Greetings,
I've been a lurker here for some time finding answers to question and enjoying reading about projects and ideas the community at large is involved with. Recently Microchip began a design contest based on its new Pic32 32 bit processor. Although not as powerful as some of the Analog Devices and TI processors, I looked at the spec for the Pic32 processor and thought it might be suitable for some audio applications and decided to enter the design contest. My design is named “Gig in a Box” and can be found here.
http://www.mypic32.com/web/guest/contestantsprofiles?profileID=39385
Make sure to check out the blog entries if you have a chance. That’s were I’m posting progress.
It’s basically a four input mixer (two microphone inputs and two instrument inputs) and effects processor with a 20watt Class D amplifier. It also has an SD card interface for recording and an LCD touch screen for the user interface. Also included is a 24bit stereo DA for headphone output or sending to a higher fidelity power amp. It’s intended to be highly portable (it’s battery operated) but still have high fidelity processing and recording capability. The class D power amp is used to maximize battery run time. It’s based on the TI PGA2500 microphone preamp, PCM4204 quad 24bit AD and the PCM1796 24bit DA. I have the prototype audio interface board running and am able to record audio to the SD card. I’m impressed with how clean the PGA2500 and the AD are.
My reasons for posting are two fold. One is to solicit any advice, desires and input that any of you might have. There are people on this site with a lot more experience than me at audio design so I’m curious what you have to say. The other reason is that the designs are not judged based purely on technical merit, but on a community voting process as well. This reduces the contest to somewhat of a popularity contest which I don’t particularly care for, but I need to work with the rules as they stand. In addition, many of the visitors to the contest site seem more interested in robotics and custom test equipment than in audio (not that I don’t like those things too) so I thought I would post to a forum that had a community of similarly interested people and see if I could encourage some of you to visit the contest site and cast a vote for me if you think the design is worthy. I need votes to make it to the next phase of the contest which is where I will develop most of the software. People who register and visit the design pages are automatically entered in weekly prize giveaways. Last week they gave away some IPod Touches. It’s also worth mentioning that the designs are open so all schematics and software is posted for anyone to take a look at and use. I also have a few extra prototype audio interface boards available if anyone is interested in building one up.
Even if you don’t care to register with the site and vote, I’m curious to hear your input on the design. The schematics can be downloaded from the site which I think you can do without registering.
Sorry for the long post and thanks for your time,
Brian (Wolfe32)
I've been a lurker here for some time finding answers to question and enjoying reading about projects and ideas the community at large is involved with. Recently Microchip began a design contest based on its new Pic32 32 bit processor. Although not as powerful as some of the Analog Devices and TI processors, I looked at the spec for the Pic32 processor and thought it might be suitable for some audio applications and decided to enter the design contest. My design is named “Gig in a Box” and can be found here.
http://www.mypic32.com/web/guest/contestantsprofiles?profileID=39385
Make sure to check out the blog entries if you have a chance. That’s were I’m posting progress.
It’s basically a four input mixer (two microphone inputs and two instrument inputs) and effects processor with a 20watt Class D amplifier. It also has an SD card interface for recording and an LCD touch screen for the user interface. Also included is a 24bit stereo DA for headphone output or sending to a higher fidelity power amp. It’s intended to be highly portable (it’s battery operated) but still have high fidelity processing and recording capability. The class D power amp is used to maximize battery run time. It’s based on the TI PGA2500 microphone preamp, PCM4204 quad 24bit AD and the PCM1796 24bit DA. I have the prototype audio interface board running and am able to record audio to the SD card. I’m impressed with how clean the PGA2500 and the AD are.
My reasons for posting are two fold. One is to solicit any advice, desires and input that any of you might have. There are people on this site with a lot more experience than me at audio design so I’m curious what you have to say. The other reason is that the designs are not judged based purely on technical merit, but on a community voting process as well. This reduces the contest to somewhat of a popularity contest which I don’t particularly care for, but I need to work with the rules as they stand. In addition, many of the visitors to the contest site seem more interested in robotics and custom test equipment than in audio (not that I don’t like those things too) so I thought I would post to a forum that had a community of similarly interested people and see if I could encourage some of you to visit the contest site and cast a vote for me if you think the design is worthy. I need votes to make it to the next phase of the contest which is where I will develop most of the software. People who register and visit the design pages are automatically entered in weekly prize giveaways. Last week they gave away some IPod Touches. It’s also worth mentioning that the designs are open so all schematics and software is posted for anyone to take a look at and use. I also have a few extra prototype audio interface boards available if anyone is interested in building one up.
Even if you don’t care to register with the site and vote, I’m curious to hear your input on the design. The schematics can be downloaded from the site which I think you can do without registering.
Sorry for the long post and thanks for your time,
Brian (Wolfe32)
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