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MusicPad

Created by [Matthew] • Started on June 02, 2025

A macropad meant to serve as a physical UI for media/music players.

Time Taken

7 hours

June 2 - Brainstorming

I decided on making a Macropad that essentially acts as a Music application UI:
image

Decided to make a design that looks like this:
image

Other designs of consideration were: - Stacking the input keys/RE switch in a pyramid like fashion - Putting all the inputs in one row and putting the OLED above it - Moving the microprocessor to the left side (would look too similar to the OrpheusPad, also makes it less compact)

Time Taken: 30 minutes

June 3 - Schematic

Today I made the schematic for my Music Macropad. I followed three resources: - The Hack Club tutorial for the HackPad - This video by Joe Scotto - Reverse engineering the schematic for the Orpheus Pad

Schematic Image image

Footprint Assignments
image

I got the footprint for the OLED here

Time Taken: 60 minutes

June 4 - PCB placement

Today I began work on the PCB. I didn't get too far besides placing the components though, since I was overthinking about the placement. I also need to learn how to work with grid sizes to make things fit together better. image

Time Taken: 30 minutes

June 5 - PCB finalization and project documentation

Today I documented everything I've done thus far in my project journal, and uploaded all of the files I have to the project Github. I'm hoping I can finish the PCB and start the case today.

I indeed finished the PCB
image

Time Taken: 60 minutes Might start the case today

June 6 - Case start

Today I started work on the MusicPad's case. I was following the tutorial then branched off after making the top portion of the case (the one with the plate/holes for the keycaps). I decided that I wanted a 3D model of the PCB and the components itself first, so that I could build the case around it. So the rest of my evening was spent manually placing the components that weren't on the step file of my PCB generated by KiCad. I wasn't able to finish, though, with issues surrounding aligning my rotary encoder with its respective slot on my PCB. I'll be continuing tomorrow. image image I used the Orpheus Pad CAD file and Lucas11222's Geometry Pad CAD file as reference.

Time Taken: 120 minutes

June 20 - Case finish and Preliminary Firmware

Hour 1-2 I had finished creating the case for the musicpad some time ago, but forgot to record it here. Due to my inexperience with Fusion 360, I resorted to just doing manual placements of everything, but it resulted in something I was satisfied with. image

I also put down some starter firmware using QMK that I'll improve more on once I've built my hackpad. It registers the OLED, encoder, and the keys so far. I'm planning on making a chrome extension that reads the macropad's inputs so that it functions on the web version of youtube music (since youtube music doesn't have an application).

I used the QMK docs to get the starter code.

Time Taken: 120 minutes