advertisement


Buffalo-III and Arduino

Well nothing to lose by taking the Sabre off the board.

I started with a micro dremel type thing but became worried of slipping so I tried a scalpel which proved very good. I used very light strokes, just the weight of the scalpel. Around 10 strokes and all the risers has been severed with only a tiny force being applied and out popped the Sabre.

I the ran the iron around the pads and the tiny (now severed) legs popped up and clung to the iron.

Then the trouble started, there was some dust on the board left over from the aborted dremel grinding so I sloshed some IPA on the board an gave it a little scrub with an artist paint brush. I became surprised as some pads started to lift.

Crappy photo from my phone shows a missing part of a pad on the top row.

2013-09-13174111_zps5bdf71fd.jpg
 
I had a lifted pad as well Tony. I used a tiny bit of superglue beneath to reposition and secure it just touching its track and then re-soldered it to the track when it was cured. It was very fiddly but worked. Even if you didn't replace the track you could point to point it with a fine strand of tinned copper after all else is done. I thought it was just me being unlucky but it seems these tracks aren't well adhered to the board and it is easy to catch their un-terminated ends.

John
 
Thanks John, I don't have the missing trace but there is probably enough and as you say point to point is the get out of jail card.
Being as I used zero force to remove the remnants of the legs I would agree that the tracks aren't well stuck down, just swishing IPA around with a kiddies paint brush did this damage. I think even moderate force in chip removal could result in board damage.

Although I removed the I/O expander with not so much care at all as I never anticipated needing to refit it and the expander pads are the same size and are fine.

Still unsure of how to proceed.
The good buffalo has some value of course.

One aspect of the buffalo is that is much larger than my needs, probably three times as large as needed. I need to look at the Chinese board options, it would be nice if there was an open design on Eagle. It does not seem as though there is very much in the buffalo board design once you strip out the controller parts.

Hoping to get my mitts around a friends $99 board in a week or so.
 
If you are considering a self made Buffalo implementation the you should consider implementing the regs on the board (that's stating the obvious I suppose). The ESS9018 would be but a small fraction of the board space. You're already much of the way there with your mite layout as well. The result would be a superb DAC board.
 
It is a thought at the back of my mind, but I need this first board back from the board house and see what a mess I made of it before I even consider moving on with board production.
 
Back with the isolator again.
Now have a shield fitted and stuck a pair of isolators on the shield, one unused for now until I decide which way to go with the buffalo repair.
Using a pair will be a better configuration as it removed a ground common that existed between the two buffaloes when only one isolator was used.
It also means a twisted I2C connector cable using four cores for both buffaloes as opposed to one four core and one three core, I think this will provide better common mode rejection for the cable.

If using just one isolator the shield has seven pads for a SOIC and saves the two SOIC / DIL adapters I used.

This time I used side 2 for the Arduino as all the sources I found showed the I2C bus on side 2 and multiple devices on side 1

IMG_1988_zps3a4f6c77.jpg


IMG_1989_zps6902da6c.jpg


IMG_1992_zps97387f19.jpg
 
Back on u.fl, fully terminated at Buffalo and WaveIO
Using adapter boards to pickup the Buffalo input header and the WaveIO isolated I2S header.
Been getting round to this for months.

IMG_2013_zps2a34d6be.jpg


IMG_2018_zps8973c666.jpg
 
The Buffalo 3 boxed..its paired with mono Hackernaps and Joggler. I have made it compatible with touchscreen and apple remote...all fully isolated. Sounds quite nice, I will make it dual mono next, but have to upgrade my speakers first.

it sounds quite better than naim cd5x, nap150, teddy regs PS and B4

https://picasaweb.google.com/106342...hkey=Gv1sRgCNOVjo67mN-BAw#5941958013573676290

https://picasaweb.google.com/106342...hkey=Gv1sRgCNOVjo67mN-BAw#5941955898564288562

Thanks for support, especially for Bemused...who gave me couple of really useful tips.

Tomasz
 
Looks like you're a happy bunny Tomasz.

But it should be blowing the CD5 /150 away in my experience, a major, rather large step change. The HackerNAPs alone should have significantly more grip and detail. Maybe you have too much bashfulness.
 
Ohhh yes, I do am a happy bunny Bemused ;)

I have to still fix this ant that, make some mods, but hey...at least its boxed ;)

It does sound much better than naim, but i also need better speakers to get the best of it. Just the buffalo beat cd5s by quite a margin and hackernaps have also much of reserve.

The Harbeths are nice little speakers, but they lack the detail and are bit warm. It seems to me that they are quite forgiving about the source and amp, they sound good almost on any equipment, but its not what Buf3 and HNap deserves.

So now have to do something with speakers, maybe ergos... but with my wood work skills its not the very best idea
 
Yes Ergos, hmmm perhaps some friendly pinkfisher has a year or so of spare time to do you a pair.
Blimey was I lucky with my EIIIrs.

Having recently gone from largish to small then back to large it seems that small speakers just don't reproduce "the scale" of a piece of music and a sorted buffalo can most excellently reproduce scale.

Seems you're one up on myself by getting nicely boxed.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.


advertisement


Back
Top