Very often, computers and music gear greedily consume whole corners of the room. Here’s a tidy alternative, modest in space consumption as well as in cost.

So, what’s so wonderful about DIY creations by our friend Sasa Djuric (aka fibra)? It isn’t just that his stands are recycled from monitor stand parts. It’s not just because the free ReBirth for Windows and an Asus netbook make for a wonderfully affordable computer music station. It’s not even that his cases for the x0xb0x 303 clone and a MIDIbox project are beautifully executed, or that magnets on the stands more effectively support those gadgets and place them in an ergonomic position.

What’s wonderful to me is that these designs relate the scale of those music-making objects to human hands. You just want to put your fingers on these devices and make some music.

From the Flickr set, Sasa explains:

This universal stand was part of the monitor once. I attached a piece of thick still and and 2 neodymium magnets recycled from hard drive.

[on the now-free-as-in-beer software running on the Asus netbook] …yes, in the name of good old times. ReBirth was my very first step in music making. I couldn`t even imagine I`ll build myself clones of all those machines. :)

He tells CDM:

I used 2 stands that are leftovers from monitors that are installed into an info kiosk. One is bigger than other which is allows me to cascade few machines. This was a really quick project as I used what I had laying around. Thick piece of steel is wood joint. Magnets are from a hard drive; the
tin plates glued on the eee and other machines are cutout from CDROM drive case, rubber comes from a blood pressure meter…
pretty much everything is recycled. :)
Besides the x0xb0x and eee you recognized, you can also see a ClockBox – MIDI clock generator (midibox project).

Really beautiful work – economic use of materials, clever design, and it could let you put a drum machine in your kitchen so you can cook music and food for a brilliant evening.

More on the elements of this project:
The x0xb0x is a fully open-source 303 bassline clone
The clockbox is a project based on the Midibox platform (see site, blog)
The Liliputing blog has great netbook coverage
ReBirth lives on as freeware at the ReBirth Museum. This is Windows, but if you don’t want to swap Windows onto your netbook, you can run it in WINE on Linux. (have to try that myself!)
Flickr set

All photos by Sasa Djuric, used by permission.

We got a couple of good notes on how to source your own x0xb0x synth kit. In general, I wouldn’t recommend the x0xb0x as a first synth project, but that said, there are some good resources out there if you decide you want to give this synth a try. Likewise, the resources on Lady Ada’s site are worth a look even if you don’t intend to build a x0xb0x — there’s a treasure trove of parts info there that could be useful for other projects, too.

Video: “wyllytesla Live Acid – a 303, 909 and x0xb0x pounding out hard techno”

Julien Chevalley says he had some good luck building his own open-source, DIY x0xb0x, sans kit:

It was a relatively easy process. I was able to get all the “rare-parts” from one guy (Gaetano) who has done all the hard work of sourcing them and offers them on sale in the xoxbox build forum. Even better he is based in the same country as me (Australia), so 90 bucks and 1 day later I had all the “rare” parts. 2 Weeks later I had everything else.

It took me 3 days to assemble, taking my time. Everything worked OK, first time (Yes I was actually pleasantly surprised!).

The total cost for me was about $400 (AUD). The real killer here is postage from the US suppliers (digikey/mouser). I might have been able to source the parts locally but it would have been a long and complex process, so I was happy to spend a bit of extra cash for the convenience…

Here’s where you might want to look:

x0xb0x Build Manual Parts List (includes each individual part with photo, description, source, alternatives where appropriate, and availability information)
Bill of Materials Spreadsheet on the Wiki (with printable PDF, if you’re luck enough to have a brick and mortar electronics store!)
Modifications to make the 303 a “true” clone of the Roland

I still wonder if there are other ways to “modernize” the design for easier availability, though I suspect you’d still have the issues getting parts in some parts of the world. If you work on such a project, let us know.

So that leads to my next question: has anyone tried sourcing the x0xb0x themselves? Anyone thinking of embarking on it now who wants to report back?