General AZSMZ mini board topic

There was nothing like this on the forum so i thought it might be helpful for new AZSMZ mini board users.
Feel free to ask anything about this board here, share your experience, setups, config files, etc. help each other as well if you can.

Here is my AZSMZ mini controlling my own delta printer:
[imgur.com]
It's under the heatbed so i had to unscrew it.

The only problem with having a dedicated thread here in a RepRap forum is that we are not sure about the Open Source status of this project.

Yeah i know but still there are some AZSMZ mini users that need some help.

You can contact cxandy directly for support, he is the designer of this board and a very nice person. And always ask him to release the necessary documentation to make his board Open Source!

So, please set me straight. Is it forbidden to discuss the AZSMZ board on these forums?

Would it be better if cxandy were to totally withdraw his claims of it being open source, since it is viewed as being only partially open-source at this point?

As the OP stated, it would really be nice to have a place for users to discuss this board.

Forbidden? Certainly not the word I would use and also I have no authority to forbid anything.
On the other hand I would be bothered if this forum would become a place for support of non Open Source commercial products, this is a RepRap forum after all. As a community, we all stand to lose when a manufacturer does not comply with Open Source licenses.
Summarizing: if you want to discuss any product in this forum please go ahead.
If you need support for any commercial, non Open Source product, please contact the manufacturer directly. These is absolutely no reason why this forum should dedicate any of its scarce resources for support of non Open Source commercial products.

Opensource or not, reprap is all about building your printer yourself for less money than a brand-name.
this board costs only 1 third of these Smoothieboards and only half of the azteek-ones (who don´t seem to answer mails).

Let me rephrase it in simpler words using simpler concepts, so perhaps you'll understand.

This forum is not a customer support center.

(eight words, let's see if the message gets through)

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AndrewBCN
These is absolutely no reason why this forum should dedicate any of its scarce resources for support of non Open Source commercial products.

Since:

1) Repetier Host has gone closed-source, and

2) Repetier has their own sub-forum here supporting their products

...then I guess that there's proof the management of this site does not share your opinion in this regard.

However, the wiki seems to have a different set of standards for inclusion, which by recent actions requires the publishing of enough documentation to reproduce a product before allowing it to be included.

Disclaimer - you do not see the word "Administrator" next to my name in this or any other posts, since I am a regular forum user.....

to clear a few things up:

it is not forbidden to talk about the AZSMZ boards you can talk about whatever you like.

The AZSMZ board used to have a page on the wiki however it was removed after repeated warnings about false claims of being opensource, CxAndy ignored both the "Not Opensource" and "Advertising" tags and at one point removed them illegitimately
he made it very clear to us the there was no intention to release sufficient sources to make a copy, The page was removed after a generous grace period.


Repeteir and Repeteir host and the closed source story: while it's disappointing they have gone in the direction that they have, the comparison between the AZSMZ and repeteir is very difficult, the AZSMZ page was easy to remove however getting rd of an entire forum section is a bit different

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vreihen

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AndrewBCN
These is absolutely no reason why this forum should dedicate any of its scarce resources for support of non Open Source commercial products.

Since:

1) Repetier Host has gone closed-source, and

2) Repetier has their own sub-forum here supporting their products

...

In their own sub-forum here, Repetier provides (I would rate it as excellent) support for their firmware which is available on GitHub last I checked i.e. Open Source and GPL compliant. They also provide (again, I would rate it as excellent) support on their own forum on their own website for both Repetier host and Repetier firmware...

Oh, but wait, you knew all that, right? So you are just being annoying? OK, go ahead...

On the scarcity of reprap forums resources : I don't think we lack space or bandwidth enough to motivate a selection of topics...

On the other hand, it could probably be said we lack organization and that's it's already difficult to find what you search around here, so yes not getting too much off topic - "reprap forums", remember - would be better.



So my opinion - only mine - is that we should allow topics to help people who have been mislead to buy that controller to integrate it in their DIY / otherwise reprap related projects.
Of course any support issue really specific to that board is unlikely to be answered by the community, and should be directed to the seller or manufacturer.
Do we have some working contact information to publish ?

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/24/2015 09:39AM by DeuxVis.

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Most of my technical comments should be correct, but is THIS one ?
Anyway, as a rule of thumb, always double check what people write.

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AndrewBCN
Let me rephrase it in simpler words using simpler concepts, so perhaps you'll understand.

This forum is not a customer support center.

(eight words, let's see if the message gets through)

Glad you made it understandable with simple words that even a moron like me can understand.

Not forbidden - but highly frowned upon. End result is the same.
No problem - I can read between the lines. Message got through loud and clear.


.

@KDan

Actually you are quoting a post of mine that was not directed at you. Here is the post that I wrote above in reply to your queries:

Quote
KDan
So, please set me straight. Is it forbidden to discuss the AZSMZ board on these forums?
Would it be better if cxandy were to totally withdraw his claims of it being open source, since it is viewed as being only partially open-source at this point?
As the OP stated, it would really be nice to have a place for users to discuss this board.

Quote
AndrewBCN
Forbidden? Certainly not the word I would use and also I have no authority to forbid anything.
On the other hand I would be bothered if this forum would become a place for support of non Open Source commercial products, this is a RepRap forum after all. As a community, we all stand to lose when a manufacturer does not comply with Open Source licenses.
Summarizing: if you want to discuss any product in this forum please go ahead.
If you need support for any commercial, non Open Source product, please contact the manufacturer directly. These is absolutely no reason why this forum should dedicate any of its scarce resources for support of non Open Source commercial products.

I don't think there is anything to read between the lines in the above, or in any of the posts from the admins of this website, but if you need any clarifications you can always create a thread in the proper section of this forum (the Administrative one).

@ AFK-er

Just got my AZSMZ mini + Display in the mail, well it realy looks good and yes its mini indeed , why don´t you come over to the google+ board "Ingentis, HercuLien and Eustathios Builders" its far more build orientated then this discussion taking place here

:-)
Jo

So there is a FolgerTech build thread going for 26 pages that I am contributing to and I have bought this board and would like to implement it with my delta. There are many experiences being shared there on the product (which is the printer kit). That said I have been in touch with AFKer and it really makes sense to chat about and disseminate information about products we use. INCLUDING this one.

So let's take the tact of users helping users and educating the public.

I have 2 issues with my AZSMZ board currently and I am not familiar enough with Smoothieware and this AZSMZ board to know which is which.

1. My x motor is always remaining energized even after I have sent M84 to the machine. I have had issues with this motor (the wiring is reversed in it) so I'm leaning toward motor issues on this one. But would love to know if anyone else is experiencing this.

2. My Endstops are only registering 2.94 volts and I do believe they are supposed to be 5v. Is there a jumper to set this to 5v? The LED's on the board aren't lit up so I'm guessing here.

Anyone have any helpful hints regarding this board that you implemented to make your lives easier??

Thanks for any experiences shared - fellow builder and maker Tim,

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/25/2015 09:08PM by Wittmason.

Hi, for the #2: there's a jumper on the back of the board, but needs to be soldered:

I just searched for info about the AZSMZ Mini and as a user and potential buyer I find it a bit unfortunate that the wiki page has been deleted.

But from what I understand the AZSMZ Mini not only made false claims but it also violates the smoothieboard open hardware license?

Too bad really. Because this one together with the MKS SBase seems to be the cheapest board upgrade compared to the old ramps 8 bit boards. All other solutions seem to be upwards of $100. For me this is one of the ideals of open source / open hardware: to give more people access to new technology by making it easy to reproduce and make it cheap. So in a way a cheap version of the smoothie boards is precisely what you would want. On the other hand violating the license makes it "illegal".

Maybe create a new wiki article or clean it up / lock it / ban the spammer and make clear what the problem with this board is. Purely from a user perspective I'd like to see the reprap wiki as the ultimate resource for information about 3D printing (and not just open hardware products).

Just my 2c

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Dejay
Because this one together with the MKS SBase seems to be the cheapest board upgrade compared to the old ramps 8 bit boards. All other solutions seem to be upwards of $100.

Have you looked at the Duet? It's $79.99 from Replikeo, with 4 drivers on board (with the AZSMZ Mini they are extra), and open source.

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Large delta printer [miscsolutions.wordpress.com], E3D tool changer, Robotdigg SCARA printer, Crane Quad and Ormerod

Disclosure: I design Duet electronics and work on RepRapFirmware, [duet3d.com].

Thanks DC42, certainly interesting! Especially with your nifty autocalibration In Europe with shipping and import vat it's still more expensive though:

[replikeo.com] Probably around 110€ including shipping from US and import VAT
[www.think3dprint3d.com] 126 € including shipping from UK
[reprappro.com] 120 € including shipping from UK

At that price point I could also wait and get the new replicape and a beaglebone black for 150€ (including the new TMC2100 stepper drivers).

AZSMZ Mini will run about ~73€ without steppers and the the MKS SBase about 78€ including steppers (including shipping and import VAT). But a long shipping time.

What I mean is that there is a huge jump in price between the old ramps kit (40€ from amazon including steppers) and any kind of upgrade.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/07/2015 06:12AM by Dejay.

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Dejay
[replikeo.com] Probably around 110€ including shipping from US and import VAT

They're actually in Hong Kong. I don't know about the rest of Europe but in the UK we tend to get charged a lot of VAT etc on stuff from the USA but very little, if any, on stuff from China/Hong Kong.

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asbo

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Dejay
[replikeo.com] Probably around 110€ including shipping from US and import VAT

They're actually in Hong Kong. I don't know about the rest of Europe but in the UK we tend to get charged a lot of VAT etc on stuff from the USA but very little, if any, on stuff from China/Hong Kong.

Ah I see! I think that's mostly because they cheat and write "gift" and a product value <22€ on the parcels So it's a gamble. But at least shipping is much cheaper from Asia.

I've emailed makerbase.com.cn if you can order the board via paypal.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/07/2015 06:27AM by Dejay.

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Dejay

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asbo

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Dejay
[replikeo.com] Probably around 110€ including shipping from US and import VAT

They're actually in Hong Kong. I don't know about the rest of Europe but in the UK we tend to get charged a lot of VAT etc on stuff from the USA but very little, if any, on stuff from China/Hong Kong.

Ah I see! I think that's mostly because they cheat and write "gift" and a product value <22€ on the parcels So it's a gamble. But at least shipping is much cheaper from Asia.

I've emailed makerbase.com.cn if you can order the board via paypal.

When I got mine last month it cost me under 90 Euro's ($ 94)

Product Price Quantity Total
Duet Board + Regulator 5V $79.99 1 $79.99
Subtotal $79.99
Shipping $13.23
Order total $93.22

HTH

Doug

p.s. Didnt get hit for customs either

I contacted the creator of the board and asked why he did not put the board under a proper OS license.

Sadly he does not seem to understand the point of open sourcing it at all and is afraid of someone copying his design. He said that by releasing the schematics that would be suficient for studying the design.
Even though smoothie is a fine ecosystem and this is the only board with replaceable drivers, I don´t see it gaining wide accceptance just because of the fact it is not open hardware.

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Yellobello
I contacted the creator of the board and asked why he did not put the board under a proper OS license.

Sadly he does not seem to understand the point of open sourcing it at all and is afraid of someone copying his design. He said that by releasing the schematics that would be suficient for studying the design.
Even though smoothie is a fine ecosystem and this is the only board with replaceable drivers, I don´t see it gaining wide accceptance just because of the fact it is not open hardware.

it's not so much that he doesn't understand , he's made it clear to us on the talk page that it was more money related, the page was removed for other reasons though mainly failure to release any remotely usable sources (while trying to keep the opensource claim) was the main one though:

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Cxandy
For AZSMZ Mini,I have opened Schematic file, I think, for study , discussion or research is enough, whether it can be temporarily not open board layout.Because I am not a manufacturer, I'm just a DIY enthusiast, I have no way to price competition of manufacturers, so I didn't open board layout on the web, because the design will take time and effort for me, I want to through a sale to subsidize the cost of living. I hope you can understand, thanks!--Cxandy (talk) 17:51, 11 March 2015 (PDT)

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Dejay
Maybe create a new wiki article or clean it up / lock it / ban the spammer and make clear what the problem with this board is. Purely from a user perspective I'd like to see the reprap wiki as the ultimate resource for information about 3D printing (and not just open hardware products).

everyone would like to see the reprap wiki the ultimate resource but regulating the activity of those who want to use it as a advertising platform for false opensource claims seems in practice to be a pretty thin line we do ask authors to release the sources and give them quite a bit of guidance as what they need to publish and most make the effort however there are some who simply ignore us thinking they can get away with it.

what seems to be happening lately is that authors of hardware projects seem to be going through a phase where they release nothing but pdf's of everything which are obviously useless when it comes to trying to make a variant of a board or making contributions to the project, the intent s pretty obvious however in some cases like the alligator board we've had to accept it as sources, because you "could" make a copy of the board from them (it's just time consuming and inconvenient)

the resulting question in making the reprap wiki the ultimate resource for information is do we focus on the quality of wiki pages or quantity of wiki pages ?

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So just curious: If he wouldn't have made claims that the board is open source hardware (not the software which is open source) then he wouldn't have gotten deleted?

Do these boards use a board design directly derived of the smoothiebord? I mean if they don't then they are not in breach of the GPL license of the smoothieboard. Just using the same components it shouldn't be too hard to make your own board layout at least if you know what you are doing. After all they are just stepper drivers and mosfets connected to a micro controller. Not that I know how to do it but...

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Dejay
So just curious: If he wouldn't have made claims that the board is open source hardware (not the software which is open source) then he wouldn't have gotten deleted?

it's never quite that simple, there were a variety of things that led to deleting the page eg mailing list/wiki spamming ,after i got a couple of complaints drawing my attention to the spamming and the wiki page, i stuck the "notopensource" and "advertising" tags on the page with a 3 week deadline to publish some kind of sources which was ignored and edited around, i then gave it a little longer (1 week) by which point there wasn't much else left to do. had there been more communication and a bit of willingness to negotiate the page probably could have ended up staying

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/08/2015 09:43AM by thejollygrimreaper.

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thejollygrimreaper:

If cxandy would re-think his position and release all sources maybe you would allow him to be on the wiki again?

Dejay:

That´s what I also thought. I already learned a bit to use kicad and I have redrawn the schematics. I´d love to use this board as a base for a cool improvement project.
First, I´d change the position of the USB port in the layout since it is positioned in a bad place.. someone pointed this out already.. it leads through the whole stepper lines where there is a lot of noise going on.
And still dreaming a bit, I would change the pololu sockets to the new AMIS-30543 drivers, enabling SPI signals to the spare microcontroller I/O pins.
This would allow current control by software, and even cooler, stepper stall detection which would allow to correct lost steps.
...dreaming....

Wow stall detection sounds interesting. And 3A is enough for big Nema23 right?
But I guess they really require a new board with the SPI lines. Might as well hard solder the stepper IC then. And you'd need new software too if you want to handle stall detection in a meaningful way. At least you could use it to finely tune your max acceleration and current. Maybe even automatically!
And I thought the SilentStepSticks would be the next step (haha pun intended) but from what I understand the silent mode suffers from lost steps. If the AMIS-30543 has such a silent mode but allows you to tune it - that might be cool. Or maybe not, I don't know much about electronics.

But to go back to the topic: Why was the board layout for the AZSMZ mini or the MKS SBase even changed compared to the smoothieboard - since that is open hardware already?

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Yellobello
thejollygrimreaper:

If cxandy would re-think his position and release all sources maybe you would allow him to be on the wiki again?

Dejay:

That´s what I also thought. I already learned a bit to use kicad and I have redrawn the schematics. I´d love to use this board as a base for a cool improvement project.
First, I´d change the position of the USB port in the layout since it is positioned in a bad place.. someone pointed this out already.. it leads through the whole stepper lines where there is a lot of noise going on.
And still dreaming a bit, I would change the pololu sockets to the new AMIS-30543 drivers, enabling SPI signals to the spare microcontroller I/O pins.
This would allow current control by software, and even cooler, stepper stall detection which would allow to correct lost steps.
...dreaming....

if the project is opensource and he is willing release usable sources that a copy of the board can be made from then there is no problem with him starting his page up again,

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