Thanks, I love your design! I like the “self contained” nature of the PCBs creating the enclosure and the creative use of the solder mask to achieve the final appearance of a floppy disk.
Thanks to eBay, I found an assembled unit. :) It has a blue LED for the drive activity, however. A rather intensely bright one. I have read others report blue LEDs being brighter than other colors. The green power LED is fine. In fact, it is bit on the dim side. I was thinking it could be an aged LED but I also see that 390 ohm resistors were installed instead of the BOM's recommended 330 ohm. Perhaps an attempt was made to reduce the blue LED's brightness to no avail. I will seek out a red LED instead. I suspect it will be at the same intensity level as the green one.
When you look for another LED, check the listing or manufactures data sheet for the Luminous Intensity, it is quoted as mcd. Also the viewing angle. You’d need to Google to find what people recommend as a suitable mcd value for status LED. Have fun with you new toy!
I don’t know who designed this, but when you go through the effort of designing a PCB then also draw in the level converter, its two resistors and a FET per channel - and in SMD it takes up less space than the extra board. Other than that it’s cool designed PCB. And I love that ADD button functionality. I don’t thing my UltimateII+ has that feature. I need to look into that :)
I design things mostly with the aim of building one for myself, not as a product in any form. I would love to consider SMD, but due to an illness I have problems handling smaller components for any length of time and this was a reasonable compromise. However, it is my hope that my projects be accessible for anyone to build - if anyone would choose to do so. I'm glad you enjoyed the other parts of it at least 😀
Can you link to the bottom PCB with the power connector at the rear? I also saw an example of a dual color OLED display on FB. Would that require a specific top level PCB? Thanks.
Hi, the power connector can only be fitted to the side - github.com/tebl/C64-Pi1541-II/blob/main/gallery/2020-09-24%2022.49.03.jpg If you wanted to make it come out the rear, you would need to update the PCB layout. The KiCAD files are in the designers github repository if you wanted to give that a go -github.com/tebl/C64-Pi1541-II regarding the dual colour OLED display, if its the one I am thinking ok, then it is the same size as the single colour display. The top part of the display is just always yellow.
Thanks. I have seen one sample photo of a built unit where the power is connected at the rear but no actual PCB layout. It already exists in the gerber files according to a Facebook poster. I was hoping to find the actual PCB layout diagram just the like the side but for the rear. I could not locate it on the PCBWay site either.
Minimum order is 5 boards per design. Quantities are in multiples of 5. I was provided the boards for free for the video, but when I’ve purchased similar ones, typically around $15 to $20 USD for 10 boards with lead free HASL surface finish, plus shipping. It’s worth playing with the quantities as sometimes it works out only a couple of dollars more.
I’d say ok for a beginner if time is taken to read through the build instructions.The most fiddley part was making the serial cable. The most time consuming part was sourcing all of the parts, and from as few places as possible to keep the postage down. Key tip, make sure you have everything to hand a read through the build first, then go back and start the build.
Yes, but you'll need to add the Jiffy DOS ROM image for the drive to the micro SD card with the name Jiffy.bin Info is buried in the instructions here - cbm-pi1541.firebaseapp.com/
Thank you sir. The only video that explains about using multiple D64 games. legend!
Love the channel, keep up the good work!
Thanks for the positive feedback 😊
Good video! Never knew another one of these was already out in the world 😀
Thanks, I love your design! I like the “self contained” nature of the PCBs creating the enclosure and the creative use of the solder mask to achieve the final appearance of a floppy disk.
Excellent!
Thanks to eBay, I found an assembled unit. :) It has a blue LED for the drive activity, however. A rather intensely bright one. I have read others report blue LEDs being brighter than other colors. The green power LED is fine. In fact, it is bit on the dim side. I was thinking it could be an aged LED but I also see that 390 ohm resistors were installed instead of the BOM's recommended 330 ohm. Perhaps an attempt was made to reduce the blue LED's brightness to no avail. I will seek out a red LED instead. I suspect it will be at the same intensity level as the green one.
When you look for another LED, check the listing or manufactures data sheet for the Luminous Intensity, it is quoted as mcd. Also the viewing angle.
You’d need to Google to find what people recommend as a suitable mcd value for status LED.
Have fun with you new toy!
@@iNimbleSloth Thanks for the info!
I don’t know who designed this, but when you go through the effort of designing a PCB then also draw in the level converter, its two resistors and a FET per channel - and in SMD it takes up less space than the extra board. Other than that it’s cool designed PCB. And I love that ADD button functionality. I don’t thing my UltimateII+ has that feature. I need to look into that :)
I design things mostly with the aim of building one for myself, not as a product in any form. I would love to consider SMD, but due to an illness I have problems handling smaller components for any length of time and this was a reasonable compromise. However, it is my hope that my projects be accessible for anyone to build - if anyone would choose to do so. I'm glad you enjoyed the other parts of it at least 😀
Can you link to the bottom PCB with the power connector at the rear? I also saw an example of a dual color OLED display on FB. Would that require a specific top level PCB? Thanks.
Hi, the power connector can only be fitted to the side - github.com/tebl/C64-Pi1541-II/blob/main/gallery/2020-09-24%2022.49.03.jpg
If you wanted to make it come out the rear, you would need to update the PCB layout. The KiCAD files are in the designers github repository if you wanted to give that a go -github.com/tebl/C64-Pi1541-II
regarding the dual colour OLED display, if its the one I am thinking ok, then it is the same size as the single colour display. The top part of the display is just always yellow.
Thanks. I have seen one sample photo of a built unit where the power is connected at the rear but no actual PCB layout. It already exists in the gerber files according to a Facebook poster. I was hoping to find the actual PCB layout diagram just the like the side but for the rear. I could not locate it on the PCBWay site either.
What is minimum order quantity for PCBs when you are ordering? And if it is not secret, how much did you pay for lot of PCBs in your video?
Minimum order is 5 boards per design. Quantities are in multiples of 5. I was provided the boards for free for the video, but when I’ve purchased similar ones, typically around $15 to $20 USD for 10 boards with lead free HASL surface finish, plus shipping. It’s worth playing with the quantities as sometimes it works out only a couple of dollars more.
Nice build. I have the more traditional pi1541 but this looks tempting. How difficult would you rate this for a beginner build ?
I’d say ok for a beginner if time is taken to read through the build instructions.The most fiddley part was making the serial cable. The most time consuming part was sourcing all of the parts, and from as few places as possible to keep the postage down. Key tip, make sure you have everything to hand a read through the build first, then go back and start the build.
Is it possible to use Jiffydos with the pi1541?
Yes, but you'll need to add the Jiffy DOS ROM image for the drive to the micro SD card with the name Jiffy.bin
Info is buried in the instructions here - cbm-pi1541.firebaseapp.com/