Face U/MX-mini U replica knowledge base

alinh · 05 Nov 2014, 19:46

chzel wrote: ↑Nice guide goes here

Finally got around to doing this and it worked like a charm. Was a pita to solder the tiny resistor (your magnified pic made it look easy

)

chzel · 05 Nov 2014, 19:58

Great!

SMD's can be a pain!Patience, flux, and practice make it easy!
A pic would be great!

alinh · 05 Nov 2014, 20:01

chzel wrote: ↑ Great!
SMD's can be a pain!Patience, flux, and practice make it easy!
A pic would be great!

The layout : iso style left shift and hhkb style right one

With leds on (every switch has sip sockets for leds, but leds are only set for modifiers for now. waiting for different color leds to arrive) :

The clicky switches will be FN (though I have no idea what to do with 3 FNs )

DanielT · 05 Nov 2014, 20:12

So you did it you little maniac

alinh · 05 Nov 2014, 20:20

DanielT wrote: ↑So you did it you little maniac

Well.. I put in the stabs and the damn backspace led was still bugging me, so I said... plm

chzel · 05 Nov 2014, 20:40

Nice work!
You are using screw mount stabs right?
How are they? I am waiting for mine!

alinh · 05 Nov 2014, 20:43

chzel wrote: ↑Nice work!
You are using screw mount stabs right?
How are they? I am waiting for mine!

Yeap, screw mount stabs. They fit in nicely and stay in place. I had more problems with the "standard" ones.

Now.. if only I could hack that Caps Lock led to behave like the other ones (not just on/off)

chzel · 05 Nov 2014, 21:01

alinh wrote: ↑ Now.. if only I could hack that Caps Lock led to behave like the other ones (not just on/off)

You know how, you have done it! If you need a pictorial let me know!

alinh · 05 Nov 2014, 22:44

chzel wrote: ↑
alinh wrote: ↑ Now.. if only I could hack that Caps Lock led to behave like the other ones (not just on/off)
You know how, you have done it! If you need a pictorial let me know!

but.. but.. there's no unused close switch position I can use/steal like I had for backspace

chzel · 05 Nov 2014, 22:56

Use longer wire!

Get the + from the unused left shift position to the unused Caps lock led(+ side), desolder the "R2" resistor and piggyback it onto the resistor between the two shifts!
I just realized that you didn't need to cut the trace of the Num-lock led, removing the resistor would have been enough, sorry about that

alinh · 05 Nov 2014, 23:01

chzel wrote: ↑Use longer wire!
Get the + from the unused left shift position to the unused Caps lock led(+ side), desolder the "R2" resistor and piggyback it onto the resistor between the two shifts!
I just realized that you didn't need to cut the trace of the Num-lock led, removing the resistor would have been enough, sorry about that

Sneaky with the shift stuff

(getting close to hand wiring that board

)

and evil with the cutting the trace part. That was actually almost as hard as soldering the resistor

Madhias · 17 Nov 2014, 21:39

I built my second Face U board, and thought it would be perfect because of just switching the PCB (and plate) to have for example two boards with different switches. Now i have PCB mounted MX Blacks, and plate mounted MX Clears. That was also my plan (but maybe with a bigger layout like a TKL or 75%) for my huge Round 5 order.

The problem with the second PCB is that the left CTRL and also the right CTRL not working correctly - only every 5th or 10th key press is recognized. This could be the soldering of the switch? I have to check that.

beltet · 18 Nov 2014, 00:01

madhias wrote: ↑I built my second Face U board, and thought it would be perfect because of just switching the PCB (and plate) to have for example two boards with different switches. Now i have PCB mounted MX Blacks, and plate mounted MX Clears. That was also my plan (but maybe with a bigger layout like a TKL or 75%) for my huge Round 5 order.

The problem with the second PCB is that the left CTRL and also the right CTRL not working correctly - only every 5th or 10th key press is recognized. This could be the soldering of the switch? I have to check that.

Check the soldering, it can be a "cold joint". Otherwise I believe its a firmware related problem. But thats only my theories.

chzel · 18 Nov 2014, 09:11

It could be indeed a cold joint.
Try to remove the switch and short the pads together to test the board and rule out the switch!

scottc · 20 Nov 2014, 22:41

WTF. I have had a perfectly working Face-U for days (since I bought one of matt3o's spare PCBs) and it randomly stopped working. It isn't recognised by the OS when I plug it in, except when I put it in flash mode. I've tried re-flashing the firmware (like HzFaq suggested a few pages back), but nothing.

Nuum · 20 Nov 2014, 22:49

(Semi-)broken USB cable maybe? Sounds like the problem I had with mine before changing the USB cable.

scottc · 20 Nov 2014, 22:55

Perhaps... My cables all seem to work with my HHKB and beam spring controller, though. *sigh*

Edit: I'm not even sure where I'd get a good-quality USB cable that's not a fancy €20 one. I'm having the same problems trying to find a good micro USB cable for my Nexus 4.

Nuum · 20 Nov 2014, 22:57

Same here. One cable I have here is working perfectly fine with Soarer's Converter but not with the FaceU.

scottc · 20 Nov 2014, 23:00

Hmm. I really hope it's the same issue here. Do you have any suggestions for places to get good cables?

By the way, I just went back a few pages and saw your board. It looks really good! I've always wanted a set of those purple mods.

Nuum · 20 Nov 2014, 23:04

Thanks, I got my cable from amazon.de, it's from a company called "Good Connections" and 1.8m long, but I don't know, if they have them on amazon.co.uk, too.

scottc · 20 Nov 2014, 23:11

Thanks. I've found some of them on Amazon UK for about £20 (!) but shipping from the UK to Ireland from non-first-party sellers on Amazon is excruciating. I think I'll just look for a "name-branded" USB cable on there.

DanielT · 21 Nov 2014, 09:23

I recommend Hama cables, the quality is very good and the price is more than OK
http://www.emag.ro/cablu-hama-mini-usb- ... E48XTBBBM/ that one is around 4EUR.
I'm using these cables on all my boards, they look good and the quality is awesome. If you don't find any I can send you shipping would be like 2EUR in a bubble mailer.

alinh · 21 Nov 2014, 15:31

DanielT wrote: ↑I recommend Hama cables, the quality is very good and the price is more than OK
http://www.emag.ro/cablu-hama-mini-usb- ... E48XTBBBM/ that one is around 4EUR.
I'm using these cables on all my boards, they look good and the quality is awesome. If you don't find any I can send you shipping would be like 2EUR in a bubble mailer.

I can confirm that that cable is great. I too had problems with crappy cables (had like 5 which were bad).

scottc · 21 Nov 2014, 15:55

Thanks, guys. I ordered some fancy Lindy cables from Amazon last night so I'll try those out and if those don't work then I'll look around for these ones.

DanielT · 21 Nov 2014, 16:29

Lindy cables are supposed to be good, your problem should be solved.
The problem with USB cables is that the cheap ones have crappy thin wires and even more crappy connectors. I had a lot of problems with external usb disk enclosures only because of the crappy cables.

scottc · 24 Nov 2014, 21:29

The cables arrived today. I'd hoped that it would bring some good news. Nope, no such luck.

I really don't understand this.

Nuum · 24 Nov 2014, 21:38

Oh, damn, that's a strange problem, maybe you broke a resistor or diode while fiddling with it?

Laser · 24 Nov 2014, 21:41

scottc wrote: ↑The cables arrived today. I'd hoped that it would bring some good news. Nope, no such luck. I really don't understand this.

*Nothing* works? Try to re-burn both firmware and keymap with the new cable.

If it's in the hardware ... you'll have to measure it.

scottc · 24 Nov 2014, 21:45

Laser wrote: ↑
scottc wrote: ↑The cables arrived today. I'd hoped that it would bring some good news. Nope, no such luck. I really don't understand this.
*Nothing* works? Try to re-burn both firmware and keymap with the new cable.

If it's in the hardware ... you'll have to measure it.

I can get into the bootloader mode and re-flash it, but it doesn't have any effect. This was the same even with the old cable. When I then unplug the cable and re-insert it, my machines don't recognise that a new device has been inserted (specifically, in Windows there's no "new device" chime and on Linux, dmesg shows no new lines).

Nuum wrote: ↑Oh, damn, that's a strange problem, maybe you broke a resistor or diode while fiddling with it?

I've got no idea. I don't think so. It worked one night when I went to bed, then the next evening after work, it didn't.

I had just loosely screwed it in to its case the night before it stopped working. Maybe that could be it? Too much flex on the PCB? It worked for a few hours that evening, though. I know that some people had problems with PCBs only working when flexed in a certain way. It might've broken a cold solder join somewhere. I've got no idea. I bought a multimeter to try to figure it out. I don't really have any idea of what to do, but I'll give it a shot. Otherwise, that's 2 PCBs down the shitter. For 65 euro, I could've bought a proper PCB or maybe even a pre-owned Poker...

chzel · 24 Nov 2014, 21:52

Just to rule it out, did you try it on another computer? or even USB port?