Replacement controllers - Filco, QuickFire, Rosewill, (others?)

[metalliqaz]

That's awesome

[SpAmRaY]

^^ That has to be the coolest DIY project I have seen in a really long time

[mooswa]

Thank you, thank you, thank you bpiphany!
That was my first soldering experience and what a fun it was!  My first electronics experience even! 

Anyway, finally I have finished soldering my first Frosty Flake.  It was not perfect, I had to resolder few things a few times, but now all keys are go!
I still have one problem though and I have no idea where the bug could be.  All leds are always on.   

I have red leds, and I have used 510Ω resistors.  I've inspected original CM QFR and it also has 510Ω.  Again, all keys work; Caps Lock functions fine, the led just stays on regardless.  I read 3.3V on the led pins.  I've probed all resistors on the Flake and they show the right values.  Being a total electronics nub, I just don't know where to look further.  Any advice?

[bpiphany]

5-3.3=1.7 which sounds like a reasonable drop across the LEDs. My guess is something on the firmware side, or you've managed to short them both out to GND on the board somewhere, the LEDs are active low.

I moved the re-flow videos in the DT thread to youtube, they are all up now http://deskthority.net/workshop-f7/toaster-smd-re-flow-oven-t6861.html

[mooswa]

Thanks! Yes with hacked firmware I can dim/light all 3 leds at will.  Seems like ubuntu 12.04 is having some issues with syncing statuses across multiple keyboards.

[bpiphany]

Built a test unit for the new mini controller. Also made a spiffy light show =) Sorry about the poor lighting.

[Jmneuv]

toaster made?

[bpiphany]

toaster made?

Of course =D I had a part of my polyester sheet dedicated to this one-off solder job. There are advantages of really cheap plastic stencils as well.

Now this puppy just needs some design to sit in... I guess a circuit diagram may help a bit at least =)

[metalliqaz]

"The Blinky Test Unit" haha I like that

[regack]

Built a test unit for the new mini controller. Also made a spiffy light show =) Sorry about the poor lighting.

(Attachment Link)

This is great!   I love it!

[mooswa]

I've run into a problem connecting Frosty Flake-modded QFR via KVM switch.  This is with latest firmware from bpiphany. 

Keyboard itself initializes, leds are fine, I see a bunch of devices:

/dev/input/by-id/usb-Bathroom_Epiphanies__Costar_Keyboard_-_CM_Storm_Quick_Fire_Rapid-event-kbd
/dev/input/by-id/usb-Bathroom_Epiphanies__Costar_Keyboard_-_CM_Storm_Quick_Fire_Rapid-if02-event-mouse
/dev/input/by-id/usb-Bathroom_Epiphanies__Costar_Keyboard_-_CM_Storm_Quick_Fire_Rapid-if02-mouse

But no key presses are sent to OS. 
When I switch back to stock daughter board, it works.  Without KVM it also works.

Any pointers on how to debug this?

[mooswa]

Interestingly, when I run hid_listen it does change from "Waiting for new device" to "Listening" when I connect keyboard through KVM but does not produce any output. 

I have also tried connect through KVM to windows - same results - windows do not see key presses.
     
Does anyone have a KVM you can try?a

[joelk2]

can we still buy these?

QFR controller is what i was looking at (ideally i just want a replacement of the original to see if it will fix my board)

im based in the UK.

[domoaligato]

can we still buy these?

QFR controller is what i was looking at (ideally i just want a replacement of the original to see if it will fix my board)

I have one. please send me a private message if you are interested.

[mooswa]

Spent all evening with usbmon and wireshark - I cannot see anything wrong.  After setting up the keyboard everything looks good but interrupts from the keyboard a just not being sent.  Must be a KVM thing then.  I wonder if that extra debug interface could be throwing it off?

[geniekid]

Received my two toasted Frosty Flakes last night and installed both using metalliqaz's Easy AVR

Great work bpiphany 

Picture:

[Grendel]

Hm, wondering if The Black Petal could be used in a CM Storm Quickfire XT ?

No, most probably not. It looks very much like they moved the USB communication pins. They have also ****ed with all interchangeability on previous controllers, for no good reason.. Coming from the same manufacturer and all =P

Definitely not I added the CMS QFXT info to the DT Wiki, just in case..

[laffindude]

bpiphany = awesome

Few hours of soldering ahead

Edit: ~3 hours in, about 80% done. Just need to do the SIP connectors and MCU. So I am probably looking at another hour tomorrow. 0603 is a pain a 100nF cap flew across the room when I pinched it with the tweezer. Guess I'll have to finish that one later after I go pick another one up.

Oh I ran out of flux too ;___; Gonna need moar when I do the ATmega.

[blackbox]

Hm, wondering if The Black Petal could be used in a CM Storm Quickfire XT ?

No, most probably not. It looks very much like they moved the USB communication pins. They have also ****ed with all interchangeability on previous controllers, for no good reason.. Coming from the same manufacturer and all =P

Definitely not I added the CMS QFXT info to the DT Wiki, just in case..

I hope there will be a controller thats supports the XT in the future.

[Grendel]

May be a good idea to subscribe to this thread if you are interested in a XT controller... 

[blackbox]

Yup i did

[CPTBadAss]

Hooray! I got my Pegasus Hoof today. Thanks bpiphany!

[Grendel]

Ladies and Gentlemen, may I have your attention please.

It is my pleasure to announce the availability of a new Costar Replacement Controller: "The Ghost Squid". It is tailored to fit the CM Storm QuickFire XT line of keyboards and will allow you to take total control over your typing needs.

"The Ghost Squid" is the latest addition to bpiphany's line of 8x18 matrix controllers for Costar keyboards and will be available for purchase as a kit or fully assembled here or here shortly.

[/shameless plug]

I'm totally excited about this ! Ever since I got my QFXT boards I was enviously eyeballing the other controllers, wishing there was one for the QFXT -- I even got some QFR's and a RK-9000 so I could play w/ them bpiphany and I started talking and it turned out that the QFXT is very close to the RK-9000. Close enough to give it a try and the Ghost Squid was born, all went well with the first try even ! Kudos to bpiphany, you got skills !!

And yes, these ghosts really exist. Seriously. Gee, fine. Here you go

[metalliqaz]

Ladies and Gentlemen, may I have your attention please.

It is my pleasure to announce the availability of a new Costar Replacement Controller: "The Ghost Squid". It is tailored to fit the CM Storm QuickFire XT line of keyboards and will allow you to take total control over your typing needs.

"The Ghost Squid" is the latest addition to bpiphany's line of 8x18 matrix controllers for Costar keyboards and will be available for purchase as a kit or fully assembled here or here shortly.

[/shameless plug]

I'm totally excited about this ! Ever since I got my QFXT boards I was enviously eyeballing the other controllers, wishing there was one for the QFXT -- I even got some QFR's and a RK-9000 so I could play w/ them bpiphany and I started talking and it turned out that the QFXT is very close to the RK-9000. Close enough to give it a try and the Ghost Squid was born, all went with the first try even ! Kudos to bpiphany, you got skills !!

And yes, these ghosts really exist. Seriously. Gee, fine. Here you go

Show Image

When is the firmware going to drop?

[Grendel]

I don't know.

[blackbox]

Yay! Bought a ghost squid immediately when I saw it.

[laffindude]

I just want to say the names for the controllers are awesome ;o

[dorian]

I saw that the quickfire XT looks very similar to the quickfire ultimate (http://gaming.coolermaster.com/en/products/keyboards/quickfireultimate/) would the replacement controller for the xt work on the ultimate as well?

[bpiphany]

That looks back lit, which says no, like with the rapid-i.

[dorian]

Would it work if I would accept going without the backlight working? I really like the concept of your work. After I got my KC60 and programmed it, it quickly seemed as if I bought the wrong full size board...

[bpiphany]

No, I would guess that board, like the QFR-i, has all the controller components placed directly onto the main board. And they never made two keyboards with the same controller anyway =P You could however probably hack it with a Teensy++, wiring it in to all columns and rows as well as the three regular LEDs. But that has a tendency to get very messy with all the wires if you don't plan it nicely =)

[dorian]

I see I see. Thank you for your help!

[Harima]

Sorry for necro'ing this thread but I think a new topic wasn't necessary because it is too relevant to what I wanted to ask. I would really like to see this left-handed keyboard made programmable.

http://www.dsi-keyboards.com/shop/brands/dsi-left-handed-usb-keyboard-with-cherry-mechanical-red-key-switches-new/

My brain had been itching on what I would really like in a keyboard and this is it. I don't see anything else like it out there and the deskthority wiki https://deskthority.net/wiki/Datacomp_left-handed_keyboard says that there's only one manufacturer right now with this design. My only gripe is that it's just a basic keyboard. Other alternatives were to have a separate numpad on the left side but I want to have just 1 HID device if possible. I would without question put money up front for one of these done.

[Tactile]

Sorry for necro'ing this thread but I think a new topic wasn't necessary because it is too relevant to what I wanted to ask. I would really like to see this left-handed keyboard made programmable.

http://www.dsi-keyboards.com/shop/brands/dsi-left-handed-usb-keyboard-with-cherry-mechanical-red-key-switches-new/

My brain had been itching on what I would really like in a keyboard and this is it. I don't see anything else like it out there and the deskthority wiki https://deskthority.net/wiki/Datacomp_left-handed_keyboard says that there's only one manufacturer right now with this design. My only gripe is that it's just a basic keyboard. Other alternatives were to have a separate numpad on the left side but I want to have just 1 HID device if possible. I would without question put money up front for one of these done.

Does it have to be internal? How about one of these?

https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=69169.0

[Harima]

Sorry for necro'ing this thread but I think a new topic wasn't necessary because it is too relevant to what I wanted to ask. I would really like to see this left-handed keyboard made programmable.

http://www.dsi-keyboards.com/shop/brands/dsi-left-handed-usb-keyboard-with-cherry-mechanical-red-key-switches-new/

My brain had been itching on what I would really like in a keyboard and this is it. I don't see anything else like it out there and the deskthority wiki https://deskthority.net/wiki/Datacomp_left-handed_keyboard says that there's only one manufacturer right now with this design. My only gripe is that it's just a basic keyboard. Other alternatives were to have a separate numpad on the left side but I want to have just 1 HID device if possible. I would without question put money up front for one of these done.

Does it have to be internal? How about one of these?

https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=69169.0

That's pretty cool. Is that one of a kind? Can it store settings onto the adapter? Can it do macros?

[Tactile]

Sorry for necro'ing this thread but I think a new topic wasn't necessary because it is too relevant to what I wanted to ask. I would really like to see this left-handed keyboard made programmable.

http://www.dsi-keyboards.com/shop/brands/dsi-left-handed-usb-keyboard-with-cherry-mechanical-red-key-switches-new/

My brain had been itching on what I would really like in a keyboard and this is it. I don't see anything else like it out there and the deskthority wiki https://deskthority.net/wiki/Datacomp_left-handed_keyboard says that there's only one manufacturer right now with this design. My only gripe is that it's just a basic keyboard. Other alternatives were to have a separate numpad on the left side but I want to have just 1 HID device if possible. I would without question put money up front for one of these done.

Does it have to be internal? How about one of these?

https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=69169.0

That's pretty cool. Is that one of a kind? Can it store settings onto the adapter? Can it do macros?

Here's a programming page

http://www.tmk-kbd.com/tmk_keyboard/editor/unimap/?usb_usb

Questions to & buy from this guy - I have one of his controllers in my HHKB and it works great

https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=72052.0

[Harima]

Sorry for necro'ing this thread but I think a new topic wasn't necessary because it is too relevant to what I wanted to ask. I would really like to see this left-handed keyboard made programmable.

http://www.dsi-keyboards.com/shop/brands/dsi-left-handed-usb-keyboard-with-cherry-mechanical-red-key-switches-new/

My brain had been itching on what I would really like in a keyboard and this is it. I don't see anything else like it out there and the deskthority wiki https://deskthority.net/wiki/Datacomp_left-handed_keyboard says that there's only one manufacturer right now with this design. My only gripe is that it's just a basic keyboard. Other alternatives were to have a separate numpad on the left side but I want to have just 1 HID device if possible. I would without question put money up front for one of these done.

Does it have to be internal? How about one of these?

https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=69169.0

That's pretty cool. Is that one of a kind? Can it store settings onto the adapter? Can it do macros?

Here's a programming page

http://www.tmk-kbd.com/tmk_keyboard/editor/unimap/?usb_usb

Questions to & buy from this guy - I have one of his controllers in my HHKB and it works great

https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=72052.0

Thanks, I will ask him some questions about it. Would still like to know if an internal replacement is possible

[bpiphany]

Christmas baking!! I thought I would be able to use all my remaining 95 ATmegas, but alas I ran out of decoders after only 92... Now I would expect these to last a while before I need to buy components again =D

[bpiphany]

I also haven't had tome to wrinkle out my QFN soldering, so I submitted a design I've had prepared for a long long time for a combined Black Petal/Kitten Paw controller. It's basically just a Black Petal with extra headers to fit the Filco as well. It even runs the Petal firmware. I still have Petals left if anyone would like one of those.




By the way, clearance is key..

[ireun]

What the difference between this ^^ and the Ghost Squid, they look very, very similar..

All right, I've noticed the difference.