Sort of Rypdal-ish, isn’t it? 
I have built another zynthian mini today to pair with my new akai apc key 25.
It went smoothly and everything worked on the first boot of latest stable oram. It takes around 3-4 hours of careful soldering and assembling.
I went through docs of zynthian’s akai apc key 25 driver and what a great driver this is. Thank you @oscaracena for building it.
8 Likes
Thanks for your encouraging words! 
2 Likes
Sorry, can’t find any information but will there be a complete kit for the Zynthian Mini to purchase? It seems to be a beautiful device.
EDIT: Ah. I see there is a complete guide in Wiki to build by yourself. Thanks.
It seems unlikely, and would probably cost. If you wanted to put together a group buy of PCB’s that might be the best bet of a way to get it. You could probably also ask if anyone has any extra PCB’s or components they might part with, but sourcing the components you actually need is pretty easy and cheap.
1 Like
Current zynthian MINI is designed for people who can follow instructions available on zynhtian wiki. In nutshell for people that know how to solder components on PCBs that can be ordered directly from china here:
This PCB is using through hole components for easy soldering by humans so can not be soldered by robots in factory. I have designed but not tested yet PCB that uses SMD components that can be placed by robots on top of PCB and soldered directly in factory oven. I am still investigating if there will be enough interest for already assembled board in factory knowing that cost will be close to V5 main board. There are some benefits of this approach compared to V5 main board because you can use single MINI V2 board and have mostly everything that you need without a case. It will keep together rpi, screen and have encoeders and switches. Also case can be printed (design is also available). I could add audio in out and headphones from V5 to such design but probably would need to remove HUT in this case so I am investigating another option with just audio in board as it is currently designed for audio out ad keep the HUT if somebody would like to slot in hifiberry card instead of cheaper cards.
The problem with this approach is that it would be too expensive for people that just need one assembled bord to order themself directly from factory. Minimum orders are 5.
I could fund ordering myself and then reselling individual boards but this would require additional administration on my side (open a web site and managing this additional income and tax). Finally, @jofemodo mentioned to me before that he is planning to design something similar to MINI and have it on zynthian store. Hence I am worried that my approach would be just waste of my money.
2 Likes
I will add that I’d probably be willing to put together a group buy in a couple of weeks if there’s an interest. My day job is industrial controls so I am pretty regularly ordering boards from PCBWay anyway, and would be more than happy to add a few sets of main PCB’s and fascia’s to my order for resale. I’d point out that I would have to add a share of the import costs to the US as well as charge a small amount for shipping them back out again… and I’d realistically only be able to do this for North America (US and Canada).
I’m running inventory next week of boards to see how many I need to order so I’m probably placing an order toward the end of the month. I’ll have to do some math and see what the resale cost is going to realistically be.
2 Likes