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Author Topic: Batteryless Mod Instructional  (Read 5705 times)

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kfowler8

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Batteryless Mod Instructional
« on: Time Format »

    Here's a full run down on how to do the batteryless mod to your MP-1. I don't take credit for coming up with this. All the work and testing is credited to Kaz Kylheku.

    The original details can be found
HERE. My purpose is to approach this more from a layman’s perspective and provide some more details based on what I learned by doing this. I understand the how but not necessarily the why in some of the components.
 
Something of note. When I was discussing this mod initially with some of the other members, MarshallJMP pointed out that chip U44 also receives power from the battery. So if you remove the battery, what impact will that have? At this point I don’t know. My MP-1 seems to be working normal and I haven’t noticed an issues after a week of use.
 
I would categorize this as a low priority mod. Especially given that some of you are getting 10+ years of life out of your battery. However I think there are some cases that make sense.
 
Reasons to do this mod:
 
- You’re having an issue with battery life. This was my problem. Something was draining my battery and I couldn’t track it down. I was only getting about 2 months of battery life. Pretty frustrating when you keep losing your presets

- You’ve never done the original battery mod where you had to add the battery clip. One big advantage of the battertless mod is there’s no soldering or modification to the original board. It literally plugs into the old chip receptacle. This also means that if you screw up making the daughterboard you really didn’t touch anything on the actual MP-1 so it’s a low risk mod

- You’ve got a lot of presets on your MP-1 and you just want to remove any chance you may lose them
 
Total cost for this mod is going to be between $20-$30. The parts themselves are not expensive. The trick is finding them. Especially in one place. I had to order from several different sites. Add in shipping and your costs start to add up.
 
Parts List
 
(1) NVRAM chip (STK12C-PF25). The actual one I used was a STK12C-PF25I I bought off Ebay for $8.10 including shipping. Here’s the link: (http://www.ebay.com/itm/271826766630?_trksid=p2057872.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT) You could potentially use a different chip but I know this one works


(1) stripboard/vero board. Lots of options here. I used one from Mouser. Part # 854-SB300 (http://www.mouser.com/Search/ProductDetail.aspx?R=SB300virtualkey57130000virtualkey854-SB300). $3.99 and you can make two boards out of it. This one’s nice because it has two center strips running parallel to the horizontal strips. This can be handy when running the negative side of the cap (see below)


(1) “thin” 28 pin IC socket. This is one that will mate with the new chip. I bought mine locally at an electronic supply store. Any on-line store will have these. Just make sure they line up with your new chip

(2) 2.54 mm single row pin header. You need 14 pins per side. The one I bought had 40 pins and then you can trim it to size. I got mine off Ebay but I’m sure Mouser has them. Here’s the link: (http://www.ebay.com/itm/231558434048?_trksid=p2060353.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT) $3.79 including shipping for 10 pieces. This is what will connect your daughterboard to the original IC socket on the MP-1


(2) 10K Ohm resistors. I used ¼ watt
(1) 100 uF electrolytic capacitor. I used a 35 volt because that’s what I had in stock but I’ve seen a 25 volt used.
(1) jumper wire[/li][/list]
 
Try to plan ahead and get everything from one place to save on shipping. I’ve started ordering 3-5x the amount of parts I need since they’re usually pretty cheap and I figure I can use them as backups or on other projects.
 
Let’s start soldering! Note there is a specific orientation to a lot of this so pay attention to your layout. In order to keep the daughterboard from bumping into another chip, you want to keep the edge as close to the resistor side as possible. When you solder the thin IC socket and headers on, it’s not a bad idea to test fit it onto the MP-1 board to make sure you have enough space. The main ROM chip is right next to it and you may have to trim your board down to get it to fit.


 

Solder the thin IC socket to the strip board. You’re strips should be running out perpendicular to the chip. If your strips run all the way across your board, make sure you cut the strips in the center to keep the left and right side of the pins separate. I’d test this with a multimeter to ensure integrity. All of your soldering should be done on the side with the copper traces. So the pins should be sticking out of the copper trace side. All of the parts should be soldered this way. So you’re always soldering on the same side of the board. This is where I screwed up the first time. Solder doesn’t stick to epoxy very well.

Clip the 3rd pin in on one of your headers. From the diagram, this will be at the top right side, pin 26. So pin 26 should not be contacting the board. Solder your heads to the board. The long part of the pins is what you want to stick into the board. So the black part will be sitting on the epoxy side. The pins should stick out far enough to sit in the MP-1s IC socket. Make sure your spacing matches the picture and your chips. Again make sure the header with pin 26 clipped is on the right side and toward the top.

Solder one of your 10k resistors to the strips on pins 26 and 28. Solder your other 10K resistor on the strips on pins 27 and 28. Spacing gets tight so pay attention to your bends. It should look like the diagram.

Solder the positive side of your cap to the strip on pin 1. You can solder the negative side in a couple of different ways. If you have the center strip, you can solder it to that but you’ll need to do it before you solder the wide strip at the beginning. If you do this you’ll need to run a jumper at the bottom to the strip at pin 14. Another options is like the diagram where you solder it to the strip above and then run a jumper wire to the strip at pin 14. I ran a jumper wire directly from the negative side of the cap to the strip on pin 14. This allowed me to run the wire on the top side of the board.

You can do this along the way but it’s a good idea to test all of your connections with a multimeter and make sure you have continuity. Also check the strips next to each joint to make sure your solder didn’t overflow to the next strip. You’ll end up with a short. This also happened to me the first time.

Place the new chip into the IC socket on the daughterboard. NOTE: The orientation of the chip is very important. The notch at the top of the chip should be on the same side as the cap and resistors.

Place your new daughterboard onto the original IC socket on the MP-1. Again pay special attention to your orientation. The notch on the chip, cap, and resistors should be closest to the front of the MP-1.



Power up your MP-1. Don’t put your top place back on yet in case you have to troubleshoot. Your MP-1 should run through cycle as if your battery had died and was just replaced. After the cycle it’ll blink like it’s ready for your first program. Make a preset. Save it. Turn your MP-1 back off. Turn it back on. It should now work as normal.
 
There you go. It’s actually a very simple mod with little risk. Please let me know if you have any questions or see any mistakes.
 
Kevin
« Last Edit: Time Format by kfowler8 »
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rnolan

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Re: Batteryless Mod Instructional
« Reply #1 on: Time Format »

Hey kfowler8, well done  :thumb-up: and thanks for sharing  :wave: While I don't have a MP1 anymore I read through your steps, very interesting and relatively easy mod. We need to work out why U44 needs power from the battery, but as you say no issues so far. I wonder if we can do something similar in the MP2 ?  Though there's isn't much room available in the MP2, it's kind of wall to wall on the motherboard
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kfowler8

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Re: Batteryless Mod Instructional
« Reply #2 on: Time Format »

Hey kfowler8, well done  :thumb-up: and thanks for sharing  :wave: While I don't have a MP1 anymore I read through your steps, very interesting and relatively easy mod. We need to work out why U44 needs power from the battery, but as you say no issues so far. I wonder if we can do something similar in the MP2 ?  Though there's isn't much room available in the MP2, it's kind of wall to wall on the motherboard

Is there room to go up? One option may be to stack IC sockets so the daughter board sits above the other chips.
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MarshallJMP

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Re: Batteryless Mod Instructional
« Reply #3 on: Time Format »

Just a word of caution.

This can't be used in the MP-2 since the MP-2 has a 256kb RAM chip.You can use it in the MP-1,MP-1 classic and MB-1 since these all have 64kb RAM chips.

If for some reason (and this can happen) the memory gets corrupted you can't just reset it ,like with normal RAM by pulling out the battery.
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