Announce Thread: Magpie Modular - uBraids - Braids in 8 HP.

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phidelity
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Announce Thread: Magpie Modular - uBraids - Braids in 8 HP.

Post by phidelity » Fri Aug 26, 2016 3:36 pm

Hello Everyone
I'm happy to announce that I've managed to get this project in a decent enough shape to share it publicly.

It's a derivative of the Mutable Instruments Braids module where we shrunk down the footprint to half of the original (a miniature 8HP) and added a OLED and atmega chip to drive it. It functions, flashes, operates the same as a regular Braids so you can put whatever firmware you like on it including Tim Churches Bees in the Trees.

For now we are offering PCBs & Panels on our store page

Our Github Page for this project (which I am populating as I go) is at
uBraids Github
I will be uploading a complete BOM, a more fleshed out build guide, schematics and diptrace file in the near future.

Im using the project page & Github as the main repository for information but I will try to answer questions here.


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thelizard
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Post by thelizard » Fri Aug 26, 2016 3:59 pm

Whoa! That's amazing. Awesome idea, and for sure something I'll look into building.
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Post by GryphonP3 » Fri Aug 26, 2016 4:00 pm

Wooooo been waiting for this for a while! Glad to see its finally happening :sb: 2x ordered
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DMR
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Post by DMR » Fri Aug 26, 2016 4:32 pm

This is neat, should power consumption be the same / about the same?
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phidelity
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Post by phidelity » Fri Aug 26, 2016 8:20 pm

DMR wrote:This is neat, should power consumption be the same / about the same?
It will be braids plus the draw of the OLED which according to adafruit is:

"Display current draw is completely dependent on your usage: each OLED LED draws current when on so the more pixels you have lit, the more current is used. They tend to draw ~15mA or so in practice but for precise numbers you must measure the current in your usage circuit."
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EATyourGUITAR
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Post by EATyourGUITAR » Fri Aug 26, 2016 8:36 pm

adafruit can't give us specs for white screen!? pish posh this is a bugger
WWW.EATYOURGUITAR.COM <---- MY DIY STUFF
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phidelity
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Post by phidelity » Fri Aug 26, 2016 10:13 pm

EATyourGUITAR wrote:adafruit can't give us specs for white screen!? pish posh this is a bugger
this is bad yelp review or write your senator worthy!
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forbin
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Post by forbin » Fri Aug 26, 2016 10:24 pm

Like the display and panel.

I did have a look at your display INO... is your plan to use the Braids code without modification and get the AVR to pretend to be LED displays?
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Post by ignatius » Fri Aug 26, 2016 11:20 pm

this looks great. saw it today. super excited. oleds are great.
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phidelity
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Post by phidelity » Sat Aug 27, 2016 12:32 am

forbin wrote:Like the display and panel.

I did have a look at your display INO... is your plan to use the Braids code without modification and get the AVR to pretend to be LED displays?
yeah, it's a creative/primitive duct tape and efficient cutting of corners to achieve the end goal.

I can think of a number of better ideal situations but many of them require creating a non backwards compatiable fork of the braids code in order to make it happen. For now - its no worse than the original and Im open to improvements :razz:
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Post by Crashlander42 » Sat Aug 27, 2016 1:16 am

I ordered two as soon as I saw you put these up, really looking forward to building these.
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Post by diablojoy » Sat Aug 27, 2016 3:33 am

sorely tempted
:moneyburn:
It probably wont happen today but if it does it definitely wont go smoothly.
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Post by emilio.pozzolini » Sat Aug 27, 2016 8:48 am

Amazing!
I'm considering to swap my 2 braids for these!
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Post by a773 » Sat Aug 27, 2016 11:29 am

That looks like fun, ordered a set :party:
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ambrohski
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Post by ambrohski » Sat Aug 27, 2016 11:30 am

Whoa, this looks great! :tu:

The first in a series of shrunken MI, I hope?
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Post by halandorin » Sat Aug 27, 2016 12:48 pm

I'm definitely going to have to build this!
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Post by auxren » Sat Aug 27, 2016 7:06 pm

Any videos of how the menu diving looks?
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Post by Timmy » Sat Aug 27, 2016 8:33 pm

auxren wrote:Any videos of how the menu diving looks?
Exactly the same as Braids - the OLED display is just emulating the 4 character LED display on Braids, at least as it stands. Firmware changes to make better use of the OLED would be possible if someone wants to take on the project.
Last edited by Timmy on Sat Aug 27, 2016 8:40 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by auxren » Sat Aug 27, 2016 8:40 pm

Timmy wrote:
auxren wrote:Any videos of how the menu diving looks?
Exactly the same as Braids - the OLED display is just emulating the 4 character LED display on Braids.
Gotcha. That is just for now... I'll work on making it so the OLED shows more once I build up the modules.
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Post by Zymos » Sun Aug 28, 2016 12:47 am

Next can you make micro Elements?
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bpcmusic
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Post by bpcmusic » Sun Aug 28, 2016 1:25 am

Fantastic! Ordered a handful. Can't wait for the BOM; hopefully there are mouser part #s (or equiv) for everything to save hunting...

Love the creative use of the OLED replacement; it is perfect that you kept the core MI firmware AS-IS. Kudos for clever hackery! :)

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Post by diablojoy » Sun Aug 28, 2016 2:13 am

Fantastic! Ordered a handful. Can't wait for the BOM; hopefully there are mouser part #s (or equiv) for everything to save hunting...
there is a mouser BOM on the magpie site near the bottom of the page don't know just how complete it is - does not include the OLED but that is hardly surprising

oh and yes I ordered one as well :deadbanana:
It probably wont happen today but if it does it definitely wont go smoothly.
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Post by a773 » Sun Aug 28, 2016 2:47 am

Timmy wrote:
auxren wrote:Any videos of how the menu diving looks?
Exactly the same as Braids - the OLED display is just emulating the 4 character LED display on Braids, at least as it stands. Firmware changes to make better use of the OLED would be possible if someone wants to take on the project.
As far as I understand, the whole point of this is to not fork the firmware, but to have uBraids 100% compatible softwarwise to MI braids.
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Post by latigid on » Sun Aug 28, 2016 3:15 am

atte wrote:
Timmy wrote:
auxren wrote:Any videos of how the menu diving looks?
Exactly the same as Braids - the OLED display is just emulating the 4 character LED display on Braids, at least as it stands. Firmware changes to make better use of the OLED would be possible if someone wants to take on the project.
As far as I understand, the whole point of this is to not fork the firmware, but to have uBraids 100% compatible softwarwise to MI braids.
No problem, the OLED runs off its own MCU.
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Post by a773 » Sun Aug 28, 2016 3:30 am

Ok, but wouldn't " make better use of the oled" imply changing things in the braids firmware, hence breaking compatibility?
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