Wednesday, March 2, 2011

Redesigning a fundamentally awkward design..

so yeah..

I've started a complete Hollow Earth redesign. I really want to see it being sold again and the old design was just so difficult. Being on two PCBs, socketed ribbon cables, wired switches, hacks and tricks giving each build it's own little quirks. I've had enough of all that. The old one was designed when I was just beginning to understand microcontrollers almost two years ago and I've learned a lot since. Time to do it right, this time.

Instead:
-single PCB design
-everything PCB mounted, except jacks
-rotary encoders instead of pots, with double functions
(turn does one thing, push and turn does another, or just push, like tapping the speed knob for tap tempo)
-less parts (no "shape" stompswitch for one)
-in-program interpolation, no more smooth knob
-and so on

Probably no more vactrols either. They were a pain to bias properly so that CV-out and the actual tremolo effect played nicely together. Gonna try digital potentiometers instead.

UPDATE: I'm afraid trigger mode will probably go the way of the dodo. It never worked THAT great, and it's one of the major roadblocks in my simplifying.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Will you be starting up a list of pre-orders any time soon? Great news btw.

cloudscapes said...

People who have been on the old list get first dibs before any sort of new list is made.

Hides-His-Eyes said...

Is there a way to use a digital pot for gain without it being in the audio path?

An OTA/VCA could work too, but apart from being ROHS compliant they're not that much better in the unobtainium stakes...

cloudscapes said...

there is. I've ordered some programable gain amplifiers to play around with.
I think in the end I'm still going to end up using vactrols. just not ones I make myself, this time.

Anonymous said...

Do want!

mapmap said...

very very very excited.

cloudscapes said...

I'm afraid trigger mode will probably go the way of the dodo. It never worked THAT great, and it's one of the major roadblocks in my simplifying.