#22

i’ve got a question. I have just received the norns shield and do not know how to turn it on. it turned on once (I have no idea how I did it) then I unplugged it to make some room for different chords and now I can’t get it to turn back on. the red LED is on and the sd card is in but the screen is not on.

any help is appreciated!

much love

#23

fantastic news!

welcome

1 Like
#24

ugh, we just redid the docs and totally left out those pretty crucial instructions. very sorry for the trouble!

i’ve now added them to the introductory section:

if your Pi is unresponsive still, please email help@monome.org and we’ll help get you sorted :slight_smile:

1 Like
#25

oh awesome! thank you for your help

#26

@imwaiting there’s a chance your sdcard is corrupted, you might try re-flashing the disk image. if it’s unreliable you may need a new card.

#27

okay thank you, I will try and do that

#28

https://www.instagram.com/p/CIoDxQyhjLv/

So happy that everything just worked
I was already used to the SD card writing procedure because of the video synths I’ve made for RPIs

looking forward to diving into the script tutorials and releasing some things :slight_smile:

1 Like
#29

I just won a Norns Shield on eBay and am absurdly excited to finally get to play within the Norns ecosystem!

2 Likes
#30

That was probably done like this so people don’t use the wrong image (i.e. for norns proper) or a prerelease image. The massive header on the releases might help but still :stuck_out_tongue:

@dan_derks Might be good to check this with @tehn

#32

Hi, I’m curious about the audio quality difference between Norns & Norns Shield in more detail. Only info I can find is that Norns has “very high quality audio”. But what does that mean in relation to Norns Shield?

#34

@zebra Ok, thank you for the explanation & quick reply, much appreciated!

1 Like
#35

I have a version with your older boards, but have always been bothered by my flimsy case… (yes Norns is the long term solution but a bit more costly.)

Would it be possible to buy the case+top plate alone? Or just the top acrylic plate and I could buy the case from JHC?

(Or perhaps someone is doing a run of top plates?)

#36

the top plate and case are both in the github repo. you can easily order these from any rapid proto service. pololu does good laser cutting (plates) and shapeways is a common 3dprinting source.

1 Like
#37

I do see an aluminum top plate for sale on Reverb sometimes if you want to go that way.

1 Like
#38

https://llllllll.co/t/norns-shield-case-designs/ there is also this thread , I think I have seen ppl in there offer to make cases for others before if u wanted to look around

2 Likes
#39

Thanks! I checked shapeways (from JHCs Dropbox link, I’ll check github too) earlier and the cheapest estimate was over 40 USD, which seemed excessive compared to some other prints I’ve done. But there might be some options to tweak to get the cost down. I’ll figure something out.

#40

I have a Norns Shield due to arrive midweek and thought I’d get on with as much prepping as possible ahead of receiving it - but I’m unclear about the role of the SD card and would be grateful if anyone could enlighten me.

I have a (new) SanDisk 16gb card, I’ve installed Etcher on my Win10 laptop and have downloaded and unzipped norns201202-shield.img from the link at https://monome.org/docs/norns/help/#fresh-install

So far, so good - but I’m not sure what comes next. Am I supposed to put the SD card in my laptop and just copy norns201202-shield.img to it? And then what? Is there a card slot in the Shield that the SD card goes into? If so, should I leave the whole Etcher/image thing until then? Or is the SD card/image/flashing procedure just a one-time thing that (somehow) runs from the laptop to the Shield, and which can be disconnected and put away when the Shield is up and running? I’m really struggling to understand the steps outlined in the shield fresh install process in the link above.

Apologies for the supremely n00b question, but I’d be really grateful for an “explain this to me as if I’m 10 years old” walkthrough.

Thanks in advance for any clarity that anyone can bring…

1 Like
#41

hi @Helen – happy new year!

shields require a different flashing process than stock norns:

  • after you download the norns201202-shield.img, you’ll also need to download etcher (a program that helps flash the norns software to the SD card)
  • then, pop your SD card into your computer and etcher will walk you through – you’ll need to select the unzipped norns201202-shield.img as the image and your SD card as the target, but then it should take care of everything from there
  • once done, drop the SD card into the Raspberry Pi you’re using for your shield and you’ll be in business!

once your shield is up and running, you might notice that the available capacity is less than your card – the steps listed here will help with that :slight_smile:

let us know how it goes!

5 Likes
#42

That’s fantastic - thank you!

As ever, I was overthinking things :thinking: and I’m grateful for the straightforward explanation.

Really looking forward to receiving my Shield now!

4 Likes
#43

there are some differences between the norns and norns shield:

  • norns has a battery, 1/4” mono jacks, a separate headphone jack and driver, very high quality audio, serial connection over power port
  • norns shield has 3.5mm stereo jacks (headphones work on the output jack) and an ethernet port

As it’s mentioned in the differences, how is the audio quality on a shield unit with off-the-shelf Pi? I’m seeing myself eyeing over Norns and Grid more everyday, and the price is not an absolute dealbreaker. Norns seems a really, really pleasant design and I would be happy to have a robust, ”complete” unit, and 1/4” jacks would be preferable, but those are things I could live with and would justify the price difference. But absolute sound quality is something that would leave me always wondering if it would’ve been better to just take the plunge full on. I don’t have golden ears, but after switching to RME interface won over my scepticism of real-world audible difference in conversion/amplification quality of modern consumer grade interfaces I’ve been more interested in this stuff. Although I do see the irony in simultaneously building more quality setup and sliding into noisier and more experimental style of music…