I am happy to wait the extra few days. That said I suppose I should order the other things I'll need. So power supply and a teensy. Unless there are options for those.
Quoted from ecurtz:Yeah. It might delay your shipping a day or two depending on my Mouser order. I wasn't expecting international shipping to beat the USPS.
Quoted from winteriscoming:Also, for Eli's board you'll need to buy a Teensy separately, right? Or is that going to be an option from Fast as well?
I ordered a "buttload" of Teensy 3.2s, they will be included with the board.
Quoted from Crash:Wow, full bitmap replacement. I wasn't sure if these computers would have the power needed to pull this off. This is huge, not only can you colorize frames yourself without the limitation of a 2-bit palette, you could even re-draw the artwork entirely! I think this will be a big selling point over ColorDMD. And if anyone is wondering no, this does not infringe on ColorDMD's patents. Their system analyzes monochromatic frames and injects chroma information into the stream and displays it as a full-color bitmap, preserving the original luma component of the image. This update skips the chroma processing altogether and injects full color frames in real time.
Looking better and better from my point of view. I hope these are used in the Fast / PPS 2.0 titles if and when they are restarted.
MMR's new colour dots show what can be done with colour dots. If you're going to do augmented colour dots there's no argument for an LCD. OLEDs cheap enough and which won't ghost in this kind of application are years off. Surely these RGB LED DMDs have to be the go to display for these and perhaps CGC/PPS' future remakes.
So I have UncleSash's "complete" rev2 system coming when he starts shipping (sounds like later next week, maybe). I have a panel ordered and on the way from China, and a bracket from Fast Pinball. Oh, and a power supply. So the only thing I should need to be ready to pop this thing in a real machine is an SD card, right?
--Donnie
Quoted from Crash:How do you get the software?
For UncleSash's? It's on GitHub.. that's where I got my copy from.
Quoted from Crash:Wow, full bitmap replacement. I wasn't sure if these computers would have the power needed to pull this off. This is huge, not only can you colorize frames yourself without the limitation of a 2-bit palette, you could even re-draw the artwork entirely
I sure hope so. I've been looking for a way to replace frames for a re-theme project I've been kicking around. Between Pinball Browser for the call-outs and this, I would think one could re-skin modes into something else entirely, although with the old rules.
Quoted from Crash:Wow, full bitmap replacement. I wasn't sure if these computers would have the power needed to pull this off. This is huge, not only can you colorize frames yourself without the limitation of a 2-bit palette, you could even re-draw the artwork entirely! I think this will be a big selling point over ColorDMD. And if anyone is wondering no, this does not infringe on ColorDMD's patents. Their system analyzes monochromatic frames and injects chroma information into the stream and displays it as a full-color bitmap, preserving the original luma component of the image. This update skips the chroma processing altogether and injects full color frames in real time.
Yeah these little things are powerful. We get about 30fps when reading from SD Card.
Not sure what the teensy is capable of.
About the selling point. PIN2DMD is "charity ware" which means that you don´t pay for
it for private use but you are kindly asked to donate for the work Steve and I have done.
We forward the donation to a charity project of our choice which is currently a orphans home.
Here is a link to the donation button
https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=QNNL5UDYRH4MA
Mean Well makes some solid power supplies. I am adding some Mean Well RS-50-5's (5v 10amp) to my supplier order. If anyone is interested in saving some hassle I can add those to any RGB DMD Panel or Bracket Only order for $19. These should be in early next week.
http://www.meanwell.com/mw_search/RS-50/RS-50-spec.pdf
Aaron
FAST Pinball
Quoted from Mocean:Any thoughts on a VGA connector so I can support this in PyProcGameHD? If not maybe there's something else I can work into the HD branch to make it easier to do color on these on P-ROC?
Post expo, I want to play with this... Let me know how I can help.
You can use the USB interface to send raw picture data or video.
PM me if you need further info how to do this.
Quoted from boogies:Will Elis board work with P-ROC? I believe the timing cycles are different than other systems.
It will work with a P-ROC, but there's no real advantage to using it in that way if you're doing a custom game, you can just talk to it over USB and get full color. The streaming support is already coded, with some basic examples in Python and C for the host computer.
Quoted from lucky1:Eli told me that is uses the same timing like SAM. But it is not a big issue to add other timings.
P-ROC has four bit planes with equal timing during the boot screen and then switches to SAM style variable timing once it begin displaying images from the host.
Quoted from ecurtz:It will work with a P-ROC, but there's no real advantage to using it in that way if you're doing a custom game, you can just talk to it over USB and get full color. The streaming support is already coded, with some basic examples in Python and C for the host computer.
Yep! To elaborate on eli's post.....
If you use Mission Pinball Framework as your platform, which works with both P-ROC and FAST, you get RGB DMD support for your custom game via USB.
This took me about 5 minutes to set up with MPF:
You'll have to excuse the shitty camera work that makes the LEDs look bad, it looks phenomenal in person.
While excitedly and patiently waiting for my parts to get to me, I was looking over DMD options currently available and it will be very interesting to see how the RGB LED panels come out in comparison. Granted that I haven't seen one of these RGB LED panels in person, and haven't figured out final cost yet (guessing 150-175 depending on price of sourced parts), it seems like they'll be the best bang for the buck with the super valuable addition that they can fit within the standard DMD space, something the LCD alternatives can't claim.
I had to modify my JP's speaker panel to install a tall LCD for DMD Extender in it and remove some bulbs from the back box panel as the screen overlaps. I have since cracked the fragile LCD screen while moving the game to an expo and accidentally having the light panel slam into the LCD... I would imagine the RGB LED panels would be less at risk from such damage.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
As far as I can see, these are the DMD options:
LCD Options (all of which can potentially require some kind of modification to the speaker panel - the LCD screen will stick up over the speaker panel - or flat out not fit due to odd DMD placement or various features present in the backbox that you wouldn't want to cover with the LCD):
-SmartDMD - $250-275 depending on price of sourced parts - SAM (Spike?) games can be colorized, others are limited to 1 custom palette. Large Sega DMD support available.
*Note: While SmartDMD can be an LCD-only option, it looks like there are plans for the RGB LED panels to be able to pair up with SmartDMD, where the SmartDMD colorization is displayed on these panels, so it can also be viewed as a complimentary product to the RGB LED panels. It also does not exclusively have to be used as a DMD replacement. It could be used to add a display in addition to the stock DMD.
-DMD Extender - $250-275 depending on price of sourced parts - Color options are currently limited to 1 custom palette. Large Sega DMD support available.
*Note: DMD Extender is also an option for installing an additional display, such as in the apron, while leaving the stock DMD in place. It is not exclusively a DMD replacement.
-ColorDMD - $400 - Colorization limited to what they release (to their credit, they have been releasing a good number of titles and are praised for quality) - only single color palette otherwise (i.e. user can choose and change from all blue, all white, all red, etc), no customizable palettes like the other 2 (i.e. can't choose for there to be red and green in the same palette).
Single Color LED Options (all of which should be able to fit in a standard DMD space, requiring not alterations to the speaker panel - All are made up of smaller squares and alignment issues can result in visible lines in displayed images).
-XPin - Orange or Red - $230
-XPin - Green or Amber - $260
-XPin - Blue - $280
-XPin - White - $300 - This is the one you would choose if you wanted to change colors with gels.
-Red LED DMD found in Sterns - $195 - available at Pinball Life
Other LED options available? I couldn't easily find any.
Plasma DMD options (replacement for original DMD - stuck with orange, but shouldn't be questions of whether or not they will work unless trying to install in relatively new machines that don't have high voltage):
-$220 list price at Marco Specialties (currently sold out) - couldn't find listing at any other major online pinball retailers. Could purchase used ones for way less. They're not manufactured anymore, right?
---------------------------------------------------------------------
It seems like XPin should move to these RGB panels simply because we're now going to be able to build a working DMD replacement for cheaper than they are selling white panels, rendering them unnecessary because through software you can change colors rather than having to swap gels. Plus we'll have the added benefit of no visible grid, which is my main complaint about XPin DMDs (I own one of their orange displays, for the record).
Add in custom palettes and these RGB LED panels are competing functionally with DMD Extender and SmartDMD in non SAM (Spike?) games. Custom palettes aren't an available option as far I know in ColorDMD.
Add in palette swapping by key frame and these RGB LED panels are surpassing currently available (as far as I've seen, so not 100% sure on this) options in SmartDMD (with non SAM games) and DMD Extender.
Add in frame by frame colorization for all systems, and these RGB LED panels have the potential to surpass the options currently available in SmartDMD (non SAM - as colorization is possible for them), DMD Extender - and match ColorDMD functionality with regards to colorization. It will be interesting to see if ColorDMD will begin adding RGB LED panels as an option.
The only potential drawback for the RGB LED panels when compared to LCD alternatives is that the LCDs offer options such as image smoothing and other effects that some people like. Otherwise I'm seeing RGB LED as superior to all other choices (pending actually owning one and seeing it in person 
). My expectation bar is set high. I hope I'm pleased.
Thanks to both ecurtz and Lucky1 for realizing the potential for these panels and each building something to share with others. Thanks to Fast for making US-based adoption of this type of product much easier.
Quoted from winteriscoming:Other LED options available? I couldn't easily find any.
Vishay 128x32 DMD orange: $440
Vishay 128x32 DMD red: $205
They used to make monolithic standard and jumbo DMDs but they don't anymore. They were something like $500 and $650 respectively.
Quoted from winteriscoming:-$220 list price at Marco Specialties (currently sold out) - couldn't find listing at any other major online pinball retailers.
Pinball Life: $170
It also appears not only frame-by-frame colorization has been implemented, but full frame (RGB bitmap) replacement. This too surpasses anything that has been offered on the market throughout the game's history.
Quoted from winteriscoming:(guessing 250-275 depending on price of sourced parts)
Do you have a rough itemized cost, i thought it would be considerably less than this ?
I just checked my order from China. My buddy and I got four panels (two dmd displays) for $112 shipped. We CNC'd our own frames. If you are willing to source the parts yourself this solution is much cheaper than if you want to be part of the group buy for $100 per panel, so please factor that in.
Dan
Quoted from pfinny:Do you have a rough itemized cost, i thought it would be considerably less than this ?
Oops, totally meant 150-175, but looking at overall costs of individual parts, maybe a better estimate is 175-200.
DMD Panels:
$100 for a pair (2 are required) from Fast plus shipping - Potentially less ordered directly from China.
Fast's comes with a mounting bracket that can otherwise be purchased separately for $9.
Power Supply:
$12-$20 depending on specs - various suppliers
Micro computer with adapter shield:
Option from ecurtz: $50 fully assembled
Option from Lucky1 by way of UncleSasch on VPUniverse: $60 for Pin2DMD kit Rev 2.
SD Card:
Not sure at the moment if standard or micro are needed and not sure on recommended size/brand.
Looks like decent sizes can be had for under $10 these days.
Maybe additional wire needed for power connections?
I see Fast currently has a listing in their store for FAST RGB DMD at $199. I'm curious to know if that's a complete kit. I'm probably seeing it before they have finalized the listing.
Quoted from winteriscoming:Option from ecurtz: Not sure on final price at the moment
$50 fully assembled including Teensy. I have to do a few and see how long/annoying it is to determine the you-solder price, but $40-$45.
Quoted from ForceFlow:Has anyone tried this pin2dmd solution on any Gottlieb System 3 games?
curbfeeler has successfully used my version in a DE Last Action Hero, which looks to have almost identical DMD timings to the Gottlieb System 3, so it should be possible. I'm not sure if the Pin2DMD group has tested non-WPC games yet or not.
Quoted from winteriscoming:Inclusive of Teensy?
Yes, edited above to be clear.
If anyone wants some route testing done in a moderate to heavy play environment I may be able to contribute. Currently have a Dracula and Tales from the Crypt I can swap from plasma.
Quoted from ecurtz:curbfeeler has successfully used my version in a DE Last Action Hero, which looks to have almost identical DMD timings to the Gottlieb System 3, so it should be possible. I'm not sure if the Pin2DMD group has tested non-WPC games yet or not.
We currently have tested PIN2DMD successfully WITH WPC(Fliptronics), WPC95 and SAM.
The timing for DataEast, Whitestar and Gottlieb is already implemented but not tested.
Steve has a Stargate and a Lethal Weapon to test which will be done the next week or so.
A LOTR is a one hour trip away and is on our to do list.
All platforms are supported by the pin2dmd editor.
SAM can additionally be used with pinball browser colored ROMs.
Quoted from lucky1:All platforms are supported by the pin2dmd editor.
SAM can additionally be used with pinball browser colored ROMs.
Excellent! Looking forward to trying it out.
Quoted from winteriscoming:I see Fast currently has a listing in their store for FAST RGB DMD at $199. I'm curious to know if that's a complete kit. I'm probably seeing it before they have finalized the listing.
Doh! I didn't realize that was on. Too many late nights recently!
But yes, we have a turnkey option in the works. I didn't want to go on and on about it until it was available to order. Been burned before by sharing things too soon without knowing what could drag things out. Yes, I have learned some things over the last couple years. 
I will say that for anyone buying panels from us in the meantime, you will be able to purchase the turnkey solution at a discounted price and use the panels we sold you in the new package.
Update on Orders: I was at ULINE today getting new packaging boxes, etc. I discovered that this mounting bracket size pushed us into an expensive shipping category, but I was able to get creative and get the price back down. Phew! I will be testing and packing up all the orders for shipment on Monday.
I also want to say that I have met a lot of new, cool people through this process of providing a source for RGB DMD panels. We really do enjoy the opportunity to bring cool stuff to our new pinball friends!
Aaron
FAST Pinball
Quoted from ecurtz:$50 fully assembled including Teensy. I have to do a few and see how long/annoying it is to determine the you-solder price, but $40-$45.
Bring up the parts and we can rally together on those tonight if you want! I'll be here LATE working on FAST system wiring diagrams and updating the damn website. Is it sick that I enjoy doing SMD work? As long as it's not a 300+ part controller board, it's pretty fun. We can live stream the most boring Twitch stream ever!
We can open the arcade downstairs on free play and see who wanders in!
Aaron
FAST Pinball
Quoted from Curbfeeler:My buddy and I got four panels (two dmd displays) for $112 shipped.
For me the argument against ordering direct from China is my concern over not knowing if I'll receive what I think I'm buying. Not everyone has received something usable. If more and more people start sharing positive experiences and could maybe share a listing that doesn't change or become invalid 5 seconds later, that might make the option more desirable.
For now I'm more than happy to purchase from Fast knowing that the risk has been removed, and I'll pay a premium for that.
Quoted from winteriscoming:For now I'm more than happy to purchase from Fast knowing that the risk has been removed, and I'll pay a premium for that.
Happy to help!
If I wasn't so damn busy (and if I had enough 5v to push it) I would setup a mini jumbotron to test all these panels! We will have to do that on the next shipment!
Aaron
FAST Pinball
Do it, I'd watch that!!
Quoted from fastpinball:We can live stream the most boring Twitch stream ever!
Well I know I want to get 2 of Eli's boards. I think I found the power supply that will work for me as I need some 12v as well. So just the board.
Since I ordered my panels from Aaron and don't mind waiting maybe I'll wait to ship together, or from the sounds of it together might be the complete kit. So, whats my best option? Go direct to you Eli and have two shipments?
Quoted from agodfrey:Well I know I want to get 2 of Eli's boards. I think I found the power supply that will work for me as I need some 12v as well. So just the board.
Since I ordered my panels from Aaron and don't mind waiting maybe I'll wait to ship together, or from the sounds of it together might be the complete kit. So, whats my best option? Go direct to you Eli and have two shipments?
We will be getting together probably Tuesday. I can hold any shipments in order to include Eli's boards. If anyone would like us to ship together, please email me at [email protected] to let me know. If you could include your FAST order #, that would be a sweet!
Aaron
FAST Pinball
I'm super excited for this. I mentioned this but it may have gotten buried, I can test a BSD or TFTC on location if anyone is curious how the panels/software will hold up long-term in exchange for a discount or something if any of the devs want to do that. I'll be glad to provide detailed results of any kind of test.
For anyone wondering if getting your dmd from Aaron is a good idea I just watched him personally inspect, under a freaking microscope, each individual led from a group of panels to ensure theyll work. To me that's totally worth it!!!
Thanks!!!
Quoted from agodfrey:For anyone wondering if getting your dmd from Aaron is a good idea I just watched him personally inspect, under a freaking microscope, each individual led from a group of panels to ensure theyll work. To me that's totally worth it!!!
Thanks!!!
Sorry the feed was so flakey. Any "mark-up" as these pass through our hands is going into making sure the pinball market isn't looded with shitty panels.
I took a break to let my eyes adjust and I am trying different packaging to keep the postage low.
Aaron
FAST Pinball
Taking Wi-Fi out of the mix really helps! Check out the most boring feed tonight!
Feel free to pop in and ask any questions. Please excuse the karaoke in the background!
Aaron
FAST Pinball
OK I am going to call it for tonight. I made a guess when I started testing the lot of 100 tonight that maaaaybe 4 would have issues. Turns out it was only 3! I have already been in contact with my supplier and they did not hesitate to credit 3 panels in the upcoming shipment.
My task for tomorrow will be to create a methodical way to test these a little more efficiently. The cumbersome part is keeping them from sliding all over the place while connecting and disconnecting cables. It is fairly easy to damage the the pixels so I want to be careful.
OK time for some dinner and then a some more wiring diagrams for the FAST boards. That might be better as a nap and an early breakfast.
Aaron
FAST Pinball
Nice feed! I noticed near the end you adjusted something on the power supply during the brightness test to turn the brightness down from full bright to dim red, what did you change? The amount of current the power supply will provide?
Here is a more or less complete list of current features of PIN2DMD interface:
Hardware specs:
- 168MHZ STM32F407VGT6 microcontroller with ARM Cortex-M4F core, 1 MB Flash, 192 KB RAM
- external SD-card slot for micro SD
- real pinball interface with input signal filter
- micro USB interface
- Hub75 Interface for China RGB DMD
Software supports:
-WPC95 real pinball input
-WPC Fliptronics real pinball input
-Stern SAM real pinball input
-Whitestar real pinball input (beta)
-DataEast real pinball input (beta)
-Gottlieb real pinball input (beta)
-SmartDMD inframe color switching with Pinball Browser modified SAM ROMs
-Frame colorization with PIN2DMD Editor by Steve (beta) (all systems)
-Frame / Animation replacement with PIN2DMD Editor by Steve (beta) (all systems)
-Storage of custom data on SD-Card (animation, frames, palettes, config etc)
-WCID automated USB driver installation (no driver hassle)
-config tool to adjust brightness/default palette/mode
-Visual Pinball / PinMame with recording of DMD output to be used with PIN2DMD Editor
for colorization of virtual and real pinball
-Future Pinball with DMD interceptor DLL
-Unit3d Pinball
-Ultra DMD
-XDMD
-PinballX
Already 5 revisions of pcb layout with improvements (latest Rev 2.0) from UncleSash
Large user community (200+) with shareable custom data and experience.
Currently working on improvement of the PIN2DMD Editor features
(hardware acceleration of frame handling)and dump routine of real pinball
machine DMD output via USB for use with editor.
Well, I ordered some 603 METRIC parts, which I didn't even know was a thing, and they are invisibly tiny, so I'm doing documentation this weekend instead of assembly and that's getting bumped to the middle of the week. 
Quoted from agodfrey:Since I ordered my panels from Aaron and don't mind waiting maybe I'll wait to ship together
You may want to just go ahead and I can mail these separately.
Quoted from lucky1:dump routine of real pinball machine DMD output via USB for use with editor.
Whoa, seriously? That would be very useful for getting dumps of specific animations. To my knowledge there is no way to do this in PinMAME since you cannot drag the ball around in Visual Pinball or manually trigger switches. Just take the glass off, start recording, and start the mode you want to record animations for.
Quoted from Crash:Whoa, seriously? That would be very useful for getting dumps of specific animations. To my knowledge there is no way to do this in PinMAME since you cannot drag the ball around in Visual Pinball or manual trigger switches. Just take the glass off, start recording, and start the mode you want to record animations for.
You can manually trigger switches in PinMAME when it's run by itself rather than as a backend for Visual Pinball.
I was never successful in getting that to work, followed the instructions exactly but no switches ever registered via the keyboard.
Quoted from winteriscoming:Note: While SmartDMD can be an LCD-only option, it looks like there are plans for the RGB LED panels to be able to pair up with SmartDMD, where the SmartDMD colorization is displayed on these panels, so it can also be viewed as a complimentary product to the RGB LED panels.
Does this mean I can get just the microcontroller/shield, install it into an existing plasma/DMD Extender/SmartDMD game and use the shield to chain the signal over to the existing display I have installed? This would allow me to move the shield to multiple games easily and record frames straight from the game.
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