Interesting - your Multi looks like a new board revision.
I was going to post a few days ago about this but forgot. We have used all of the first revision pcbs up. The only ones left are units in need of repair. So there may still be a handful of repaired units available in the future.
What cooljerk has is what we are calling v1.5.1. He received one of the protos. Another member should have also received a proto this week. I sold these protos because they tested 100% and there are no more changes needed before I order the pcbs to finish our wait list. The remaining orders on the wait list will receive multis identical to cooljerks (except the cpld sockets will be brown).
I'd actually hoped to have the list done this month but Chinese new year caused the protos we ordered to take over a month to arrive. As soon as the new pcbs arrive I expect to finish the list very quickly. My nephew is already on standby to help.
So what changes have been made to the design and are there any changes to functionality. The first thing we decided to do was reduce the IC and part count. We did this by replacing the 5 gal chips with a single cpld. With v1 we could only ever get the old obsolete lattice 22v10c gals to work properly. Now we no longer need to source old chips and hope they work. New current chips can be used. This chip is programmed using a kit that plugs into the multi, therefore there is another header next to the dipswitch that is identical to the remote dip header. They are labeled so do pay attention if you use a remote dip assembly. Finally we decided to return the pcb to standard thickness. In our investigation of why we were having so many trace issues in assembled units, many times after they tested ok already, we found that the thicker pcb we thought we needed was contributing to the issue. I am using a selective wave soldering machine to assemble each multi in three sections back to back. This process requires a bit of flexibility in the pcb that the thicker pcbs could not handle. The seven v1.5.1 protos I assembled already preformed beautifully during the assembly with no issues found so far. We had also thought we needed the thicker pcb to support all of the eproms but it has been determined to not be necessary.
Is there any new functionality? No.
, thanks for the tip !!
- kudos guys, well done.