Sad news, but some good news

First, the sad news:

Ron, a.k.a. "Thinking Brain Dog", passed away a few months ago. Not only was he my friend, but he was the fingers - and at least half the brain - behind this blog.

And now, for my next trick...

With the heavy lifting of the memory unit out of the way, I'm thinking of other things. First cab off the rank is an improved IF buffer amp…

A few months ago I posted a quick write-up of a design I did many years ago, not too long after DRM first started appearing on the airwaves. It was a pretty straightforward JFET + 2 BJT design, nothing special - but it did the job. I've never been entirely happy with it though and, since that amp has graced a friend's set for years, I figured I'd build something better for mine ;)

An Updated Memory Module : Part 4 - It's Alive!

It's taken a while longer than I had planned, but it's finally done:

A fully-functioning, DIY, self contained, built from scratch memory unit for the FRG-7700!

I'm calling it the NMU-7700.

Still alive!

Just a quick post to remind people I'm still alive, and to let everyone know memory unit development is picking back up again after a short medium hiatus due to work, parts delays, and general Life.

The new & slightly redesigned main boards (smaller! better! same speed!) arrived a few weeks ago, one has been assembled for testing, all the individual functions have been proven, a few component values have been tweaked (to ensure signal levels etc. are spot on), software is being re-written to handle the design changes (and make ongoing development easier), and I'm walking backwards for Christmas...

Slow goings

I haven't had much chance to work on the memory unit software recently - lazy, then a dose of the 'flu, followed by extremely busy - but it's progressing along, albeit slowly. Soon, I promise, soon…

In the meantime though I've had emails from a few people who've been following along. Some have pointed out errors (thanks, I'd already caught most of them!), most have wondered if I'll be selling completed units or kits (more on that later), but one gave me a bit of pause. After nicely pointing out a few mistakes I've made, they wanted to know if I could help with faultfinding their factory-fitted memory unit by checking some signals & making a couple of measurements on my MU-7700.

An Updated Memory Module : Part 3a - Main Board Build

We have boards!

02/08/14, AM: Main boards arrived yesterday!

A little slower than usual (just under 3 weeks, vs just over 2 weeks in the past), but I'm not going to complain. I'll reserve my complaining for the idiot who ordered the wrong voltage regulators (TO-263 vs DPAK/TO-252); he has been given the task of finding the correct regulators on a Saturday morning. Not easy in a world where the main electronics hobby chain stocks more farting toys than surface-mount components…

For a change, I think I'll keep updating this post as I build and test the board - you don't want to dig through multiple posts, and I don't want to make them.

More when I get back from my search…

An Updated Memory Module : Part 2a - Hardware Changes, Demo Software

I know, I know … last time I said I'd post some very basic software soon. And, slackly, I haven't. Here's why…

The short version: after the first home-made prototype of the interface board I made a few changes to the circuit, re-designed the board, sent it out to have a small run professionally made, started work on schematic for the main board, ordered the parts for both, and planned to release a quick demo package after building a new interface board (rather than release my mess of spaghetti code and half-arsed functions as a 'demo' that'd need modification to work with the new design).

Most of that went swimmingly. But…