DIY: norns shield

[Glitcher]

The last spacers arrived recently so I was able to build the enclosure. Thanks very much for all the posts in this thread it’s been a great resource.

Very pleased to have this amazing system for music creation.

[infovore]

PLEASE DON’T DRILL THE PCB

we’ve already had somebody have issues because of that. Chances of shorting things that shouldn’t are high.

The two screen spacers are M2, unlike the M2.5 everywhere else.

[misuba]

So, I’m getting the idea that if you get a blank screen, you probably have a bad joint somewhere? I’ve redone the joints twice now. I didn’t think I was that bad at soldering but it’s a possibility.

I do, however, want to make sure that the current shield image is okay to use with a 4B?

[ngwese]

@misuba

want to make sure that the current shield image is okay to use with a 4B

I don’t believe the currently posting image for the shield will work on a 4B. It is specifically targeted at a RPI 3B or 3B+ which matches the CPU in the norns hardware.

[misuba]

aha. So… is it possible for a mere mortal to build for 4B and make an image?

[okyeron]

There’s a thread:

Can I use the official Norns Shield w/ Raspberry Pi 4?

First off, new user so I’m not sure if this is the right section but here goes. Just got my Norns Shield Kit in the mail (woo!) and assembled it last night. Looks like the only RPis I have on hand are 2/3B/4B, no 3B+. I’ve ordered one but due to the current state of the world I don’t expect it to get here anytime soon. In my impatience, I wanted to see if I can get it working on my RPi 4 since it will be closest. I’ve looked a bit into the norns image code and it seems the only thing I would n…

[misuba]

Managed to miss that, sorry. Thanks! (The really annoying part is I have a 3B… somewhere. Welcome to the exciting new age, where full-featured computers can be lost in a junk drawer.)

[freaknodd]

Sorry, this may be a stupid question, but where can I get a complete Norns shield kit?

[tehn]

first link top post! back in stock within a week or so

[andrew]

more boards-only coming too ? (askin for a friend)

[jorgen83]

I’m having this exact problem right now. Perpetually loading, and similarly problems with the snd card loading.

Edit: Tried it with a different SD card, it works now. I’m getting sound and can select apps. Thing is, DMESG gives me the same error still, so that’s not something to go by.

[Benjamin_Mauch]

First successful soldering project ever. Thanks to @jojjjajjr for all of the help!!!

[Ukasz]

Hello guys, how do I transfer samples to DIY norns (shield)? On the micro sd I dont see these folders called tehn and so on. I just connect it via usb to computer? Cant check it at the moment - no cable

[Oootini]

check out the docs: https://monome.org/docs/norns/fileshare/

[Zop]

I attached an Anker Powercore 10000 battery to the underside with pedalboard velcro, and it turned out nicely.

[spontaneouspotato]

Hi everyone! I’m new around here, and recently got to putting together a norns shield. However, I couldn’t find the stock Newhaven SSD1322 display as they were out of stock at all the usual areas and prohibitively expensive in others. In the meantime, I put together the rest of the board and stuck on a SSD1322, 256 x 64 screen just to see if anything would pop up.

To my pleasant surprise, it did work as expected (though everything is stretched out due to the width difference), except the text is mirrored vertically as shown:

Does anyone have any ideas if there’s a fix I can do in the system without compiling a new kernel, or is that my only option? I have tried messing about with dtoverlay, and looking into fbtft options but all I can see is to rebuild the entire kernel.

As a second question, I have a properly sized 128 x 64 screen around as well, but it is SSD1325… would it take a lot of work to rewrite/modify drivers for this and make it compatible? Would this also require building the kernel?

Any responses or suggestions would be appreciated, thank you very much! All the other hardware seems to be working fine, so the board is working as expected.

[simonvanderveldt]

There’s rotation support in the dtoverlay for the display, which was added in this PR https://github.com/monome/linux/pull/41
See here for how to use it https://github.com/monome/linux/pull/40

[spontaneouspotato]

Thank you for the suggestion! This was something I had tried, and it did rotate the screen, but the issue is that it’s flipped vertically, as if it’s a mirror image, and not just rotated. Changing the rotation settings just made it be upside down, but still flipped.

[midouest]

Wooooooo! I was sure that I was going to mess something up, but it booted up on the first try. This is my first soldering project.

I did slightly mess up SW3 by soldering it at a bit of an angle. I tried to undo it with a solder-sucker/wick but didn’t have any luck.

[simonvanderveldt]

Ah, sorry, I missed that. AFAIK there’s no flip option for the display.