Now, what would ’tis season be without its fair share of Christmas carols? Well, MIDIDesaster has decided to give the traditional sing-a-longs a bit of a Maker twist using his MIDI compatible dot-matrix printer.
As previously discussed on Bits & Pieces, the rigged DMP is equipped with an ATmega8 MCU that interprets the inbound MIDI data, which then feeds the information to an FPGA and drives the stepper motors for the print head and paper feed. The machine can play up to 21 different notes simultaneously, communicating to the printer through some custom circuitry.
In an effort to spread holiday cheer, MIDIDesaster has unveiled a pair of new mods that complement his growing lists of dot-matrix remakes — which all can be found here.
There is no doubt that you remember the inescapable ‘90s hit, The Macarena. The pairing of a catchy beat and a simple dance turned the Los Del Rio smash hit into a national phenomenon. Now, 20 years later, we can reminisce about the tune all thanks to one Maker and his MIDI compatible dot-matrix printer.
A hacker by the name of MIDIDesaster has made a habit of turning dot matrix printers into musical devices. Previously on Bits & Pieces, we covered an ingenious DMP cover of the Rocky theme, Eye of the Tiger.
And so, our pal MIDIDesasater has returned — this time bringing back warm memories of Saved by the Bell and Bill Clinton with his newest rendition of a classic pop culture hit.
The modified printer uses an ATmega8 MCU to interpret inbound MIDI data and then feeds the information to an FPGA that essentially tunes the printer.
Though you can find an entire playlist of MIDIDesaster’s songs here, we decided to compile a few of our other favorites below… Disclaimer: Don’t blame us if you end up dancing at your desk or find these melodies stuck in your head for days!
“Eye of the Tiger” is a song the by American rock band Survivor. Released in the spring of 1982 as a single from their third album, the track was written at the request of Sylvester Stallone for the film Rocky III.
According to Wikipedia, “Eye of the Tiger” was certified platinum in August 1982 by the RIAA, signifying sales of 2 million vinyl copies. Since then, the song has sold over 3 million in digital downloads in the United States (by March 2012) and was voted VH1’s 63rd greatest hard rock song. Combined sales of original vinyl release and digital downloads total over 9 million copies, making “Eye of the Tiger” one of the best-selling singles of all time.
Recently, the MIDIDesaster crew modded a Dot Matrix printer to play everyone’s favorite theme song as a MIDI compatible sound generator.
According to HackADay, the DMP is equipped with a stalwart ATmega8 microcontroller (MCU) and an FPGA connected to various sectors of the original printer’s circuit board.
“The Atmega8 takes the incoming MIDI data and communicates it to the FPGA, while driving the stepper motors for both the paper feed and print head,” explained HackADay’s James Hobson. ”The FPGA on the other hand is responsible for the PWM to drive the individual printer pins.”
In addition, the Dot Matrix turned MIDI machine is capable of playing up to play up to 21 notes simultaneously, while taking in up to 16 MIDI channels, all with individual volume, pitch and key velocity.
