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Author Topic: Crystal Focus Saber Core V2  (Read 50416 times)

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Offline erv

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Crystal Focus Saber Core V2
« on: April 18, 2007, 07:41:21 AM »
Hi ! After being away for some time, I'm back on forums !
My set of V1 crystal focus was "salvaged" so fast by customers, that I though I should put some more ideas I had in a new design, so here we are with V2.

I don't want to be thru engineer blabla talk, so here are the *features*

- K2, lux III and V compliant (need 7.2 / 7.4 batt pack for lux V). 1.3 A max
- power supply from 3.3V to 11V
- 28 mm x 56.8 mm x 10 mm (1.1" x 2.23" x 0.39")
- use a removable SD card to store sound and configuration. I'll sell an inexpensive SD card reader as well
- 29 mm 8 ohm speaker prewired
- 1w amp / volume adjustment with a little potentiometer on board
- current regulation - maintains the brightness of the blade during the whole batt life
- blade extension / retractation at power on/off simulated with my blade + blade films (ultimate diffuser)
- full custom sounds. You can make you own, record your dog or whatever and put it on the SD card
- energy shimmering. I think that it's what is called "movie flicker" in ultra board. Since it's not a pulse, but a random variation
effect, I've called it "candle effect" like the fluctuation of light of the flame of a candle.
- all parameters can be setup with "SD-config". Including sensitivity to get the board responding to your fighting style
- auxiliary button to activate other effects like blaster ray blocking and blade lockup. Uses a momentary button. Press and release = blaster blocking, press and maintain you get a blade lockup. Adjustable delays for those effects.
- handles latching OR momentary buttons / switches for activating the saber. Latching can be normally closed OR normally opened electrical contacts. Various tastes => various flavors
- 8 sounds of clash, 8 sounds of swing, hum, power on / off, blaster and blade lockup sounds.
- random sound playing OR linear sound playing (one slot after the other).
- seamless playback, no transition between sound. Sound a premixed using the sound mixing utility I'm providing on my website.
- Low battery flashing LED. Based on current measurement inside the core. Starts flashing (faster and faster) when measured current is not what was specified on the sd card.
- progressive power on LED. So cool to have an LED on the hilt that fades in and out according to the luxeon
- force feedback motor option. Will progressively rumble in and out with fade in and fade out effects of the luxeon, and depending on the kind of motor, you can feel perturbation force feedback during clash effect or blaster.
- autopower off of the luxeon when removing the sd card. Edit a parameter on the SD and put it back, saber will start again with the new settings.

that what we had for V1. Now the plus of V2 :
- 16 bits sounds !!! (22.050 KHz). Very clear and nice quality !
- 4 banks of sounds, each with its own configuration file. You can preset 4 differents sabers with differents sound fonts, but different energy shimmering, pitch, sensitivity, clash effect duration etc.
- each bank of sound can be described by a sound file in the root directory of the card. I made some test recording "one" "two" etc and passed the files in my voice deepener program I wrote to get a nice SW intonation. But you can call your banks with a more descriptive sound file like "ligth side configuration" "dark lord saber" or "my first baby lightsaber" if you like it. Easy way to browse your configuration.
Means that you can preset you hilt with FOUR configuration and recall them without the need to open the hilt/pommel to get in the saber gathering the SD card to rewrite it or swap it. Pressing the Aux button at start up will drive you in the bank browsing menu. It's not a vocal menu per se (Ultra is the guy you MUST congrat for this nice idea). The saber will "say" the name of the different configurations. Press 5 sec the aux button, bank is saved and saber starts. The selectec bank will be recalled next time.
- boot sound. Just like in a digital camera, you have this little sound logo (sometimes annoying). Allows to have the saber saying "yes my master" just like mine right now. Or don't put it in the root directory, you'll get a little beep. Don't want any sound at boot. Create an empty sound file of 100 ms and you're done.
- FORCE PUSH ! YES ! combination of a little movement of the hilt and pressing the aux button at the same time, just before, or even during the movement. One slot for the Force sound on each sound bank of course. Effect can be disabled
- static pitch shifting. Incline the board pointing the floor will lower the pitch of the hum. Applied as well on blade lockup. Amount of pitch variation setup on the sd card. Can be disabled
- DYNAMIC pitch shifting. Hardness of the swing is measured and can be applied to the swing sound. This way you'll never really get the same swing sound twice even with random sound selection. Can be disabled
- mute option. sometimes usefull when experimenting  ;D And since the core is also the main board for omnisabers, my wireless version, you can have wireless + in the hilt but this is annoying. When using wireless you might want to mute in the hilt sound. Use one of the 4 sound banks / config files for the wireless settings.
- Blinking LEDS management ! sounds cheap idea, but I'm sure some of you will like it. I used to have a single LED wiring on the board, which was used to activate my bargraph PLI board.
Now I have 4 LEDs and a sequencer... as usual as an editable text file in each soundbank. 4 LEDS = 4 bits = 16 possibles patterns. You can specify a 16 stage sequence with delays between them, from 2ms to 60 sec. The sequencer can be stopped in the sequence by a 0 delay, like scrolling on 5 stages then stopping with all LEDs on. I'll add as well a random pattern possibility.

That's all for today. The last version of the PCB was assembled by my hands yesterday and was tested all day. Works great ! I can go for manufacturing a batch of PCB. I expect to have the first units by MAY ! (price should remain the same as V1)
Sorry for the long email, but there are tons of things in this new board !  ::)

Erv'

Offline Darthirishman

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Re: Crystal Focus Saber Core V2
« Reply #1 on: April 18, 2007, 08:42:47 AM »
How much for a saber
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Offline erv

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Re: Crystal Focus Saber Core V2
« Reply #2 on: April 18, 2007, 10:53:29 AM »
generally betwee 300 and 400 euro, depending on the machining I have to go thru, and the options you take (vibrating motor, well I have to find a good source for that first, charger, decoration items, grip etc.)

Offline Aluke123

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Re: Crystal Focus Saber Core V2
« Reply #3 on: April 18, 2007, 03:47:54 PM »
erv, won't the SB itself be around 140$ U.S.?
i thought you were gonna keep it the same price as V1

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Offline dark_jedi_vokk

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Re: Crystal Focus Saber Core V2
« Reply #4 on: April 18, 2007, 06:51:28 PM »
lots of nice features there
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Offline Kyp Durron

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Re: Crystal Focus Saber Core V2
« Reply #5 on: April 18, 2007, 07:38:29 PM »
erv, won't the SB itself be around 140$ U.S.?
i thought you were gonna keep it the same price as V1

I think he was taking about a complete saber, hilt and all.

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2010...I certainly hope it's better than 2009 was! ::)
10/10/10~Well, so far with my Father's passing away, I'd say that this year was actually worse than 2009, even the fact that I now have a full time job (For now) isn't anywhere near enough to make up for that...so...maybe 2011 will be better? I'm not holding my breath... ::)

Offline erv

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Re: Crystal Focus Saber Core V2
« Reply #6 on: April 18, 2007, 09:35:28 PM »
yep, he's right, that was for a full saber, I should have used "quote" for answering that  ::)
With $ versus € today, the V2 will be $132
Until now, I did not have any bad surprises about new parts to add or something like that, so I could keep the electronic design pretty simple : I've removed many discrete part used in V1, replaced with better quality IC. Cost is therefore pretty well balanced.
If the hardware remains the same price, no reason to ask more money for software only, despite the time I spent on this  ;D
Well, actually, it was pretty fast : I started working on the new version around the 10 of march. On month and a half for 16 bits sounds (not so simple), new pcb and tons of programming / testing is pretty good IMO  :)
I'll try to put some news on all the different forums when it's there, I'll order the PCBs today !
Erv'

Offline GRAND MOFF TARKIN

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Re: Crystal Focus Saber Core V2
« Reply #7 on: April 18, 2007, 10:56:08 PM »
Video?

Offline erv

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Re: Crystal Focus Saber Core V2
« Reply #8 on: April 19, 2007, 12:29:54 AM »
sure, I'll make one today I think !
Erv'

Offline Yoda

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Re: Crystal Focus Saber Core V2
« Reply #9 on: April 19, 2007, 02:29:53 AM »
Sounds Cool Erv 8)

If it's all one piece now as the dimensions suggest at 28 mm x 56.8 mm x 10 mm (1.1" x 2.23" x 0.39")
Does the sound card stick out from the board on one side?


Offline erv

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Re: Crystal Focus Saber Core V2
« Reply #10 on: April 19, 2007, 03:50:58 AM »
it's all in one piece actually since V1. Before, you're right, it was an "electronic duo" with the sound board + the luxeon driver, lenght was about 8.5 or 9 cm. Now it's almost the size of the very first sound board !  :)
The SD card sticks out from the sound board of a few millimeters, just what you need to catch it between the thumb and the first finger to remove it from the hilt.

Offline Yoda

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Re: Crystal Focus Saber Core V2
« Reply #11 on: April 19, 2007, 05:23:06 AM »
That's good to know and will make it much more installation friendly. :)

Play sound samples when done, you must ;D


By the way does your SD card set-up refer to software to work for Mac or is it only PC compatible?
Just curious?



Offline erv

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Re: Crystal Focus Saber Core V2
« Reply #12 on: April 19, 2007, 05:47:43 AM »
the SD card does not require any specific software for either putting new sound or editing them. It's therefore compatible with PC and mac. You just need the computer and OS to be able to format and read the SD card with FAT16, but most OS do it.
The USB SD card reader is just like any USB reader for digital cameras. Usually, it works without specific drivers, on MAC and PC, and behaves just like a USB flash key. So... editing the config file for instance is as simple as putting the card in the reader, it opens on the file browser as a removable hard disk. Open the file with notepad or textedit, change the value, eject, put it back in the saber. The latter is waiting for the card to be back and it will restart with the new parameters.

The USB reader I'm selling is really nice cause you can put an SD card on the opposite side of the USB plug, put a cap on it, and you have a USB flash disk/key in your pocket.
But you were maybe refering as well to the software I'm using to pre-mix the sounds before storing them on the SD card. It mixes all sounds with the hum so that transition between sounds is seamless.
This utility is cross platform on mac and PC, it's just that I did not take the time (yet) to compile it for MAC. As soon as I get a request about it, I'll borrow a MAC at work and compile it !
« Last Edit: April 19, 2007, 05:49:51 AM by erv »

Offline Yoda

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Re: Crystal Focus Saber Core V2
« Reply #13 on: April 19, 2007, 05:55:45 AM »
Thank you Erv, Good to know this is ;)

Maybe sometime later this year I will try one out :)

I've got a lot of monet tied up in other projects right now, but I'll be checking it out
as your new Board development moves along 8)


Offline levelnext

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Re: Crystal Focus Saber Core V2
« Reply #14 on: April 19, 2007, 06:49:53 AM »
my god erv! this sounds like a dream board to me!!!!

Keep us posted, i am already saving for this!!!
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