Nice Hack For The Apc20 Users and One question
If you don’t wanna use your power supply try this:
when i opened my apc i saw this:
And always interested in what these pins do?
I thought it might belong to the apc 40 encoders and maybe i can use these pins to add my own encoders to the Apc 20
Any thoughts?
Surprised it works on 5v at all TBH.
Yep the board on yours looks the same as an APC40 I believe - even the mounting points for the footswitch connectors are there so guess they just left your connector in place for whatever reason.
I doubt the APC20 has encoders available to it as there are definitely changes to the hardware and firmware between the two, just cutting corners on needing to manufacture device specific boards.
Will this USB Powered hack work on the APC40 too?
If so…WOOT!
I have the APC80 and having to power both is a drag!
I have a Powered USB hub…so that should do it no?
After watching the video…I think it will work well with a cable like his and my USB hub.
I seriously doubt that the APC40 would work on it or they wouldn’t have issued 1200ma PSU’s (relatively expensive compared to an 800ma for examples sake).
I can understand the APC20 is over-spec’d and as a result the 5v supply works fine as they are just re-using the same boards/psu’s they already have for the 40 most likely to avoid re-inventing the wheel.
If I was in your shoes I’d grab a 2 Amp PSU (the PSU from an Asus EEE works great) and daisy chain the 12v supply internally from your APC40 into the APC20 side of your APC80, thus just needing one power supply 
I hate the idea of powering mission critical devices though USB hubs .. gives me the heebie jeebies
