I've been thinking a lot about the balanced output. I was going to do it on a daughterboard. But then I started working out what kind of architecture I need in order to make a daughterboard work right. It turns out that I need some infrastructure on the main board to support it, which takes more effort than just butting them on the board in the first place, so balanced is in. Getting the connectors on the board is not easy, XLRs are HUGE compared to say a micro USB jack!
The connectors, size of board, and the case are all turning out to be highly interconnected. So here is what Gen1 is looking like in my mind right now: 6.3"x6.3" board Hammond 1455T1601 case, Extruded aluminum with PCB slots designed for 6.3 boards. Separate screwed on end plates. Connectors on one side of the board (the back) and stick through holes on the custom end plate. The front end plate has nothing on it, so it can be whatever you want, use the one that comes with the case or be creative. The case has an internal height of slightly less that 2". The XLR jacks are slightly higher than 1", so the board cannot bein the center slot,it will have to be slightly offset. The connectors need to fit on both sides of the board, but some cannot be on top and bottom because they are through hole and the holes interfere with each other. So this is what I have come up with, sorry I don't have a picture. Tharting from the right side working left are: top: barrel power jack, bottom: micro USBas power connector top: RJ-45 Ethernet jack, no bottom top: micro OTG USB jack, bottom: HDMI jack top: stacked USB full size type A jacks (hostjacks , type on laptops etc), no bottom top: BNC jack (S/PDIF), bottom: TOSLINK top: 3.5mm headphone jack, no bottom top: 2 RCA jacks side by side, bottom: 2 XLR jacks side by side It looks like this will all fit in the 6.3". It will just barely fit in the less than 2" height. If I can find surface mount full size USB A jacks I might put one on the top and one on the bottom instead of the stacked USB jacks. I can't really re-arrange the order of the jacks, it's determined by the pin order on that giant connector. If I change the order I will have high speed differential signals crossing each other, and I don't want to do that. The 6.3" depth is more than I need, but that is the smallest depth the hammond extrusions come in for 6.3" width. I like the concept of using the aluminum extrusions because the main "box" does not have to be drilled or milled in any way, just the small flat end plate. There are other manufacturers that make extrusions for casses, but they were more expensive and much harder to get than the Hammond ones. I was thinking of having the end plate done as a PCB, (at lest for Gen1) they can do all the holes and labeling for about $8 a piece in 25 unit run. Other places I have looked into that do aluminum plate milling charge a lot more than this. ReValveiT, if you want to do the back plates that would be fine. Can you do the labeling as well? Any thoughts? John S. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ JohnSwenson's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=5974 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=97881 _______________________________________________ discuss mailing list discuss@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/mailman/listinfo/discuss
