Anyone got socket recommendations?

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emt377

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Mar 10, 2019, 9:22:56 PM3/10/19
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I haven't had a lot of luck finding panel-mount sockets that will enable me to extend the Pi connectors (HDMI, Ether, USB) out to the rear panel.   I managed to find a micro-USB cable from Adafruit by nibbling away at the cable boot, or whatever you call it, with diagonal cutters.   No similar luck with HDMI or USB; haven't found anything that might be worth trying for Ethernet.

The problem in all cases is the cable bend radius.

Does anyone have any good suggestions?

Mark Matlock

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Mar 10, 2019, 11:52:04 PM3/10/19
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emt377,
   I also used the Adafruit extender cables but instead of nibbling away on the cable boots, I made a wooden extension to my case, that gave enough room to use them as is. I then added a clear acrylic back panel. Rather than repost the details, look at the "Show us your Kits - Completed PiDP-11s" thread on December 14th.

  There are a couple photos and a .odt file for the back panel that I converted to .pdf and set to the laser cutting service. I love to be able to show people what's inside. Also, a bit of extra weight from the wood aids flipping the front panel switches.

Best,
Mark

Stephen Casner

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Mar 11, 2019, 1:30:25 AM3/11/19
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I did manage to use the available cables but it required substantial surgery on the connector bodies.  See my photo in this post.  My cables came from DataPro, but look the same as those from Adafruit.

Mark Matlock

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Mar 11, 2019, 7:03:31 AM3/11/19
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   Here are some photos that better show how the Adafruit connectors work in the extended frame I mentioned in the 12/14/18 post. Also, I used the RS232 connectors (Adafruit PID: 3123) with the screw terminals which allows easy modifications in case you need to switch send/receive etc. The custom back plate was cut from 4.5 mm clear acrylic by Pololu for $25. The wood was 1"x3" trim and added 60mm of depth. The fasteners were made from 10/24 threaded rod. I needed 3.5" length and I just found a supplier of 3.5" 10/24 bolts that will look a bit better.

    Rene asked about the 7 segment display which is a tiny voltmeter display. I have bought them from Sparkfun (PRT-14313) for $1.50 ea. and love to put them in projects to keep an eye on voltage. I've attached it to the prototype area so being fed through the microUSB connector and extension through the GPIO pins should give a good indication of minimum voltage in the box.

    I've also attached a .odg (LibreOffice's drawing program file format) of the latest version of the back panel. When I've positioned and added what I want I export a .pdf and send that to Pololu. Oscar's back panel design with a 3mm acrylic is made so that a small amount of plastic still holds the knock-outs in the holes in place for stiffness. I remove any. extra holes I don't want and then completely laser cut then holes. This is important with the thicker (4.5 mm) acrylic. In the first version I used 6mm acrylic and did not completely cut them and it was very difficult to remove the knock-outs.

Best,
Mark Matlock
IMG_1762.jpeg
IMG_1761.jpeg
IMG_1757.jpeg
panelmgmmod2.odg

Stephen Williams

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Mar 12, 2019, 6:46:15 AM3/12/19
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Power sockets: you've already solved this, but in case anyone else is interested (and wants to do business with Aliexpress) these are available. The mounting header is smaller than the one from Adafruit appears to be.


I bought a couple. The only problem was the fact that the mounting feet with screw holes stand a little proud of the face of the socket. A few minutes with an Xacto knife fixed that. I would expect the Adafruit ones are probably better quality, but these work.

I already mentioned this on another thread, but if you want to mount the Pi's SD card externally you can use one of these, with some mounting surgery on the case or caseback:

Neil Higgins

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Mar 12, 2019, 8:17:58 AM3/12/19
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I got these from Element14 for about AU$25 total, plus postage. They are nice and shallow. They are obviously meant for PCB mounting, but I have joined them to stripped-back USB cables, and strain-relieved the connections as best possible using heatshrink. The part numbers are:
http://au.element14.com/amphenol-icc-commercial-products/musbk55230/sealed-usb-2-0-micro-ab-rcpt-ip67/dp/2708978?CMP=i-55c5-00001621
and
http://au.element14.com/amphenol-commercial-products/musbra11130/sealed-usb-2-0-type-a-receptacle/dp/2708979?CMP=i-55c5-00001621

Gavin Stewart

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Mar 13, 2019, 4:43:01 AM3/13/19
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On Tuesday, March 12, 2019 at 9:46:15 PM UTC+11, Stephen Williams wrote:
Power sockets: you've already solved this, but in case anyone else is interested (and wants to do business with Aliexpress) these are available. The mounting header is smaller than the one from Adafruit appears to be.


I bought a couple. The only problem was the fact that the mounting feet with screw holes stand a little proud of the face of the socket. A few minutes with an Xacto knife fixed that. I would expect the Adafruit ones are probably better quality, but these work.

I bought a couple of identical looking ones, and they drop the voltage too much for a 3B+ using the official pi power supply. (You can easily check this by plugging the pi into HDMI and looking for the lightning bolt under-voltage symbol).

I tried several other suppliers (of cheap cables) that look slightly different, and they all had the same problem.

The only reliable source appears to the adafruit ones. Not so cheap, but the copper must be thicker!

Oscar Vermeulen

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Mar 13, 2019, 7:42:03 AM3/13/19
to Gavin Stewart, [PiDP-11]
Gavin,

On Wed, 13 Mar 2019 at 09:43, Gavin Stewart <g.a.s...@gmail.com> wrote:
I bought a couple of identical looking ones, and they drop the voltage too much for a 3B+ using the official pi power supply. (You can easily check this by plugging the pi into HDMI and looking for the lightning bolt under-voltage symbol).

I tried several other suppliers (of cheap cables) that look slightly different, and they all had the same problem.

The only reliable source appears to the adafruit ones. Not so cheap, but the copper must be thicker!


You know about this (from the manual or forum)?

Powering a Pi 3 Model B Plus via the key switch

The Raspberry Pi 3 Model B Plus came out after the PiDP-11. It’s great, and you should use it. But if you don’t power the Pi through its on-board microUSB connector, but instead use the PiDP serial/power connector and the key switch as a hard on/off switch: the traces for 5V and GND on the board are just a bit too thin for the power-hungry Plus. If you use a 5.0V power supply and not the Official Pi Power Supply (which really is 5.35V…), then I recommend you solder power wires (5V, GND) from the pin header of the key switch straight to the GPIO connector. Apologies, I should have known to add more beef to the power trace from key switch to GPIO.

See this link for the importance of a good PS, also in terms of performance(!) for the Pi 3B+:
www.jeffgeerling.com/blog/2018/raspberry-pi-3-b-review-and-performance-comparison


Maybe the cables on their own would be marginally OK, but I've compounded the problem with the traces from keyswitch to Pi. You could double them up with a wire and see if that makes the power-panic icon disappear from the Pi's HDMI screen.

Kind regards,

Oscar.

Stephen Williams

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Mar 13, 2019, 8:52:17 AM3/13/19
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Hi,

On two Pi 3B+  (one is in PiDP11), with 2 different genuine Pi power supplies I have run these Aliexpress cables without any sign of power throttling. Since I might have missed something I checked each with vcgencmd.  Voltages displayed are the same or better than the examples of normal output. Only sign of throttling was bit 19 set on the PiDP11, which I believe is a soft temperature indication. No power throttling ever and occasional temperature throttling. 

Best regards.

Gerry Duprey

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Mar 13, 2019, 9:19:49 AM3/13/19
to Stephen Williams, [PiDP-11]
I've always disliked the choice the rPi folks made of using a microUSB for
power. Besides the confusing "its a port that you really can't use as a port",
it's a fairly terrible connector for things over an amp or so.

I do get it meant an lower barrier to getting things working for new rPi users
(everyone has some sort of microUSB cable/power supply). But....

If you're going to the effort of making cable extensions, it may be worth
considering switching over to something like a 2.5mm barrel connector. They are
plentiful, cheap, have very easy to use panel mount hardware, handle handle 2-3
amps with little to no voltage loss, are very sturdy and designed to handle
repeated plugins. Just just directly attach them (solder or even pin
connectors) to the 40 pin header on the pi.

I've done this for every pi that has been "embedded" into some sort of case and
coupled with a strong 5.1+ power supply, never had low-volt/brown out problems
on my various rPis

Gerry
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Oscar Vermeulen

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Mar 13, 2019, 11:20:30 AM3/13/19
to Gerry Duprey, Stephen Williams, [PiDP-11]
Gerry,

I very much agree. MicroUSB connectors are awful power supply connectors, the barrel-type is much better, and there's a slot for one on the back panel. 

Especially because the Pi 3 is extremely sensitive to voltage drops already. I've already had to ditch 2 micro USB power supplies and one Pi because their connectors became unreliable.

Kind regards,

Oscar.

Peter Willard

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Mar 14, 2019, 9:20:38 AM3/14/19
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It's interesting to me to see how this discussion about the Pi MicroUSB power being a bad choice is happening in many different venues.   I'm hoping the NEXT GEN Pi design finally takes this into consideration, finally

emt377

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Mar 14, 2019, 6:49:23 PM3/14/19
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Given the amount of business that seems to have sprung up in the area of "selling Pi accessories", my guess is that the Pi people can choose any connector they want, and suitable power adapters will appear the next day! 

Rene Richarz

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Mar 15, 2019, 9:08:50 AM3/15/19
to [PiDP-11]
Attached is my solution. The PiDP11 is fixed to the wooden base using a small amount of double face tape, and the panel for the sockets is attached to the wooden base. Plenty of space, and no stress on the pi connectors, cables and sockets. :)

I still have to mount the barrel type power socket, once I have decided how to connect the power. I have also not yet decided whether to leave the upper part of the PiDP open for optimal heat dissipation and easy access to the SD card, or whether I want to add a clear acrylic back panel. I'm planning to do more temperature measurements before making this decision.

Screen - 1.jpg

Ed Thierbach

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Mar 15, 2019, 9:26:13 AM3/15/19
to Rene Richarz, [PiDP-11]
Hi, Rene - I really like your solution, and will probably borrow it when I (finally!) get around to building my PiDP-11.  I might even adapt it a bit and re-case my PiDP-8.

So, a very newbie question from someone with no fabrication skills at all. :-) How did you cut the holes for the connectors?  And do you have a template for it?

Thanks!
-Ed-

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Rene Richarz

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Mar 15, 2019, 9:43:24 AM3/15/19
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On Friday, March 15, 2019 at 2:26:13 PM UTC+1, Ed Thierbach wrote:
How did you cut the holes for the connectors?


Retro style, with driller, jigsaw and small rasp. Very low tech, but done in less than an hour, and looks as good as a high tech solution. But maybe somebody with the necessary skills can make a template. 

Jeremy Radwan

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Mar 15, 2019, 9:24:57 PM3/15/19
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I went with the AdaFruit panel connectors with the knowledge some cutting and cable stress might be involved. It was definitely difficult getting everything into the case. I left the bottom portion of the back panel slightly open a) to not have the HDMI and ethernet connectors push on the PCB, and b) figured that will help with air flow. This meant the case sits even more forward on the wood stand, but it seemed to be stable. But then I realized I was having HDMI signal issues and the address encoder LEDs were flickering. I think the stress of all those cables inside the case was too much, so I'm just going with the open back for now. Too bad because the back panel really looked nice with all the ports!






Geoffrey McDermott

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Apr 9, 2019, 1:01:24 PM4/9/19
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I bought micro-USB breakout connectors for use on a completely different project. The primary issue with the micro USB connectors is that they loosen up after a lot of use. These small, cheap pieces have an extremely tight fit, and make a fine connection.

So, if you used the micro USB cable to connect to the breakout PCB, it would not need to be disconnected, so it wouldn't loosen up. Then a hardwired connection to the main PCB would make the connection 'permanent'.

20190409_125259.jpg


And they are cheap.....if I remember, they wire about a dollar for 10 of them.


Re: [PiDP-11] Re: Anyone got socket recommendations?

Geoffrey McDermott

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Apr 9, 2019, 1:06:38 PM4/9/19
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Message has been deleted

Robert Evans

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Apr 9, 2019, 7:56:37 PM4/9/19
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On Tuesday, April 9, 2019 at 1:06:38 PM UTC-4, Geoffrey McDermott wrote:
They also make full size female USB-A breakouts......

I see that Adafruit recently announced something similar.  DIY USB Cable Parts - Straight Type A Jack 

 
4110-01.jpg

oscarv

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Apr 16, 2019, 7:50:36 AM4/16/19
to [PiDP-11]
Hi,

About mounting USB stuff to the back panel - I think it's generally accepted that fitting mountable extension cables is an annoying process involving cutting to shorten their cases at best.

Yesterday I met up with a guy who makes powered USB hubs - and I think I'll ask him to make a proper USB/HDMI/power back panel for the PiDP. It'll contain 4 external USB ports, 3 extra ones for use inside the case (plus 3 spare ones on the Pi itself makes for 10 USB ports!). And have HDMI and power connectors thrown in as well.

He'll probably charge $40-$50 per unit, so this is not really a justifiable add-on for most PiDP users. Because USB hub chips are SMD parts, it makes sense to have the whole board ready-made rather than as a kit. Not many people like dealing with SMD soldering.

I'll see how it goes, it'll take a few weeks for him to come back with a design and I'll keep you posted!

Kind regards,

Oscar.

Paul Birkel

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Apr 16, 2019, 8:33:30 AM4/16/19
to oscarv, [PiDP-11]

Oscar:  Will that be for both the 8 and 11, or just the 11?

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Oscar Vermeulen

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Apr 16, 2019, 10:43:28 AM4/16/19
to Paul Birkel, [PiDP-11]
Paul,

The idea is that this USB Hub panel will fit both the 8 (where you have to crudely hack out part of the back panel, but that'd be neatly covered up by a cover plate) and the 11.
Also, my idea is that this leads to two options for the 11: the IMHO overly expensive USB Hub PCB, but at the same time a non-hub, 'bare' PCB that allows soldering simple USB connectors.

That bare PCB should only be a few dollars, which makes more sense for most I would imagine. But if you populate it with 4 USB ports, you end up with 4 USB cables to the Pi. Which is messy.

The idea of having a good, powered USB hub offering a total of 10 USB ports on the Pi makes some sense - relative sense - as it allows lots of real terminals over USB-serial and still keeps USB ports free for USB sticks pretending to be RK05 packs or whatever! Besides, the guy who will design/make it is an Open Source Hardware guy, so the design will be freely available.

Kind regards,

Oscar.

Watch maker

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Apr 17, 2019, 2:18:48 AM4/17/19
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A possible follow-up might be a companion board with USB-Serial and level-shift chips to populate the DB-9/25 serial ports on the other side of the back panel.

Geoff

Oscar Vermeulen

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Apr 17, 2019, 4:58:35 PM4/17/19
to Watch maker, [PiDP-11]
Geoff,

Yes, a simple RS-232 connector PCB will also be done. Cost is $1 or $2 or something like that... the level shifters are already on the PiDP board itself, it's just a bit messy to screw the DB connectors on the back panel with lots of wires soldered onto the connector ends. A little PCB will clean up the, er, Serial Port Experience :)

Kind regards,

Oscar.



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emt377

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Apr 24, 2019, 6:08:34 PM4/24/19
to [PiDP-11]
If you want indication of possible sales, I'd likely be up for one of those - just in the spirit of encouraging a useful ecosystem for retrocomputing, if nothing else!

emt377

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Jul 7, 2019, 6:25:59 PM7/7/19
to [PiDP-11]
I am thinking again about redoing the cabling on my PiDP-11.

Did anything happen about this?


On Tuesday, April 16, 2019 at 7:50:36 AM UTC-4, oscarv wrote:
...
Yesterday I met up with a guy who makes powered USB hubs - and I think I'll ask him to make a proper USB/HDMI/power back panel for the PiDP. It'll contain 4 external USB ports, 3 extra ones for use inside the case (plus 3 spare ones on the Pi itself makes for 10 USB ports!). And have HDMI and power connectors thrown in as well.

He'll probably charge $40-$50 per unit, so this is not really a justifiable add-on for most PiDP users. Because USB hub chips are SMD parts, it makes sense to have the whole board ready-made rather than as a kit. Not many people like dealing with SMD soldering.

I'll see how it goes, it'll take a few weeks for him to come back with a design and I'll keep you posted!
.... 

Richard Stofer

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Jul 7, 2019, 7:23:12 PM7/7/19
to [PiDP-11]
I have been thinking about a USB <-> 4 Serial adapter.  Something like this...


On another FPGA project, I use the FTDI FT4232 MiniModule to combine 4 serial streams into a single USB.  It is pretty easy to solder the module to a daughter card that might, for example, also have a Compact Flash socket.  I like gadgets that have the 'stamp' form factor.


What I don't know is whether having the 4 ports show up in Raspian will somehow cause them to be available in 2.11BSD.

Being basically lazy, I like the first solution as long as it will work in this application.  I could see just mounting the gadget to the back panel.

andy

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Jul 7, 2019, 7:54:22 PM7/7/19
to [PiDP-11]
I have the exact Startech and it works fine without any drivers added. The only problem is I am unable to add my second startech and have 8 serials...
Although I have the same problem with my Keyspan 4-port devices, so it is probably a Raspbian limitation. Ive not had time to diagnose thoroughly but I can confirm that the 8-port startechs only allow 4/8 ports.

Tom Lake

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Jul 8, 2019, 1:27:12 AM7/8/19
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It might be a BSD limitation but definitely not a Raspbian limitation. I have eight serial ports running on mine under RSTS/E with no problem. With other OSes, you do have to edit the boot.ini to associate the eight ports with a multiplexer but I don't know about BSD.

Tom L

Johnny Billquist

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Jul 8, 2019, 6:32:17 PM7/8/19
to pid...@googlegroups.com
I have some recollection from a few months ago of a similar problem. And
it is something in the Linux config for the RPi which causes a limit on
the number of serial ports. Don't remember if it was specifically with
USB to serial ports, or something else.

Johnny

On 2019-07-08 07:27, Tom Lake wrote:
> It might be a BSD limitation but definitely not a Raspbian limitation. I
> have eight serial ports running on mine under RSTS/E with no problem.
> With other OSes, you do have to edit the boot.ini to associate the eight
> ports with a multiplexer but I don't know about BSD.
>
> Tom L
>
> On Sunday, July 7, 2019 at 7:54:22 PM UTC-4, andy wrote:
>
> I have the exact Startech and it works fine without any drivers
> added. The only problem is I am unable to add my/second/ startech
> and have 8 serials...
> Although I have the same problem with my Keyspan 4-port devices, so
> it is probably a Raspbian limitation. Ive not had time to diagnose
> thoroughly but I can confirm that the 8-port startechs only allow
> 4/8 ports.
>
> On Sunday, July 7, 2019 at 7:23:12 PM UTC-4, Richard Stofer wrote:
>
> I have been thinking about a USB <-> 4 Serial adapter.
> Something like this...
>
> https://www.amazon.com/StarTech-com-USB-Serial-Adapter-Hub/dp/B008U3OVHW
> <https://www.amazon.com/StarTech-com-USB-Serial-Adapter-Hub/dp/B008U3OVHW/ref=asc_df_B008U3OVHW/?tag=hyprod-20&linkCode=df0&hvadid=309833041189&hvpos=1o1&hvnetw=g&hvrand=15615187658903642982&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9032207&hvtargid=pla-632926557592&psc=1>
>
> On another FPGA project, I use the FTDI FT4232 MiniModule to
> combine 4 serial streams into a single USB.  It is pretty easy
> to solder the module to a daughter card that might, for example,
> also have a Compact Flash socket.  I like gadgets that have the
> 'stamp' form factor.
>
> https://www.ftdichip.com/Products/Modules/DevelopmentModules.htm#FT4232H_Mini
> <https://www.ftdichip.com/Products/Modules/DevelopmentModules.htm#FT4232H_Mini>
>
> What I don't know is whether having the 4 ports show up in
> Raspian will somehow cause them to be available in 2.11BSD.
>
> Being basically lazy, I like the first solution as long as it
> will work in this application.  I could see just mounting the
> gadget to the back panel.
>
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