opening MFpro - changing arcade buttons
hey guys..
i just received my Cue master.. amazing thing..
i want to color mash my buttons a little.
how can i savely open this thing? it has a normal MF board i guess, so a little force to get thos buttons of the pcb is required..?!
thanks for your help..
Hey,
Yeah it should be pretty easy, just do it the same way as the classics,
my cue master is sitting in the post office, gonna pick it up later today.
Just a note ;
To any UK Techtoolers who are intrested in buyin a MF Pro
import tax will cost you £32.25
well. it wasnt that easy.. the upper right arcade button was soldered (which he shouldnt!!) broke the button in the process, but had spare ones..
nothing too special inside, normal MF board, breakout board. here are some pics
Can someone confirm whether they are all built like that? I’d like to mess with my buttons too but probably won’t bother if they are soldered in.
THESE PICS ARE AWESOME! so by the looks of it every single MF pro has the exact same board and the exact same metal casing which would allow you to turn any MF pro to a different model simply by cutting a new face plate that matches the desired model and rearranging some pots/and faders this is stupendous!!!
yeah.. your’re right.. didnt see that! :eek:
I thought I would have seen this a little sooner!
Once arcade button is soldered down due to a manufacturing issue with the case which meant the screw in that corner could not be used.
So it is possible to remove the PCB if you de-solder that clip.
However I need to be very clear that this is a closed unit product, not a DIY kit so we make no warranty or guarantee for the product if you break it trying to change button colors.
And yes the expansion PCB is common to all units - it would be entirely possible to modify one model in to the other by replacing the face plate and replacing the parts. Once again this would void the warranty.
SCREW THE WARRANTY!!! 
When has djtt ever been worried about a manufactures warranty?!? I mean this whole site is based around cracking open controllers and modifying them to suit your needs (I am pretty sure [almost] every single mod on this entire site voids some kind of warranty. Since when does DJTT care about that all of a sudden. I just bought a MF Pro cue (at a disscount of coarse 
) and as soon as it arrives in the mail I am gonna sex change it into a beat masher and provide detailed instructions so any other MF Pro owner can do the same. Its about options DJTT don’t try to surpress the mod community you helped create, instead why not embrace it and tell us how we can improve our MF Pros and change/customize them? After all there is VERY little information on the subject of MF Pro mods. (I know for certain I am going to add LED’s to get the midi clock feature easter egg to work on my MF Pro, because its the same PCB as the original) Who’s with me to mod some MF Pros?!?!
I didn’t take that as discouraging mods – I think all he means is, “don’t come asking for a new one if you break it” 
Sort of, but they should still warranty the electronic components if the case is opened IMO.
What happens if you need to manually re boot the MF Pro,
you will have to open it up yeah?
Id say its the same with anything electronic: open the case and lose the warranty.
So what happens if you can’t get the MF Pro into bootloader mode via the four buttons/updater
Does that mean you have to send the unit back to DjTechtools,
because you can’t open it without making the warranty void
That seems a bit stupid
i dont think so. the MFpros have a small button soldered to the bootloader mode on the pcb, so it’s just removing the bottom plate and pressing a button when starting up.. i guess you can do this on your own, without vioding the garantee.. not sure though!!
I never said opening the case would void the warranty, we do not use any tamper detection stickers or anything like that.
It just needed to be made clear to people that if they damage their midi fighter trying to modify it or totally disassembling it they cannot expect us to replace it.
We will of course do everything we can to help people in this situation but any shipping or replacement parts required is likely to be at their cost.
any chance of a diagram of where to de-solder if you want to change buttons? And will it not function without being re-soldered?
I opened my cue master and didn’t see any solder on the buttons anywhere… Everything very easily came apart and was put back together no prob. After reassembly I tested it to make sure everything worked fine. It did.
The clip closest to the corner with no screw is soldered.
The best method for removal is to undo all the screws, careful pry the other corners up of the clips and (a little flexing of the PCB is ok - dont go overboard though) then hold a soldering iron against the soldered arcade terminal while lifting upwards and it should come free.
Some of the first units to go out did not have this mod, also units made following today have a fourth corner screw and therefore do not have any clips soldered.
I’ll be honest, I was kinda bummed to read about the soldering solution. I’m definitely planning to switch my buttons around as I progress.
However, I have had another look at my Cue Master and I am relieved to find mine has not been soldered. I can also see why you might have soldered them, as the pins on that corner were definitely only just connecting to the buttons.
The fix though is easy enough. I just grabbed a stick-on rubber foot, stuck it to the back coverplate nearest the missing screw and trimmed it for depth so that when I screwed the backplate back on it pushes the board into position.
I’ll post a pic or two when I get the time if anyone’s interested.
so if i desolder that pin i’ve no warranty left??