svn/

MegaDrum already kicks Roland's ass:) How is MSP430 good for an average DIYer? Easy to solder?

Yea thats true, but we can kick their ass even more - to the moon and back!!

ahhh, my MSP430 is SMD , u can get PDIP versions for it however.

But d/w about the hardware, its about the edrum functionality which I would like us to collaborate on. The hardware specific parts can all be modular so in order to write to the LCD all you need to call is LCD_Write(byte ) etc, and the respective function will do it all.

By Functionality I mean dynamic thresholds and other innovate edrum ideas!

but MSP430 is "only" 16 MIPS ...

Non-LCD Based :
MSP430x1xx – Flash/ ROM based MCUs offering 1.8V to 3.6V operation, up to 60kB, 8MIPS and a wide range of peripherals.
MSP430F2xx – New Flash-based family featuring even lower power and up to16MIPS with 1.8 to 3.6V operation. Additional enhancements include ±1% on-chip very low power oscillator, internal pull-up/pull-down resistors and low-pin count options.

LCD Based :
MSP430x3xx – Older family of ROM/OTP devices offering 2.5V-5.5V operation, up to 32kB and 4MIPS.
MSP430x4xx – Flash/ROM based devices offering 1.8V-3.6V operation, up to 120kB/ Flash/ ROM 8MIPS with FLL + SVS along with an integrated LCD controller. Ideal for low power metering and medical applications.

Microchip dsPIC series are better, up to 40 MIPS

A few notes:

1. Dynamic threshold is already there in MegaDrum - didn't bother giving this functionality any special name. There are others innovative ideas there as well without having proper names.
2. I already have a fully working MegaDrum prototype based on dsPIC30F4011 (I must tell it took me a few days to manage to compile a C30 compiler version without optimization limitation present in the Microchip's downloadable version of the compiler) . I'm not going to release it for a few reasons:

• a) it requires a few more resistors due to not having internal pull-ups on analogue inputs.
• b) dsPICs don't do LVP so they require building/buying a programmer.
• c) MegaDrum based on dsPIC doesn't give any noticeable advantage compared to Atmega based MegaDrum.

as you can see MegaDrum is easily portable to any MCU with available gcc compiler. Most of MegaDrum code is hardware abstract, the rest is dealt with macros.
3. I think that expanding DIY Drum trigger with an onboard sampler(saw this idea on edrum.info forum) is a dead end. It'll never be as good as BFD, EZDrummer or Addictive Drums and it'll make DIY Drum trigger much more complex, expensive and difficult to build. For the same reason LCD functionality doesn't need to be extensive - in the cheapest/lightweight form it can be controlled/configured from a PC (but difficult to use away from a computer), or a very simple LCD functionality (as in MegaDrum) to be able to make configuration adjustments away from a computer.
4. Thanks to Synthex I now remember why I didn't choose MSP430xxxx:) Yep, low MIPs.

dmitri wrote:as you can see MegaDrum is easily portable to any MCU with available gcc compiler. Most of MegaDrum code is hardware abstract, the rest is dealt with macros.

Excellent !!

I think that only reasons for having more MIPs is to increase the precision and to add features as the positional sensing.

Synthex wrote:I think that only reasons for having more MIPs is to increase the precision and to add features as the positional sensing.

I support that motion! jejeje
Sorry, I had to say that

dmitri wrote: 3. I think that expanding DIY Drum trigger with an onboard sampler(saw this idea on edrum.info forum) is a dead end. It'll never be as good as BFD, EZDrummer or Addictive Drums and it'll make DIY Drum trigger much more complex, expensive and difficult to build.

If we found a way to add a sampler it would add Live functionality to the megadrum without the use of a computer.
It doesn't matter If the sounds aren't as good as Toontrack/Fxpansion drumkit samples, they would only have to sound descent enough to trig Kick and snare, maybe even toms while playing a live gig.
This is just a thought: It would be cool to have the samplekits on usbsticks or sd-cards so that you can change sample sets depending on the song.
Sure it will be difficult, but if it's doable I'm gonna try it. I like to build things. I'm not even a drummer.

dmitri wrote:... It'll never be as good as BFD, EZDrummer or Addictive Drums ...

Personally, I dont like to wait for Windoze to boot so I can play my drumkit.