Announcement about mpc2000/xl LCD Screens (Envision Electron

All I will say is this, a lot of effort was put into trying to make them work but just became a road of futility
A lot was done by Envision to get it created, to debug it and address the issues with Mike caught in the middle.
As to be expected Mike was as helpful as he could be trying to deal with customer issues but it was not within his control based on what was the cause of the problems.

Also understand that even if Envision sold what he has developed it would not benefit him as he took a serious hit financially to manufacture what turned out to be a failed project.

He basically had no way of knowing what the real world result of trying to use them within various MPCs.
Dealing with varying degree of age and reliability within old 2k/2kXL units was an unknown factor without actually manufacturing then distributing the screens.

Akai really created a mess with the design and implementation of these screens.

This is one of those said situations where it didn't work out for the manufacturer, distributor or consumer.

They did look good when they were working.

Considering everything, it looks like it'll be another long road to travel in order to make any progress. The DIY thing may seem futile, but still worth the effort. As far as paying a lot of money for a new replacement, I believe it shouldn't be an issue, as they would last much longer than the original. The price of original screens in good working condition is high as it is, and there's no guarantee of their life expectancy. I have another good screen that I got for free last week. But I'd still support the cause with my wallet when the time comes.

It'd be great if Akai just stepped up and did something. They have all the data, why can't they just give it to someone that is willing to make them?

doughnutSpaghetti wrote:It'd be great if Akai just stepped up and did something. They have all the data, why can't they just give it to someone that is willing to make them?

they might or might not have the data for those... plus, they don't give a shit about supporting anything besides their current product. Also, they don't want to allow old gear to compete with their new gear.

doughnutSpaghetti wrote:It'd be great if Akai just stepped up and did something. They have all the data, why can't they just give it to someone that is willing to make them?

I wouldn't be so sure that the current incarnation of Akai have any of that data - or if they do, whether they'd even for a moment consider parting with it.

I remember how Simon recently needed a PDF of the Z8 service manual and inMusic/Akai were unable/unwilling to give him one, citing some ridiculously irrelevant excuse. If they cannot give out a service manual for a discontinued sampler from their 'legacy', I have serious doubts that they would be able to shed any light on the technicalities of how an even older sampler's CPU communicates with the screen.

Can't hurt to ask of course

Well for those who had no first had experience here's what the problem was with the Envision screens.
They would randomly garble up and freeze.
The unit would continue to play but the screen would be totally garbled.



I pretty much stopped recommending 2k/2kxl units to people since there is the original screen problem as well as getting a unit with the Envision screen installed.

I had no idea that was happening as well. I only thought lag was an issue. But this is a complete showstopper.

We were willing to deal with the lag because the screens just looked so good and the lag was pretty minimal.
In fact it would have gone unnoticed by many users.

At first it was hopeful since it seemed like maybe a few screens might have had an issue but then it started really showing up.
The only way to clear it was to switch the unit off.

This was what the whole aspect of a new version of the screen was driven by.

Turned out not to be an easy problem to resolve and that's what got us to where we are today.

They reprogrammed the screens and also removed the MPCStuff Boot Screen thinking that might help but unfortunately it didn't.

Those screen are why when people say MPSStuff is high priced or ripping people off, I will always disagree.
Mike was real good about trying to do right by people on the screens same as he has done in other situations that required his attention.

As the middleman the screen problem was even worse for him.

maybe there is a way to add a kill switch to the screen turning it off, or a toggle cutting the power to just the screen so u can reset just the screen when it garbles up, might be a work a round for those envision screens…

has anyone got the data sheet for the Epson/Seiko display?

It looks like Epson use their own drivers based on SEGs (segments), whereas other manufacturers use unified standards.

There is a Noriktake Itron 240x64 Display but it wouldn't work without converting the SEG messages into I2C.

Has anyone looked into this? Epson do support their SEG driver chips and sometimes they even have SEG with I2C so they must know about converting between the LCD communication standards

syn-fi wrote:Has anyone looked into this?

Only Envision, as far as we know, and they want $ for their info.

Would be great if someone comes up with a DIY solution, or at least further in depth technical info about it.

Available info seemed to suggest that it was some sort of custom communications protocol, I think, so it would be interesting if it is all off the shelf components, with technical info available, to possibly allow for a conversion to a more common display protocol.

Though it seems that Envision has issues getting it to work reliably, apparently with someone on the payroll to do it, but it does show that it is possible.

I can't see how they expect anyone to pay them for "their" IP that failed.

Finish your work.

Wallace wrote:I can't see how they expect anyone to pay them for "their" IP that failed.

Finish your work.

I just don't think they personally had the resources (nor energy) to fix the issues. Someone else may have those resources, so the existing IP will definitely have value to them.

I would assume there was a lot of money and time invested in this, so it's understandable that they want to recoup some of that if possible. I think they might have more luck licensing that IP out and take a share of the profits should anything ever come to market.

Also, how many people would actually care for these screen replacements. I mean, yes there are a lot of us in this community but the costs to even manufacture the screens is much higher when the numbers of people that would buy them are lower.