What should a standard metal enclosure look like?

#1

Hi! As I struggle with making my own enclosures and imagine that a lot of people do, I'd like there to be something like a "standard enclosure" of good quality. I know of the ones hohum lab make and they look nice, but I'd prefer a metal case and more potentiometers.

I contacted Adrian Hallik, who makes really beautiful cases for well known DIY-projects like Mutable Instruments Shruthi (XT), Ambika & Anushri, the Sonic Potions LXR drum machine or the MIDIbox Seq V4+. He said that he would like to make a case and optionally an expansion board as well when he has time.

You can look at some of his cases here and here. What should a case in this style and most importantly its front panel ideally look like?

My first suggestion would be: use all the GPIO pins with the biggest OLED display possible, 15 Potentiometers and 3 push buttons on the remaining digital pins (did I count right?:sweat_smile:).

Future of Axoloti
#2

The problem, as I see it, is that everyone has their own idea of what should be included.
Your assumption is that maximum pots, OLED and buttons is desirable. But others see it differently.

The arrangement of knobs and switches is also up to personal taste, and depends on what the device is actually used for.

This is a very different situation from building a case for a Shruthi, etc. Emilie decided those layouts when the boards were designed.

And the Axoloti project itself is not exactly thriving. This is very unfortunate, as it is brilliant.

#3

As Tele_Player suggested, there are many options depending on your needs, budget, space limitations & ideas.

I think Oled + adafruit keypads + encoders can solve a lot of scenarios (looping/ sequencing / playing / synthesis.. ). But require a lot of programming and I don't even know if the oled and the keypads work together. (Separately they do.) the grey box in the second picture is my portable axoloti wonderbox.. I mostly use it as a synth together with a portable midi keyboard but also works good as stand-alone keyless thing. I tried in the past to integrate a resistive touchscreen from a nintendo DS but failed because of defective parts.
If I had time and resources, I would definitely explore capacitive touch & multiplexing in order to make a very affordable & complete pcb that could satisfy different needs. (sequencing, playing, looping, Fx, etc.)
regarding size & looks, I would go for something between a korg volca and a roland TR-505, never bigger than the TR in any case.

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#4

You're right, but that's also why I made this thread - let's look at the things most of us can agree on. And there should definetly be the option to easily change the faceplate :wink:.
There's no other way than guessing, and I assume that most people use the Axoloti primarily as a synth, then as an effects box. I'd say a design similar to the Nord Modular G1 might be the most flexible.

I wish it was more popular, too. But also the boards are always sold out very quickly and people still contribute objects and show their projects. I don't know for sure, but having easy to make, good looking Axoloti synth/fx units around might help make it more popular.

That would be interesting, but I have no experience with patching encoders (they may require a lot of hook objects?). It's maybe too ambitious trying to make something like Mod Duo X/Empress Zoia or even Nord Modular G2?

I'd agree on TR-505 size!

#5

Encoders aren't so complicated anymore as there are dedicated objects for them.
They have the advantages that they don't produce noise when steady and because of that and the fact that they rotate 360' and don't "jump" value, they can be very easily used to control many parameters in different pages (op-1, op-z, Push, maschine, akai, arturia, etc..)
Disadvantages is that probably you need some kind of multiplexing if you are going to use a lot of them and the cheap ones have just 24 steps per rotation and that translates into the typical steppy sound when you swipe something like a pitch, filter cutoff, etc.
If you are going to go with pots, be sure to use good quality ones and maybe think about doing some hardware filtering before going to the gpio. So you will avoid some extra noise in your sound.
None of the projects you are mentioning is actually super ambitious. (Judging just the hardware controls..) I havent seen anyone that coded the Adafruit RGB neotrellis buttons but probably that can be done in 1 hr or 2 by someone that knows..
Btw I also agree in Biggest Oled you can.. We already have the object so , Why not? :slight_smile:
I would try to source a working resistive screen like the nintendo DS and throw it on top of the Oled. so you have something like a kaosspad thing always ready to spice up your synth sounds or your Fx.. And.. IF you have extra Gpios, Go for Analog Joysticks too. They are super fun and super useful.
In case you have some extra time, This is an old project I presented some time ago.. (pre-Axoloti)
Maybe some day I will do an update / video..
http://servando.teks.no/?audiocomputer
Greetings

#6

Looks like the biggest OLED possible right now is 2,42" (still too small for kaosspad action imo, but cool idea) with a 128x64 resolution according to this thread, but it needed to be modified for I2C. Because of the additional circuitry for any OLED, even if very little, an expansion board like Axoctrl seems to be the best solution.

Right, I searched for encoders on the forum and found that @Gavin's objects seem to work very well. Do they eat up as much SRAM as hook objects seem to? Anyway adding a few encoders for things that don't need immediate control seems to be a good idea. If there's an expansion board hardware filtering for potentiometers also wouldn't be a problem.