SammichSID (Part 4)

I worked some more on the SammichSID. Next thing was to put all the IC's in both PCB's. After that I connected both PCB's to each other and put power on it just to see if it worked. It seemed to work because there was a power up procedure and in the end the display said 'Ready' with a blinking cursor. That means that at least the PIC is running with MIOS installed on it. Next thing to do is assemble the casing. It is made of separate panels.

 Like I said before all the panels are covered with a paper layer. It is quite a tough job to get it of on some of the panels. Especially the front and side panels that have a lot of holes in it. The paper tears up every time so it is a job you need to be patient for. I left the paper just on the panels that need paint later on for the engraved text. In the picture you can see the bottom panel. There are some holes in there as well that are supposed to go where the power regulators are for better cooling.

The whole construction of the case is quite ingenious I must say. Everything is hold together with just the four long bolts and nuts that you see in the picture above. All other panels are stuck in between the top and lower panel. In the picture on the left you can see the base PCB attached to the lower panel. Then you have to put the 20 mm spacers on all the screws from the bottom. On top of there the front panel PCB is mounted as you can see in the picture below.

When I got this far I decided that I wanted to know if the SID's worked, because when everything is put together you can't reach inside anymore. So I downloaded a test program from the Midibox website. You can upload it with the MIOS software over Midi. When it was loaded it immidiately produces a 1 Khz tone on both the left and right SID chip. So I knew they were working alright. So it all looks good. Time to close it all up, But not today. Time for a rest :)