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Maybe talk to lik-sang about selling them. Not sure what kind of agreement you could come to so that you still get something in return for the work you've done but I bet they could produce it in greater amounts and take care of selling them and stuff. Just an idea.
You would have 2 (maybe 3) clients in france for now. They are willing to pay 45 euros maximum, the $ is relatively low today so it sould be ok with shipping included.
This odd world economy right now is favoring some American manufacturers. The Canadian goverment is threatening to apply 100% tarriffs to yachts and boats made here in the states. ::)
FYI, I'm in talks with online merchants right now to sell the USB Coders Cables. Nothing to report right now. No deals, no bytes, but no bad news yet either :D
Hopefully you can work something out with a major vendor. ;) You can call it the Axlen DC Coder's Cable Pro Plus Ultra.
have you thought about a paypal site for preorders :D
i am planning to get my dremcast back and start playing with it again...
later,
Chris
[quote author=84TAVeRT link=board=hardware;num=1093196907;start=75#84 date=12/08/04 at 14:58:17]have you thought about a paypal site for preorders :D
i am planning to get my dremcast back and start playing with it again...
later,
Chris[/quote]
I'll take a look at what they have to offer if my talks with other sites don't work out. Thanks.
As promised, here's the schematic to the USB Coders Cable. This is the final version. Click on it to view the full size image.
http://www.geocities.com/[email protected]
Updated schematic revision to "F": Changed resistor on RX2 line from pull-down to pull-up. Prevents spurious activiity on RX2 line when the USB bus is off-line (PC turned off or USB cable unplugged)
The PayPal route seems like an easy way to get the ball rolling. I've used PayPal once a few years ago for an EBay purchase; my Dreamcast. Basically I would accept orders via email. This would be PayPal transactions only. No credit cards. I will add an alias to my email account and post that address when I'm ready to start taking pre-orders (soon). I need to finish up a webpage that will provide you with all the details about the USB Coders Cable features, software links, pics, etc.
The 49 $US plus shipping for each unit still stands. I have not seen a need to change it providing I can keep all my costs down. Not having to fork 2-4% to PayPal per transaction for a merchant account that accepts credit cards is one way. Getting 100+ orders would be another way ;) I don't know if that much interest exists. For all I know this forum topic is visited by one or two real users... 2 VeRy neurotic users and myself ;D
That said, does anyone have a problem with PayPal?
Here's a picture of the populated Rev D pcb. It works great! No leakage issues. This baby is in compliance with USB standards for bus powered devices. As soon as I get the case machined I'll post another picture.
http://www.geocities.com/[email protected]
Here is the First completed USB Coders Cable.
http://www.geocities.com/[email protected]
Glowing in the dark...
http://www.geocities.com/[email protected]
Another view...
http://www.geocities.com/[email protected]
Wow, that is really well done and professional looking. Amazing job. ^^
looks very nice... :D
very nice, is everything included for the $49 plus shipping , or will I need a USB cable? Also does it work with the standard dcload 1.03 / dc-tool or is there a new version needed?
How difficult is it to build from your schematics?, I have 2 coder's cables now, so if I hacked off the end of one and and bought the parts etc. How much would I save? It would be a neat project to build, but if my cost saving are low I would prefer buying one, maybe I can find someone to buy my 2 coders cables and then I could aford the usb version :)
Troy
[quote author=GPF link=board=hardware;num=1093196907;start=90#92 date=12/13/04 at 11:29:50]very nice, is everything included for the $49 plus shipping , or will I need a USB cable? Also does it work with the standard dcload 1.03 / dc-tool or is there a new version needed?
How difficult is it to build from your schematics?, I have 2 coder's cables now, so if I hacked off the end of one and and bought the parts etc. How much would I save? It would be a neat project to build, but if my cost saving are low I would prefer buying one, maybe I can find someone to buy my 2 coders cables and then I could aford the usb version :)
Troy[/quote]
A USB "A" to "B" cable is not included. They can be found online for about 5 $US. Don't wate your money at Best Buy or Radio Shack. Those cables are way over-priced . Unless of course you like the shiney gold connectors 8)
With regard to dcload 1.03. If you are happy with 115200 baud then it willl work with that. If you want to take fulll advantage of 1.56M baud then you will want a copy of dcload-serial 1.0.4. I have not made a formal release of it yet pending the release of some new USB drivers for the Mac OS/X. It works well with windows (Cygwin), and Linux.
Hacking off a serial coder connector is what I did for the first prototype. It would not save you much. I'm working to keep the costs low, thus no included USB "A"-"B" cable.
You could build it from the schmatics, but if you are not used to working with surface mount components you might have some trouble. I considered making it using a pre-built USB Module from DLP designs, but the cost for that part alone is $25! That's what I used for the early prototypes, I knew I'd have to roll my own board to get any cost savings.
I'm not sure if I'll have to include a CD-R with the basic tools for Linux and Windows. I'll make them available for D/L of course. Some basic instructions will of course be needed. It's a developers tool primarily, so I'd hope the end users would have some idea on how to use it. You don't get anything but a the "Lik-Sang coders cable" when you purchased that now did you? It did not include an RS-232 extension cable either.
This is not a commerical venture. But I'm not goning to sell these at a loss either :P I need to take care of a few details before I post an address for pre-orders. I need to find out how to handle international shipments and getting this device through customs without any hassles or large expenses. I don't think there will be much of a problem in the USA and UK though.
I've been searching the web for solutions to get this device into the hands of willing buyers. Frankly I'm not all that happy with all the negative stuff I hear about PayPal. The anti-paypal sites don't exist for no reason. I need to accept orders from almost anywhere in the world. With all this in mind I've found an online merchant store called CCNow.com that lets you sell stuff off of your website. They only deal with sellers that sell tangible products that can be shipped to the customer. They don't take pre-orders. They take 9% off the top, but they handle all of the transactions and credit checks needed to process the sale. I'm responsible for shipping the product.
So with this in mind I would have to invest the money to build at least 50 units to keep costs down. I can afford to do that, but I'd like a little feedback from potential customers to get a feeling for how many units I could sell in a month or so.
To that end I've created an email address that you can send a short note indicating your desire to purchase a USB Coders Cable when they become available. I have tentatively set that date to the January-February 2005 timeframe. That will give me time to order parts and build up the units. This is NOT a pre-order, just a survey to determine interest. Please don't spam the address with email's just to make me feel good. I want serious inquiries only. I don't want to end up with many $$$ worth of unwanted inventory :P
The price as stated before will be $49 USD plus shipping. Again this is not a pre-order. This is to gauge interest. The address is printed here not as a link, but as plain text with a [NO-SPAM] section that you will have to remove before sending. The address is:
Coders[NO-SPAM][email protected]
Please remove the [NO-SPAM] before sending. Hmmm, I see Yabb put a space after the dot (.) too. Blast it ;)
I will put all users who respond on a list and will keep them informed when the device is available, or if not enough people respond I will inform them that there will be no production. I will use a list processor or respond individually to the email's so no one will have anyone else's email address.
Thanks to everyone for their interest and encouragement to date.
Regards,
Paul Boese a.k.a. Axlen
----- 28 Feb 2005 -----
This offer is now closed - no new requests will be accepted unless one of the current first responders opts out.
Paul Boese, a.k.a. Axlen
----- 28 Feb 2005 -----
First, thanks YOU very much for providing a new efficient way to develop on the OUTSTANDING DreamCast (a shame it died, **** the HYPE -Playstation 2 announcement - which killed the dream).
As I explained you, I plan to create a PCI card featuring almost everything surrounding the DreamCast (reset button, vga box, serial connector, USB connector, 240 MHz overclock, ...). So I don't need the PCB, yet I need parts.
As I want to thanks you for your job, I'd like to get the right parts from you with a little charge for your own benefit. Could you sell a plastic bag which would contain all the parts necessary, leaving me the job to solder them on my own PCB ? You could also sell it as a complete kit (including the PCB in the package), leaving the choice to the consumer to solder the parts on his own PCB or on the provided PCB (if the consumer's PCB has failed, he would have a working replacement PCB available).
Thanks for taking my idea into consideration, and again, THANKS YOU !
Kochise
[quote author=Kochise link=board=hardware;num=1093196907;start=90#95 date=12/16/04 at 02:54:23]....
As I explained you, I plan to create a PCI card featuring almost everything surrounding the DreamCast (reset button, vga box, serial connector, USB connector, 240 MHz overclock, ...). So I don't need the PCB, yet I need parts.
As I want to thanks you for your job, I'd like to get the right parts from you with a little charge for your own benefit. Could you sell a plastic bag which would contain all the parts necessary, leaving me the job to solder them on my own PCB ? You could also sell it as a complete kit (including the PCB in the package), leaving the choice to the consumer to solder the parts on his own PCB or on the provided PCB (if the consumer's PCB has failed, he would have a working replacement PCB available)....
Kochise[/quote]
Kochise,
I don't have any spare parts at the moment, but I can post the BOM (Bill of Material) with some sources. If I am able to produce some units then I will order a few extra parts for kits.
Qty Value Package Part ID Source 1 LED LED5MM LED1 Mouser 1 0805 FB1 DigiKey 240 1035 4 0.1uf 0805 C2, C3, C8, C9 Mouser 1 1k5 0805 R9 Mouser 1 2k2 0805 R16 Mouser 1 6.144Mhz HC49US X1 Mouser 1 10k 0805 R15 Mouser 1 10nf 0805 C5 Mouser 2 10uf 3528 21R C1, C10 Mouser 3 27 0805 R1, R6,R8 Mouser 2 27pf 0805 C6, C7 Mouser 1 33nf 0805 C4 Mouser 1 74V1G00S SOT23 5 IC4 Mouser 1 93C46BSN SOIC 8 IC5 Mouser 4 100 0805 R3, R5, R10, R13 Mouser 5 100k 0805 R4, R7, R12, R14, R17 Mouser 1 220 1206 R11 Mouser 1 470 0805 R2 Mouser 1 FT232BM LQFP32 0.8mm IC1 Parallax 1 SN74CBTLV3125D SOIC 14 IC3 Mouser 1 SP721AB SOIC 8 IC2 Mouser 1 USB "B" PN61729S J1 Mouser
I have created a preliminary web-page for the USB Coders Cable. It contains a brief history, a short technical write-up, schematic and parts resources.
http://www.geocities.com/[email protected]
Updated schematic revision to "F": Changed resistor on RX2 line from pull-down to pull-up. Prevents spurious activiity on RX2 line when the USB bus is off-line (PC turned off or USB cable unplugged)
Discussions have been initiated with a potential
backer for producing the units under a brand name. I
cannot be anymore specific than that at this time.
Regards,
Paul Boese, a.k.a. Axlen
Greetings,
It has been about 1 month (15-Dec-2005) since I opened up the coderscable email address for interested parties to respond to. To date 10 individuals have expressed a desire to purchase a USB Coders Cable. Most of these emails arrived in the first two weeks.
So far the party who seemed interested in helping me produce the device has not contacted me since our initial discussions.
I have 7 (seven) rev D printed circuit boards from my prototype run that I have not built up at this time. I'm am seriously considering making these the first and only units available due to lack of demand.
Since I only get good raw part discounts starting around the 50+ quantity range I would have to charge a few dollars more per unit to make up the difference in cost. The shipping charges I have to pay to each part vendor is a major factor in the end unit cost.
Obviously If I can order hundreds is individual parts then the overall cost for shipping is spread out. For instance; a typical $50 part order at Digikey will usually have a shipping and handling charge of 10 to 15 dollars! That adds a lot to cost of building a unit. So the more parts I can purchase at one time the better.
Therefore I will wait about one more week to hear back from my potential business partner. If I get no response, then the first 7 respondents (Those who already responded) will get first dibs at the 7 yet to built units.
Regards,
Paul Boese a.k.a. Axlen
Well, you put the plans up there, so people can build their own too.
Do someone know about configuring dreamkey for using the serial port instead of the internal modem ?
We discussed that on a french irc channel yesterday, if it's possible to have internet sharing by this mean, it could boost the usb coders cable demand.
The cable uses surface mount parts which makes it
difficult for some folks to build themselves of
course. I have seriously considered making a batch of
fifty units, but the cost to do it is pretty steep
compared to the stuff of similar complexity in the
"consumer" market today.
I have seven bare REV D prototype boards that I don't
have parts for right now. These may end up being the
first and the last that I make available 'after I pay
down my creditcard a bit' ;) I spent over $1000 since
last August on parts and pcb board services. Most of
which I was able to pay for with cash from a one time
stock sale. It was a lot of fun though so I don't
regret spending the money.
I saw a group of amateur radio operators formed a coop
to design and build electronic equipment. They all
put their efforts and cash together to fund the
project to build them. No profit motive. I don't
know if I could get an effort like that going in the
dcdev community or not. I've already put alot of time
into this, but I've placed all the knowledge gained on
my website. The only thing I have not done it put up
the pcb layout. I'm not entirely happy with it. I
think I could re-lay out the board so the device fits
in the much smaller case.
Anyway that's what's going on. I'll build up the last
seven boards... eventually ;) I 'was' planning on
selling fully built/tested unit for $49 USD (50 unit
production qty), but my potential 'backer' seems to
have disappeared :(
nm :) France powaaaa... What's the steps ? Could not buy a package before April...
Kochise
I'm sure there are others interested out there and just don't know about it yet. Make sure you put posts on several of the dcdev sites and stuff. I will be ordering one if they're still available after I get a million other more important things done first. (gotta pay off college classes so they don't kick me out)
EDIT: I would like to join such a coop if one is started. Currently taking many elte and csis courses and hope I would be some help to such a group.
I've been dragging this on too long. Let's cut out the
profit and consider another way to get the cable into
your hands. The current calculated cost for parts to
build each unit sans shipping (vendor shipping charges
to me for raw parts) is between $25 to $30 USD. That
$5 difference is based on the actually number of parts
purchased; e.g. I get a better price for buying 100
resistors vs 50.
I was asking $49 USD for each unit originally to cover
development costs and to compensate me for the time
required to build up each unit. I considered this a
fair price to ask at the time.
Would you consider $30.00 USD plus shipping with
payment in advance via pay-pal. There have been 17
posts from interested parties to this mailbox. That
should be enough to at least start to get better bulk
prices for some of the parts. One of the interested
parties may also have cheap source for the DC serial
plug (VS Cables).
This message is to get your feedback. If you are serious
please reply. I'll send pay-pal info if enough of you
respond.
Email coderscable at sbcglobal dot net
Regards,
Paul Boese, a.k.a. Axlen.
----- 28 Feb 2005 -----
This offer is now closed - no new requests will be accepted unless one of the current first responders opts out.
Paul Boese, a.k.a. Axlen
----- 28 Feb 2005 -----
[quote author=Alexvrb link=board=hardware;num=1093196907;start=90#101 date=01/13/05 at 22:51:17]Well, you put the plans up there, so people can build their own too.[/quote]
Quite true, but so far I have not heard of anyone doing so.
nm.
Kochise
I need the help of the DC hardware community. I sent a USB Coders Cable to Propeller (of GP/DC FreeDev fame) for him to use. Unfortunately he has not been able to get it too work. Barring some sort of hardware problem I'm at a loss.
Does anyone know if there are any Serial Clock frequency differences between the PAL and NTSC Dreamcasts? That might explain the the problem if there is a difference.
This is a copy of a message I just sent to my list of interested buyers. Just an FYI to those who might build their own cable.
-----Start of message-----
I have found a problem with the current design. It appears that the USB interface does not operate reliably when attached to "some" computers. I believe the problem is caused by the choice of the master clock frequency. The FTDI FT232BM chip is designed to operate with a 6.000Mhz clock. To make the RS232 serial side work at the maximum baud of 1.56M baud for the DC I needed to change the clock to 6.144Mhz.
It works great on my old computer. My new computer does not detect the cable properly. I sent a cable to Propeller (of DCFreeDev fame) and he has not been able get it to work. I also sent a prototype to Dan Potter to test on a MAC. He was able to use the cable, but not at the maximum baud due to driver issues under OSX. Of the four computer involved the cable worked on only half of them to date. That's a 50/50 chance the cable will or won't work for any of you.
If I go back to the 6.000 Crystal the maximum serial speed that can be used is 500K Baud. Mind you that is better than the Lik-Sang coders cable which is limited to 115200 baud.
I think it may be possible to modify the pcb layout to add a second crystal and a jumper so the the master clock speed can be switched depending upon how finicky your PC's USB controller is. You would have to open the case and move the jumper manually. (with the cable not connected to anything of course, and you will use good anti-static handling procedures, won't you :)
Getting 1.56M baud out of your cable may still be possible if your USB ports choke on the USB Coders Cable. You can try adding a ISA/PCI USB add-on card. But don't ask me which ones "might" work ;)
Adding a second crystal and jumper will increase costs by a dollar or two. Your chances of being able to operate it at max baud is 50/50. But you would still have 500K as a fallback.
Send me your comments and let me know if you are still interested.
Paul Boese a.k.a Axlen
-----End of message-----
I do not like the "band-aid" solution to the USB
problem. It's is a poor solution to the problem.
Therefore I am going to redesign the USB Coders Cable.
The design goals this time a mostly the same with the
following addition. No surface mount components. Only
through hole parts will be used. This will make it
possible to "kit" the device so "You" will have the
option to build it yourself.
I am currently looking at using a MicroChip PIC
18Fxxxx series USB capable microprocessor. MicroChip
provides sample code to creating the USB-Serial type
solution. I like this PIC series chip because the USB
core and processor core can use seperate clock
sources. That means the USB side will be solid and I
can still get the device to talk to the Dreamcast at
1.56M baud.
This is all preliminary so if you have any ideas please post them here.
Regards,
Paul Boese. a.k.a Axlen
Take your time. When you succeed, please notify me. :)Quote:
I am going to redesign the USB Coders Cable.
Good luck. ;)
If I can get this into an EASY to build format without any surface mount components then I'd considers opening things up again. And of course the device has to work for more than me and a handfull of other users ;)Quote:
Originally Posted by neoak
I've already ordered some PIC development tools and have a sample part in my hands already.
By the way, for those who might be interested I put up the CAD files for current USB Coders Cable: Rev-F Schematic and Layout. This does not include any crystal switching jumpers or sockets. So if you feel inclined to get your hands dirty with Eagle and improve the current design yourself; have at it. Just be sure to observe the GPL and copyright info in the ZIPed package: USBCC-F.ZIP
Here's a hacked version with 2 crystals and jumpers to configure it : ftp://semicolo.kicks-ass.org/dreamcast/USBCC-Fbis.zip (online from about 14h to 4h GMT, sorry, my sister sleeps in my computer room and she doesn't like fan noise)
Here's a picture of the basic development setup for the USB coders cable redesign. No USB cable yet since I'm just testing the development environment and getting used to the IDE. These PIC chips are really neat to play with.
Sourcing all through-hole parts for this version has been going great so far. Just discovered Spark Fun Electronics: a place that does prototype double sided PCB's with soldermask and silkscreen for $2.50 per square inch. As you might well have guessed I'll be making every effort to make this board as small as possible to keep costs to a minimum.
http://www.geocities.com/[email protected]
Thanks for seeing to this semicolo; I won't be doing anymore work on this revision. I've learned my lesson with surface mount designs. They are great for commerical products, but they can be a real challenge for hobbyists. Some kit producers are soldering all the smt parts onto their boards because too many buyers were unable to do it properly.Quote:
Originally Posted by semicolo
The FTDI based design has been a great learning experience :) ...expensive, but fun... Onward!
just a quick question about the USB-Serial interface, I was looking at existing USB/Serial adaptors and saw one on outpost http://shop4.outpost.com/product/3811787 that states that it Support over 1 Mbps data transfer rate. Would something like this hooked up to a standard coders cable and your software changes to dc-tool-serial enable it to reach that speed .
Thanks,
Troy
Your basic USB-Serial cable typically uses a single clock source to drive the USB module, cpu and serial USART. Depending on the USB version, 1.1, 2.0, the speeds the cable supports, the USB portion of the circuit will operate at some multiple of the applied clock frequency, typically 4Mhz or 6Mhz by using a PLL (phased locked look) to generate a 48Mhz internal clock (USB 2.0). The Dreamcast scif ports are driven by a 50Mhz clock. The problem is that the baud generators for each device (USB-Serial cable / Dreamcast) when programmed for 1.56M baud will not be within +-3% of each other and will not be able to communicate. The key here is the difference in actual serial speeds between the two devices beacause they operate at different clock speeds. It might work at 500K baud though depending on the drivers for your USB-Serial cable. Some drivers will limit you to 480K baud.Quote:
Originally Posted by GPF
I tried to fudge this with the previous design by using a 6.144Mhz crystal where a 6.000Mhz is called for, and it worked okay with my PC hardware. It was a compromise that looked promising, but the more systems I was able to test it on revealed that is was not a realiable solution,
The new design uses two seperate clocks. One for the USB module running at 4.000Mhz externally and 48Mhz internallly, and a second 25Mhz clock source to drive the CPU and serial hardware. That way I can keep the USB side of the equation in spec and still be able to talk to the Dreamcast at 1.56M baud.
Aside from the baud issues you will still have to translate the RS232 signals from the USB-Serial cable to the Dreamcasts 3v TTL levels either by hacking the USB-Serial cable or adding additional circuitry to translate the signal levels.
That said, you might be able to get the USB-Serial cable to work but it will take some experimentation. Try it and let us all know how it goes. Maybe you will find a cheaper way to accomplish the goal.
thanks for information. Just more currious about that cable. Its been awhile since i look at usb/serial adaptor last time i looked the cheap one were only up to 115kb, so i was surprised to see one that said it supported over 1 Mbps :)
I actually got a Broadband adaptor yesterday, so good luck with your new design, I look forward to reading about it.
Troy