Archive of the former Yahoo!Groups mailing list: MOTM

Now that the ice has melted, and all of our cars are caked with salt and sand, I can drive to the
post office and actually ∗ship∗ stuff next week. And trust me, I know ∗exactly∗ how far behind I
am. I just spent 1 hour updating the backlog and planning the building/kitting/parts ordering
schedule for the next 10 WEEKS.

Assembled backlog (not counting 500/600 series)

Has reached an all time high! Which is great because Feb. is the traditional slow month here
(folks paying off the last of the Christmas debts and waiting for tax refunds). I shipped 61
assembled modules in Dec/Jan/Feb with NAMM sucking up 6 weeks of that period. Most of the backlog
is from ∗new∗ customers, one all the way from Russia! The majority of the backlog is '190s, '300s
and '800s. I'll be soldering the entire week of March 10th. Right now I'm working on a batch of
440s.

Kit backlog (not counting 500/600 series)

I have stocked completely the '190, '490, '310 and '830. Starting Monday on 48 kits of the '800
followed by 36 kits of the '300. Looking over the current backlog, I should be able to ship over
125 kits out next week! I also made up some '940s, so some of you waiting on those will see them.
I am out of '910s, and it will take until around March 21st to get more back in stock (built by
outside shop). I do now have ∗plenty∗ of '960s and '990s. I have all of the parts in for the '950
∗except∗ the new wire set, which gets ordered on Monday.

500/600 series

The current guesstimate on these things shipping are as follows:

WaveWarper - mid April. I need to implement the last pcb tweak and get the rotary switches made.
The good news is that the Spectrol 100 ohm pots (for the 'Warp Factor' control) arrived Friday.
I'm not the only slow company around: these were ordered Oct. 11th :)

Fixed Filter bank - early May. The design is done, I'm going to order the front panels in about 2
weeks. The pcb design needs to be completed (going from 1 large pcb to two small ones) with the
expansion connector added. Several beta testers have played with it, all give it a huge thumbs
up.

Cloud Generator - June. This is all my fault, I have to get off my butt and do the prototype pcb
so the firmware can get going. The week of March 24th is Cloud Off My Butt Week.

uSeq - late April/early May. Needs 1 pcb revision, but the hardware is solid. Front panels in
stock. I'm ordering parts for 50 units next week. Right now, about 38 are on order. If you want
to get in the first run, now the time to order. I can't keep much inventory due to the high $$$
cost and the fact the parts cannot be used by other modules (like say TL072 op amps can be).

MIDI/CV - May. Atmel (the uP vendor) shafted us in late Dec. and we now have to add a small PIC
uP to assist in the SPI I/O hardware. Nothing much we can do here as about 2 months prior HW/SW
went bye-bye.

Also: the MOTM-480 will ∗finally∗ see the light of day in late May as well. I can't schedule time
to do the pcb layout until April. I do have 95% of the parts for it, including front panels.

Well, that's the 'bad' news. MOTM is still growing despite war gloom and a down economy. Without
MOTM, I'd be in a ∗serious∗ panic myself, as the EE job market is ZERO where I live, with no
signs of any recovery of any sort until 2004. At least the current backlog will keep me busy
until June/July. After that, I guess JH, Crow and I will have to cook up some new stuff for the
remainder of the year. SEM filter, anybody? :)

Paul S.