[sdiy] hi

[James Patchell]

Sounds like a great final project.

Even doing just a Note ON- Note OFF midi->CV converter parser is going to 
be quite involved...in that you do need to handle all of the messages so 
you can toss the ones you don't want.

http://www.oldcrows.net/~patchell/smb1/midi.pdf

http://www.oldcrows.net/~patchell/synthmodulesII/midifirmware.zip

Those two links constain source code for two different Midi->CV converters 
I did.  Circuit diagrams are there as well.  I used the Atmel AT90S8515 and 
wrote the code in C using the Image craft compiler.  I am not positive if I 
have handled all posibilities  (please forgive my spelling....I just got 
out from an outpaitient surgury an hour ago)....but the parser seems to 
work.  A few other people have also done the same for both the AVR and the 
PIC as well....I think by looking at the code you will get an idea of how 
to do what ever it is you need to do.  The Midi Stream parser is not hard 
to do, but, it does take a bit of work.

Also, you will need to get started now, if you want to finish by June, it 
is amazing how much work it is just to do a simple synth.

If you want to scale back a bit, another good senior project would be 
making a temperautre compensated VCO.  It would be good because it would 
involve taking a lot of data of both your compensated and uncompensated VCO 
to show the kind of improvement you made...you can then write up a little 
report with all kinds of data in it...etc....Professors seem to like that 
kind of stuff....and then you can post your results on the web so all of us 
could benifit.

         -Jim

At 03:50 PM 7/20/2004 +0100, David Thomas wrote:
>hi i'm new to this mailing list malarkie but hopefully all will become clear.
>My name is Dave, and i'm about to go into my final year of an
>undergraduate electronic engineering degree at the university of
>surrey in Guildford, Surrey. I was thinking about making an analog
>synth for my final year project when i go back in september. I think
>realistically it's going to have to be a relatively simple design, one
>vco, a vcf, vca, and one, possibly two LFO and envelope generators.
>While there are plenty of designs to look at for these modules, the
>bit i want to get stuck into is a MIDI-to-CV converter, and i'm not
>relly having much luck finding any helpful info on the net. To keep it
>simple i want a fixed-channel converter that only responds to note-on,
>note-off and possibly velocity messages, but i wouldn't mind it being
>able to understand pitch wheel and a couple of controller channels.
>I'm reasonably sure that if i start now, the analog modules are not
>beyond me, but i have not much experience in programming (i did do an
>introductory module in the first year, but haven't touched it since).
>Has anyone had any experience making a midi-cv converter? I''m not
>looking for someone to walk through my design with me, but have i come
>to the right place to find some helpful people that are able and
>willing to be 'mentors' and help we with any problems i might have?
>cheers,
>Dave Thomas

         -Jim
***************************************************************
http://www.oldcrows.net/~patchell

***************************************************************