Atari Punk Console Kit

Music Technology

Collin Cunningham

January 8th, 2009 4

GetLoFi introduces their own kit version of the popular stepped tone generator circuit originally published by the venerable Forrest M Mims III. The PCB uses a ‘no-hole’ design where all parts of the simple noisemaker are mounted and soldered on a single side. The kit also adds a capacitor bank and momentary switch for triggering custom bursts of sound. Check the site for more info and assembly process – Atari Punk Console 2.0 Kit from GetLoFi

4 thoughts on “Atari Punk Console Kit”

Forrest M. Mims III says:

January 8th, 2009 at 9:54 am

As I commented on the original blog, this is a very nice version of the stepped tone generator circuit I designed many years ago. More time was spent listening to the fascinating sounds produced by the circuit than the time spent designing it.

You can easily revise the circuit to respond to light by bypassing the pots with CdS photoresistors. Control the sounds indirectly by waving your fingers or hands between the CdS cells and a light source or directly with a flashlight or laser pointer.

For very subtle manual control, mount levers on the pot shafts. Or replace the pots with pressure-sensitive controls made from small blocks of black conductive foam (the kind used to hold CMOS chips). You can also use plastic rods or paddles coated with conductive ink or paint. Bending the rods or pressing the paddles will change the resistance of the ink.

Forrest

Forrest M. Mims III
http://www.forrestmims.org
twitter.com/fmims

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Collin Cunningham says:

January 8th, 2009 at 10:22 am

@Forrest – Great to hear from you! Thanks for the excellent suggestions. This circuit plays a vital role in introducing so many to the world of electronics (myself included). The functionality it provides through such simple construction has made what was once an intimidating field of study so much more approachable – thanks for that!

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