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[ElectroMaster]

Hi,

It would be great to know who is using Geoff's microcontrollers, and what your experience is so far. Think of it as a feedback thread for the author and a review for other members thinking of getting one.

So if you've got yourself a Maximite or Duinomite then post a bit about your experience. I am about to order one and will be giving you my experience when I get it.

Regards,
EM

 

[ljcox]

I bought an Altronics Maximite kit (via Semtronics who are a reseller & don't charge the full amount asked by Altronics) recently.

However, I can't make any in depth comments at the moment as I'm at the bottom of the learning curve.

But, as a general comment, it is what I have always wanted - somthing that I can programme easily. I don't want to bother learning C or Visual Basic (or what ever it is called).

Besides, a Laptop or PC are not suitable for some jobs.

As a matter of interest for anyone contemplating making a MM, I have attached a photo of the "chair" I made for the crystal (the construction instructions indicate the the metal body of the xtal must not touch the vias under it. I made it by cutting off a part of the plastic insert that came in the SD Card socket.

Len

 

[Ian Rogers]

I have Geoff's Colour firmware running on a UBW32.... Works like a charm... A couple of issues to deal with, but it's a damn good piece of kit..

 

[Rich D.]

I recently got this Maximite BBX from the Kickstarter campaign, and it appears to be really cool. I got the kit and put it together myself, but the SMTs and most of the components were already soldered. The only thing I didn't do was to add the Arduino compatible connectors on it figuring I'd rather wire those points to a ribbon cable or D-connector or something like that.

I went with the nice retro wood case and was planning to paint it basic black or something, but at the last minute I decided to go 70's color and paint it "Denim".

Sure it is a bit more expensive than a raspberry or Arduino 'xxx', but it is way simpler to program and has plenty of hardware options and memory capacity. I was really impressed with the features of this box and the depth of the BASIC implementation (I was pretty spoiled with the Comodore 64 BASIC).

Here's the really sad part of it all: I've been so busy that I haven't yet really had the chance to try it out on a serious project yet - I'm thinking a really awesome LED display with synthesized sound FX or something like that.

In spite of my apparent apathy for this box, it appears to be incredibly well done and I wish it all the success in the world. Check it out at http://www.maximitecomputer.com/ . And no, I have no affiliation with or get any financial gain from these guys, not really even sure if/how you can buy one just yet.

Here's the raw board, notice the battey backup, arduino connectors, external SD card slot, USB, audio, VGA video connectors, and the generous proto area on the right. Did I mention this puppy does high-def stereo outputs? As a electronics geek, my favorite part is the 26 pin I/O connector on the lower right, bristling with I/O that is in ADDITION to the Arduino I/O!

Here's my Denim wood case. I gave it a bunch of primer, but not enough to hide the grain. It fit easily together. I want to continue to customize the paint job with ...I dunno... maybe white racing stripes? Maybe I can hire an air-brush guy to paint it like the side of a van. I'd settle for some nice stickers.

 

[Mike - K8LH]

I recently got this Maximite BBX from the Kickstarter campaign, and it appears to be really cool.

Hi Rich,

It seems the Maximite BBX is little more than a wooden box and a few connectors added to the **broken link removed** sold by CircuitGizmos for $49.95 (quantity 1). Is that enough "added value" to justify the $99 or $109 price tag, or am I missing something?

Regards, Mike

 

[Ian Rogers]

Hi Rich,

It seems the Maximite BBX is little more than a wooden box and a few connectors added to the **broken link removed** sold by CircuitGizmos for $49.95 (quantity 1). Is that enough "added value" to justify the $99 or $109 price tag, or am I missing something?

Regards, Mike

Yep! That's the one I got... The UBW board kept heating up and finally popped... This board from Circuit Gizmo's has been fine ever since.. I don't see why you would buy a board twice the price...

 

[Rich D.]

That is similar, but not made anymore. What I have is the CGCOLORMAX2 and that sells there for $57+shipping.
The price I paid was on Kickstarter to help fund the development of this board, so I suppose that's why it cost me a bit more, I also got a case for it.

Because they were having some problems with the laser-cutter lens getting dirty from cutting the plastic case, I asked instead for the wood case.
I would have to say that the extra $35 was indeed worth it - because I feel that I helped make it possible.

Until now I didn't know where to find more of these boards. The website doesn't have a way to order them from there, and my efforts to send an email requesting where to find these boards has been met with complete silence.

The 'max2 can be found here: **broken link removed**

 

[Mike - K8LH]

... The price I paid was on Kickstarter to help fund the development of this board...

Wasn't the board already fully developed and being produced by CircuitGizmo?

Looks to me like the campaign originator designed a laser cut wooden or plastic box, wrote a booklet with 10 example programs, purchased an existing fully developed PCB with Geoff's Color Maximite firmware, then added a few components to make it a "package". If he wrangled a good quantity discount, he may have realized ~50% margin. I'm extremely envious (lol)...

Regards, Mike

 

[Rich D.]

Well if that is all he did then good for him*. I don't have any facts about when it was developed. He had the foresight to recognize a device that had demand, and brought it from obscurity and presented it to a willing market. (I never saw it before, and I'm sure many others didn't either with so many microprocessor boards out there). That's capitalism.

I think he might have been the guy to add the proto-board area on the board but not sure. I do know that his initial purpose was to write a (another) book, and needed a simple, affordable platform to work with, so he chose the Maximite BasicBoxx. The book writing was the value-added task. It was probably 80% of his effort. Don't you dare dismiss the effort required to "write a book", doing it well is not that quick and easy!

*The BBX is under the Creative Commons License, so if that guy did do it for commercial profit, that may be a breech of the License - but I'm no lawyer or an accountant. If that is the case then I change my wording to SHAME on him.

Never fret the dollars: It just leads to lost sleep & grumpy moods. Everything costs what it costs, and beyond public utilities we fortunately can decide or to buy it or not.

Anyway, thanks for alerting me to the CircuitGizmo site, I now know where I can get more!

 

[Mike - K8LH]

The way that campaign was written up, I can understand how someone might think the author designed the CGCOLORMAX board. I had to email CircuitGizmos to confirm that they were the designers/creators of the board.

 

[Rich D.]

New link for the color (colour) maximite, the old one is broken:

https://circuitgizmos.com/gizmo-store/#!/CGCOLORMAX2-Color-Maximite-Retro-Computer/p/53819402

 

[Rich D.]

If it's too good to be true it probably isn't? Well in this case I have use the BBX and found that the "hifi" audio only runs up to 2000Hz...not exactly hi fi. Also, the serial I/O is limited to a rate of about 19,200 because I believe it is bit-banged. In spite of those weaknesses, it's still a useable machine.