[sdiy] Dream ... Anybody?

[Tom Farrand]

Theo,

You raised some interesting points.  Kicking around my den I have at
least two NXP ARM dev kits I've not played with.  Maybe I should think
more in that direction.

The Dream price for tools is more of a nightmare.  If a commercial
venture got behind this the outlay would not be such a big deal.  For
just fooling around for amusement and the learning experience, the
cost cannot be justified.  (Translation: I can't afford that!)
Perhaps you are right ... toss an ARM at it and enjoy.

Laying out a PCB for an ARM (in a LQFP) is pretty straightforward,
though I wouldn't do a BGA part.  I cannot solder them at home and
many require six layers just to jailbreak some of the pins.

Many thanks for your thoughts.  And thanks to Neil and AA, also.

Best!
Tom Farrand


On Mon, Nov 28, 2011 at 6:07 PM, ezion <ezion67 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Looked at this something like 8 or 10 years ago.
> My impression was 'dream' developed this and Atmel bought it.
> There is a bit of Roland involvement too, think JV series of romplers. Never found solid info about this though.
>
> As far as memory serves...
> At the time the IC where cheap but only available in bulk.
> Turned out that bulk was 10,000 not 1000 or 100.
> The full development system had a price point to match in the order of $9000.
> A PCI card to test code written by dream went for about $600.
> I didn't go for it, way out of my budget.
>
> Nice looking parts though.
> A uC for handling midi, patch changes and other non time critical stuff and one (or two) special purpose synth DSPs.
> The concept of the synth DSP looks very interesting.
> As the DSP structure takes care of all things polyphonic you only have to code a single voice.
> Programming is done in a bit odd model, write short bits of assembly code as a kind of macro and then chain those together.
> Code examples show it is quite easy to build all kinds of filters with the instruction set provided.
> Bottom line, just using this as a home-brew rompler is a bit silly, there is much more power in there.
> The thing can do 32 voices of XOXBOX in software without breaking a sweat.
>
> As a last thought...
> For a home made rompler without VA oscillators or filters you don't need the 'dream' part, just a uC and a SD card for bulk storage.
> Paying back a sample, even when you need to transpose, does not consume a lot of cycles, a 70Mhz ARM part can do well over 32 voices.
> Also makes for a smaller and easier PCB.
>
> Or be practical about it and don't DIY, second hand hardware samplers with HD are available for under the $150 these days.
>
> Cheers, have fun,
> Theo
>
>
>
> On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 10:16, Tom Farrand <mbedtom at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> I was curious if anybody here has done anything with Dream synth and
>> effects ICs.  Anybody play with these?
>>
>> http://www.dream.fr/about.html
>>
>> Click on "Devices" and then scroll to SAM2553.  That looks interesting to me.
>>
>> Supposedly these parts can be had for less than $6 which is a decent
>> price point but a source eludes me.  Some of these parts were possibly
>> designed by Atmel.  At one time in the past, I think the SAM2195 was
>> officially known as an ATSAM2195 which looks a lot like an Atmel part.
>>  Now, Dream seems to be leading the charge.  The SAM2195 comes in a
>> QFN package which is pretty hostile to home-brewing but other parts
>> come in QFLP packages which are very hackable into a home-brew
>> environment.  A quick search on Atmel's website comes up with nothing,
>> by the way.
>>
>> Making a downloadable ROMpler synth would be kinda cool.  I am
>> thinking that sampling a monophonic analog synth and using these parts
>> to play back in polyphonic terms would be interesting.  Am thinking
>> that throwing a micro of some sort on the board would allow a USB
>> download of samples that would be stored on a SDHC card and conjured
>> up on demand.  A 32GB SDHC card would hold a ton of samples that could
>> be downloaded to the ROMpler IC on demand.  Might be interesting for
>> gigging as a beast of a modular synth isn't very portable but sounds
>> excellent.  Or making a XOX box using these chips as the sound
>> generators would be interesting as well.  Don't like the sound ...
>> change it.  Re-sample it and download something to your liking.
>> Anyone for a 2011 version of a SID?
>>
>> I see potential for a cottage industry here.  I might not be the guy
>> to do it but it is interesting all the same (unless of course I could
>> earn enough to buy health insurance).
>>
>> Peace.
>> Tom Farrand
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>