[Q] Buillding a budget drone with an old windows mobile phone - Windows Mobile Development and Hacking General

Hi,
I'm currently planing a litte project where i want to build a budget drone. Basically i wanna buy a bigger ready to fly helicopter and and connect to the build in microcontroller to control it (so i don't have to care about stabilisation) and add a little camera. So i digged through the various microcontrollers and wifi or 3g modules and cams and it got expensive. So i though hmmm... i've not really experience with microcontroller programming and an old wm device would have all that build in and is cheaper and i can go with .net. But before i've a few questions which i hope to be answered here.
So first is a windows mobile phone booting without a screen connected? (no screen less weight and much more battery time)
Can someone suggest a phone which has 3g gps and a serial output, rs232 or something? Not usb, because afaik usb on windows mobile is not good supported, please correct if i'm wrong.
Thanks & Regards
Benjamin

Related

HP IPAQ 310 Hacking

I just picked up an HP IPAQ 310 GPS device based on Windows CE 5.0. As far as standalone GPS devices go this one is very highly spec'ed:
http://www.amazon.com/310-Bluetooth-4-3-Inch-Widescreen-Navigator/dp/B000VRYLU2
600Mhz DualCore Centrality Titan Platform with on-chip GPS
300Mhz DSP
128MB RAM
2GB Flash
4.3" 800x480 LCD display
Bluetooth 2.0+EDR
USB 2.0
Windows.CE 5.0
It currently runs a variant of IGO 2008 navigation program and has some onboard games from PDAMill.
This is my first Window.CE project. Does anyone know where I can get the appopriate BSPs etc.. to allow me to build a bootable/working CE Image from Platform Builder 5 or 6 with full driver support?
My dream is to put a Microsoft Automotive software stack on this see how close I can get to a converged device like the Microsoft/Ford Sync. It will also be a learning experience.
In particular my end goal is to enable the following scenarios:
Voice recognition
Bluetooth DUN/PAN
Bluetooth Handsfree and voice dialing
Information Services (via web services interface to online services from Google & Microsoft). Think of movie times/locations, traffic, gas prices,address/phone/poi lookup etc..
Full fidelity video/audio player
Launch native and emulated games
Plug-in framework to extend the features
Navigation
The spec of the HP 310 Travel Companion is very impressive and I like the idea of it being a multi-purpose device. The 4.3 inch display is large enough for use as a GPS as well as watching videos. Seriously I wouldn't need GPS function every day so it is great be able to use it for other purposes. I wish one day it would be able to receive free digital TV signal like those from DVB-T or DVB-H. That would make it a truly Travel Companion.
Wow you really are dreaming if you think you can get a BSP for this device.
Or for any device for that matter.
These are never released and I never even heard of one being leaked! Just like any other proprietary code BSPs are highly guarded.
What you are trying to do is pretty ambitious, but if you want to rebuild OS for something by your self you better get a Linux device.
Sorry.
levenum said:
Wow you really are dreaming if you think you can get a BSP for this device.
Or for any device for that matter.
These are never released and I never even heard of one being leaked! Just like any other proprietary code BSPs are highly guarded.
What you are trying to do is pretty ambitious, but if you want to rebuild OS for something by your self you better get a Linux device.
Sorry.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Okay. Does anyone know much about the Microsoft Sync / Microsoft Automative software stack for Windows CE?
Regarding Windows Automotive:
You must be dreaming if you think you can source an Windows Automotive (or is it Microsoft Auto now?) OEM Adaptation Kit to do this!
As I understand, you need to be a huge OEM/ODM or car manufacturer like Ford and sign an NDA to even get any kind of access to it.
Considering its difficult enough to even source a Windows Mobile kit, I'd imagine its even harder to get Windows Automotive considering the circumstances...
However, there may be another way to source the Windows Automotive OS components besides obtaining an official kit...
Perhaps if there are some firmware updates for one of the Windows Automotive devices from Fiat, Ford, Clarion, etc. you can dump the ROM image and extract the files. Now, even if you do that you might still need to fix the relocations of every dll file...but it still might work on your HP after all that. I'd imagine you would also need to manually figure out the skin format of the Windows Automotive apps since you don't have the actual desktop tools to generate them...
I doubt you would really even need to source a BSP and build an image once you get this far. Chances are the apps you extract will run just fine from an SD card or the internal flash disk of your device if configured properly.
Off topic...
I managed to brick one of these today within the first hour. Just testing out Flux Challenge when it threw up a Please Wait screen. Soft-reset and now it sticks at the HP splash screen; had to get it sent back. Thank goodness I was only testing it.
Given this plus its molasses-slow performance, I think I'd choose something else if I really wanted to do any sort of modding...
Hi i have a 314 UK Version and wants to flash it with the german version.
Has anybody tried it ?
modellbobby said:
Hi i have a 314 UK Version and wants to flash it with the german version.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Where did you get the ROM ?
some sort of firmware update is on the HP FTP server (also includes newer maps)
Use the engineering mode to dump and restore the ROM.
have an Ipaq 310 running igo8 and finean4, like to get garmin but seems to have a resolution problem, anyboby can help plz"
[8/23/08 21:36:29 67512KB 4.20.50wp]
GFX_buf_alloc: Invalid area (-20048 480)
[8/23/08 21:36:29 67508KB 4.20.50wp]
Failure 87 allocating bitmap of size (-20048,480) 16 bpp (0)
[8/23/08 21:36:29 67448KB 4.20.50wp]
Read Access violation at data address 0xFFFFFFFC.
Program address 0x00058080 in background thread NULL (CSubAppThread::Run Garmin Mobile XT)
[8/23/08 21:36:30 67440KB 4.20.50wp]
CALL STACK:
0x18156EC0
0x182B7104
0x029FC9C4
0x02A03D24
0x93C0A090
0x93C33EA8
0x93C0DEB4
0x93C09FA8
0x18058080
0x18059900
0x180D18B8
0x180D1CEC
0x182B71E0
0x182B7010
0x182B6C54
0x029DDF04
klingklang01 said:
have an Ipaq 310 running igo8 and finean4, like to get garmin but seems to have a resolution problem, anyboby can help plz"
[8/23/08 21:36:29 67512KB 4.20.50wp]
GFX_buf_alloc: Invalid area (-20048 480)
[8/23/08 21:36:29 67508KB 4.20.50wp]
Failure 87 allocating bitmap of size (-20048,480) 16 bpp (0)
[8/23/08 21:36:29 67448KB 4.20.50wp]
Read Access violation at data address 0xFFFFFFFC.
Program address 0x00058080 in background thread NULL (CSubAppThread::Run Garmin Mobile XT)
[8/23/08 21:36:30 67440KB 4.20.50wp]
CALL STACK:
0x18156EC0
0x182B7104
0x029FC9C4
0x02A03D24
0x93C0A090
0x93C33EA8
0x93C0DEB4
0x93C09FA8
0x18058080
0x18059900
0x180D18B8
0x180D1CEC
0x182B71E0
0x182B7010
0x182B6C54
0x029DDF04
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Is seem to be the resolution problem of our GPS... I'm having the same issue also. We need to find some doc to change the resolution... I'm still searching for the solution, any1 know how to cange it???
Regards,
Jeff
iPAQ 3xx Series
This is an old post but I thought I'd confirm a couple things for the record, should anybody be looking into this kind of info in future although the device is technically EOL.
40th Floor said:
As far as I know, this iPAQ is the only device to have ever even used the (exact) processor it's using.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes this is the only iPAQ with a dual core processor for that matter.
40th Floor said:
And funny? Funny is that when it's on a charger (any external power at all) it runs at half speed (300 MHz) but when completely on battery it runs at 600 MHz.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The original USB 2.0 spec called for no more than 500ma to be pumped through the USB line. Around the time WM5 was being rolled out, HP had to wrestle with the USB klan to convince them that wasn't enough to run a device and charge it. HP was making better use of the standard by doing more with it than the authorities thought was needed. They eventually backed off and HP up through the time I'm writing this ships an AC adapter with each device that has a mini or micro USB connector; obviouisly needed since the 22-pin connector died with the 6900 (Moose) device. The adapters provide up to 1000ma of juice.
Now consider this: Prior to dropping the 22-pin connector HP shipped 2amp chargers which provided enough juice to run the device and charge the battery at the same time. The 22-pin standard came out with the h3800 Series which ran a 400MHz ARM single core and didn't have fancy stuff like WiFi built in, and only had a standard QVGA (320x240) screen.
So how could a device with a GPS, such a larger screen, and a dual core 600MHz CPU be expected to even operate with a 1amp charger, let alone charge the battery?
Playing with the OS - Differences between WinCE platforms
For those who would like to play with the OS, understand this device runs Windows Mobile 5 for devices and NOT the Pocket PC OS. Pocket PC was a platform, just like SmartPhone was a platform. Although Microsoft changes the names to confuse the innocent, we're still talking about a few significant differences.
Consider Pocket PC (or WinMo or WinMo classic depending on the wind and Microsoft's mood), a superset of WinCE that adds a few other things to the core WinCE 5 platform. Search the web for posts by people who have managed to get PocketPC apps to run on their Handheld PC (HPC) such as the MobilePro 900c. The same kind of things would apply to the iPAQ 300. The differences are not all that significant if you know which DLLs need to be added.
In short, the iPAQ 300 Series is closer to a HPC than PocketPC OS-wise. The good news is, this version of Platform Builder can be purchased, whereas the one for WinMo is strictly guarded by Microsoft and released only to OEMs like HP and Dell.
The hardest thing you'll run across is that the digitizer drivers were not optimized for fine work, just for finger use. When you bypass the NavNGo "OS" to run the underlying WinCE OS and try to use a soft keyboard, for example, you'll see the jitter I'm talking about.
The iPAQ 300 Series could have been more but it was designed to compete with other GPS devices and that's really all. The hardware was really pretty great, but the device shipped with significant bugs that were addressed post-release.
If you want a PocketPC that also has GPS, the h5900 Series was a better choice. Not dual core CPU though
Anyone still running this fine device?
I've got mine running Igo8.3, works pretty good.
I'd be interested to hear if anyone is running Primo on it.
Also, anyone know where to get a TMC antenna for this unit?
Cheers
i still have a working one
unfortunately i think it have gone into battery shutdown to little charge in the battery for an extended period of time,
it will however come to life if i plug it into the car
i was thinking tonight it would be cool to hack droid onto it

Seeking advice of whether or not to buy a Shift

I am interested in a new latop and have been doing quite a lot of research on the Shift. Voice call functionality is probably the only thing holding me back from making a definite decision right now. I have been purusing about and have come across a few questions as post dates seem intermintent on whether or not a few of the things I am looking for will come true. So if members could give me a point of view on to wait or not, or even to look at another device.
1.) I see that voice call functionality is not there, and am wondering if this is a "yet" or "a maybe" or a "don't get your hopes up".
2.) I have been a frequent user of cooked roms from HTC and was wondering if there is going to be anywhere near the support for the Shift as there is for other devices such as the Tytn II since I am all about making a great device even better.
3.) Is there any reasons why any of you can personally think of why I should seek another UMPC device or small laptop when compared to the Shift. I am going to be using it mostly for travel, media functions (mp3/movies), and of course web browsing/downloading. Things I am worried about... battery life, and never being able to make phone calls, and not having a touch screen. Owning a Tilt I am spoiled to that aspect
4.) Is the range of the bluetooth going to be greater than 33'? I know some types of bluetooth headsets can go much further distances, but am unsure if that is for media only or if that will be an option for voice call for the Shift as well.
5.) I currently have a Tilt running many programs such a mobile shell, poket weather, AT&T Navigator, and things along those lines. What is the likely-hood that I will be able to use such programs on the unlocked side of WM for the Shift. Or is that really going to depend a lot on the software programs themselves?
I have more questions, but have yet to search for the answers before posting, so I will be back soon.
Thank you for all your help and input in advance!
SKy
skyfox99 said:
I am interested in a new latop and have been doing quite a lot of research on the Shift. Voice call functionality is probably the only thing holding me back from making a definite decision right now. I have been purusing about and have come across a few questions as post dates seem intermintent on whether or not a few of the things I am looking for will come true. So if members could give me a point of view on to wait or not, or even to look at another device.
1.) I see that voice call functionality is not there, and am wondering if this is a "yet" or "a maybe" or a "don't get your hopes up".
2.) I have been a frequent user of cooked roms from HTC and was wondering if there is going to be anywhere near the support for the Shift as there is for other devices such as the Tytn II since I am all about making a great device even better.
3.) Is there any reasons why any of you can personally think of why I should seek another UMPC device or small laptop when compared to the Shift. I am going to be using it mostly for travel, media functions (mp3/movies), and of course web browsing/downloading. Things I am worried about... battery life, and never being able to make phone calls, and not having a touch screen. Owning a Tilt I am spoiled to that aspect
4.) Is the range of the bluetooth going to be greater than 33'? I know some types of bluetooth headsets can go much further distances, but am unsure if that is for media only or if that will be an option for voice call for the Shift as well.
5.) I currently have a Tilt running many programs such a mobile shell, poket weather, AT&T Navigator, and things along those lines. What is the likely-hood that I will be able to use such programs on the unlocked side of WM for the Shift. Or is that really going to depend a lot on the software programs themselves?
I have more questions, but have yet to search for the answers before posting, so I will be back soon.
Thank you for all your help and input in advance!
SKy
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
1. Dont get you hopes up, in fact i dont think we ever get all these functions that some say they are working on. why bother? what do you relly want that big acphone fore?
2. see 1.
3. it is a machine with limited power great for surfing bad for alot else
4. have only used a bluetooth mouse works great, havnt used it far from away lol
5. the stoage is wery limired on the shift, no room for alot of apps
skyfox99 said:
1.) I see that voice call functionality is not there, and am wondering if this is a "yet" or "a maybe" or a "don't get your hopes up".
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This is between "maybe" and "don't get your hopes up": requires security unlocking the device and changing some NV items in radio, but I'm not sure if the microphone is connected on the SnapVUE side. Bluetooth is definitely not connected, so it won't be possible to call through a headset.
skyfox99 said:
2.) I have been a frequent user of cooked roms from HTC and was wondering if there is going to be anywhere near the support for the Shift as there is for other devices such as the Tytn II since I am all about making a great device even better.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
ROM cooking is imminent, some of us are already using cooked ROMs.
I use mine for surfing (3G is great), documents, email and the odd movie. It won't cope with much else, which is fine because that's all I want it for. And why would you want voice calling on this thing? Bizarre, but each to their own.
The big thing is it is tiny...and well connected...a bit like Kate Moss
I appreciate the feedback. I was hoping for voice call via 1.2 i suppose for 300' range so i could just walk around with a headset on with the Shift at my desk at work. I am guessing i was expecting a little too much. I really am just looking for a touchscreen laptop that isn't too big and isn't too expensive. Any ideas for a computer along those lines?
If you at work, then you should have internet connection. Some telecom operators offer IP telephony. I am using this on Shift with even better functionality than mobile phone and with BT headset. It is possible to use also Skype for example. You can use the functionality even in move in wifi networks or mobile networks with flat rate package. Of course, 3G networks preferred.
shift
personally id buy which is what im going to do, but since it has windows mobile and a sd slot, it wouldnt be hard for some one copy software from another phone and since it has nothing to do with screen capabilities of processor speed im sure it woul be compatibal from almost any device because it is just a drive for hardware, bluetooth is not so much a hardware issue more sofware which once sd slot made usable might be ale to achive easyer when size is no matter, to addd extra options to handler or driver for blue tooth whichever.. besides if u like videos im sure the screen is somewhat high def being that its 16 million colors (not sure dont have it yet) and most computer screens are like 232k colors it might be like 720p or something not sure i dont know how many colors they can display and whatever but it'll make videos amazing compared to 64k colors of other phones, and some people have developed full xp drivers for it so might get lucky and be abl to get the ultamit device for embedded programing being you coul have embedded on a device which you could make program then test with or without touch screen very fastly and id only take a minute to switch back to fix errors...
Here in the states VOIP on a mobile phone really isn't there just yet, our networks are too slow on 3g I think. Although I don't really know much about it. Is skype VOIP to VOIP only, or can you call any phone number? I don't really want too much of a hassle having to hack this thing to get it to do what I want. I am actually getting tired of doing all that for now after flashing rom after rom to my tilt to get it to work the way I want. As is now I am unable to connect to my exchange server at work and am unsure as to what the problem is and really just want something to work ideally out of the box, but I know that won't happen.
dinscurge said:
personally id buy which is what im going to do, but since it has windows mobile and a sd slot, it wouldnt be hard for some one copy software from another phone and since it has nothing to do with screen capabilities of processor speed im sure it woul be compatibal from almost any device because it is just a drive for hardware, bluetooth is not so much a hardware issue more sofware which once sd slot made usable might be ale to achive easyer when size is no matter, to addd extra options to handler or driver for blue tooth whichever.. besides if u like videos im sure the screen is somewhat high def being that its 16 million colors (not sure dont have it yet) and most computer screens are like 232k colors it might be like 720p or something not sure i dont know how many colors they can display and whatever but it'll make videos amazing compared to 64k colors of other phones, and some people have developed full xp drivers for it so might get lucky and be abl to get the ultamit device for embedded programing being you coul have embedded on a device which you could make program then test with or without touch screen very fastly and id only take a minute to switch back to fix errors...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's amazing - one sentence....
Personally I would strongly advise you against buying this device. FOr the price you could get a small convertible tablet PC that would do far, far, far more than the Shift ever will. I bought a Fujitsu t2010 for $1100 US. I then spent $200 at NewEgg buying stuff to upgrade and i now have, for the same price as a shift ($1300):
12.1" active digitizer, no comparison to a passive digitizer (touchscreen) for taking notes, drawing, or anything else. active is 100x better
4GB RAm
250gb SATA HDD
1.2ghz ULV Dual Core cpu
WiFi/BT
5 HOUR BATTERY LIFE RUNNING VISTA WITH STANDARD BATTERY
TOTAL WEIGHT 3lbs
3g pc card modem- lets me use 3G data AND make phone calls AND send sms, slips into PC card slot and has retractable antenna
BT headset
Nice screen protector
nice webcam
Soooo, for what I spent on my Fuji I could have a little shift that has a crappier screen, shorter battery life, crippled hardware, etc. Why would anyone do that? Don't like a 12.1"? No problem, get a Fujitsu U810 (5" screen, $800), or a Fujitsu p1620 ($9", about $100 more thanthe shift). Don't like the Fuji's? OK, google convertible tablet and you'll get a ton of various little machines that can outperform the shift with a similar form-factor.
I know that there are some people who love thier Shift, and i am not trying to bash them. I just think that the Shift is an INCREDIBLY niche product and that most users would be much happier with a convertible tablet that is the same price, better battery ,processor,screen,etc. Some of the sacrifices we make in mobile devices is for the phone functionality, and if shift can't (and most likely won't ever) do that, why make those sacrifices? Especially when adding a cheap peice of hardware to a much more powerful platform (tablet pc) gives you everything you need?
am sorry but i have to said
no i have many proplem then i sale it
and buy sony ux37gn its more powerfull than the shift
and with no proplem " made in japan "
the only proplem is the price
Buy one. They are fantastic!
scopy60 said:
buy sony ux37gn
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
They have much smaller display, are bulky and have no Windows Mobile (ARM) subsystem.
devictoria said:
They have much smaller display, are bulky and have no Windows Mobile (ARM) subsystem.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Don't think they even have built in 3G do they?
I Like Shift!
FWIW, I really like my Shift....
Didn't buy it to be a computing powerhouse, but a take with me everywhere device.
I like the flexibility to use it as a slate (tablet), a laptop, or a slider.
Overall, works great...
mlalahoi said:
Personally I would strongly advise you against buying this device.
Soooo, for what I spent on my Fuji I could have a little shift that has a crappier screen, shorter battery life, crippled hardware, etc. Why would anyone do that? Don't like a 12.1"? No problem, get a Fujitsu U810 (5" screen, $800), or a Fujitsu p1620 ($9", about $100 more thanthe shift). Don't like the Fuji's? OK, google convertible tablet and you'll get a ton of various little machines that can outperform the shift with a similar form-factor.
I you need?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I agree, but cannot buy Fujitsu P1620 in Holland for some reason. Not happy with my Shift at all!
Huib
ArchiMark said:
FWIW, I really like my Shift....
Didn't buy it to be a computing powerhouse, but a take with me everywhere device.
I like the flexibility to use it as a slate (tablet), a laptop, or a slider.
Overall, works great...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Me too - it seems those that aren't happy really should have asked what they really wanted first up. I don't find performance an issue - battery life is OK for surfing etc - it's not an 8 hour music/video player though, and not meant to be. That's what iPod's etc are for. In my case, what my HX4700 is for. To me the WM6 with keyboard and 3G is extremely valuable - I am involved in music when not working and I can keep an eye on those related emails during the day (cannot log into mail from work), respond where necessary etc. No boot ups. If something needs more, or a big file attached, then I can boot to Vista.
Office 2003 is the way to go tho. 2007 is like Vista - bulky and slow.
I suspect the sales pitch of the Shift may have led people to believe it was going to be something other than what it is. I did the homework first, so knew what I was getting, especially around performance. Anyways, not sure whether HTC are actually going to sell many of these given the late arrival, seemingly little support (drivers, XP etc) and some polarised view points on it.
HTC SHIFT Rocks ....
for those un-happy with shift i would say u guys never really understood the essence of this device ... according to me this device is closest to the ideal device for a mobile person that HTC could make keeping in view today's technology and price limitations ...
I travel a lot very frequently and often all of a sudden need to spend nights over at a new place etc... but with shift along i am relieved of the hastles i used to face earlier ... its size is just ideal for it to be carried around everywhere and its functunality is well thought off ... and all the more important is that after liberation it gives u the power of two devices in one! A quick use WM side and a full fleged windows vista to substitute ur laptop for "work related" needs.
I normally use the WM interface when i am really mobile or dont need to access too much stuff.. or just need to use skype to chat with a supplier, etc ... but when i am either back in my car or in the hotel room or when i have some spare time or when i need to access bank website (our bank websites dont open in WM due to security concerns) ... I use the VISTA side ...
There are some annoyances off and on like - i cant multitask as well i can on my PC etc .. but those were known to me before i shelled out cash for this device.. the keyboard is smalll but what better u think HTC could have stuffed in such a device ...??? It's usable and its pretty neat too .. i have used it for typing long letters and reports with absolutely no problem ... no doubt u have type with a finger but its comfy once u get the hang of it! Also i can tell u with my practical experience that someone who's gonna shift after using a very powerful computer will feel it to be a bit slow but we have to understand these limitations to bring the best out of this device! So buy a HTC Shift , but plz be a bit just a bit patient while using it and it will be ur friend in need.
Keeping my kind of a multitasked life style in view (a medical doctor, a business man, a GPS System's Consultant, etc) - i would suggest u all to buy a Case Logic HDC-2 case ... it fits the shift well in it's original cover, fits in its charger, usb hub, a portable laser mouse, my stationary kit, my digital camera, a portable DVD writer, my mobile travel charger, candys to give me instant energy if reqd. and small nit bits like my 3 types of visiting cards, etc.). I normally carry the bag around with me in my car or on travel. Let the bag primarity lie in the car/hotel room as the case maybe and take only the shift in its leather case along while going for a meeting or to meet a client etc. and use the other bag contents as per need. But let me tell u that carrying this small kit has helped me out in so many conditions that i just cant thank HTC for making such a good device and to Case Logic for unkowingly creating such a good case to carry my stuff. (Case Logic HDC-2 is actually a HDD carrying case... but it fits the shift and it's accessories just right!) (see the pics)
For me carrying the shift in a harddisk carrying case gives me all the more comfort because i feel if a case is designed to protect a HDD, it can protect my Shift well!
And another thing: this bag fits perfectly and tightly in the space between any car's front seats ... so it stays there intact inspite of any bumps or pits on Indian Roads during the rainy season! ;-)
skyfox - did you have a bsquare powerhandheld once?
I am also planning to buy this machine. I need this device for simple, not so powerful development machine, where I can open up a text pad and run mysql on it. Can you run mysql on this machine and how responsive is running small dev mysql server there?

Getting serial out of the USB port to control a robot

Hi,
As most of you have, I am getting a growing collection of old mobiles now, and I want to do something cool.
I have just bought a robosapien V2 and AXON robot serial controller. What I want to do is use my old XDA exec to replace the 'brain' of the robot, so to this end, I need to be able to squirt serial data out of the phone on a wire, of which the easiest would be the usb snyc/charge port.
I am using NET 3.5 as my dev language, and the idea being is to take advantage of the wifi chip to be able to, firstly send commands to the robot from anywear (cool huh?) and to be able to stream video & audio (using the skype SDK) from the robot back to the network.
Anyone have any ideas on how to go about doing this?
And if any of you are interested enough I can post my progress here, go on, you know you would all love a robot you could send down the road on its own
sounds nice, i have no guess what it needs to control the robot nor i know anything about serial ports but i really would LOVE a small gizmo that i can control this way to do important things like rolling here, rolling there and then rolling back here, following the cat and piling it on the floor, talking through the speaker to the neighbours or affront those selfinviters ).
i'm waiting for your progress
best regards, pucki
Bluetooth
bhermer said:
Hi,
As most of you have, I am getting a growing collection of old mobiles now, and I want to do something cool.
I have just bought a robosapien V2 and AXON robot serial controller. What I want to do is use my old XDA exec to replace the 'brain' of the robot, so to this end, I need to be able to squirt serial data out of the phone on a wire, of which the easiest would be the usb snyc/charge port.
I am using NET 3.5 as my dev language, and the idea being is to take advantage of the wifi chip to be able to, firstly send commands to the robot from anywear (cool huh?) and to be able to stream video & audio (using the skype SDK) from the robot back to the network.
Anyone have any ideas on how to go about doing this?
And if any of you are interested enough I can post my progress here, go on, you know you would all love a robot you could send down the road on its own
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I suggest you take a look on BT to RS232/485 adaptors. There are some small nice ones out there. I think it'll be even cooler being all wireless, isn't it?
For example this ones here (from google, don't know the brand. Only used industrial ones until now on my projects):
http://www.alibaba.com/catalog/100402141/Bluetooth_To_Rs232_Adaptor_10m_Converter.html
This one can't be used because the phones are not class 1 devices (~100 mW , ~100m range) but just for the information:
http://www.alibaba.com/catalog/100402139/Bluetooth_Rs232_Adaptor_100m_603004.html
Good luck with your project!!
shmilson
shmilson said:
I suggest you take a look on BT to RS232/485 adaptors. There are some small nice ones out there. I think it'll be even cooler being all wireless, isn't it?
For example this ones here (from google, don't know the brand. Only used industrial ones until now on my projects):
http://www.alibaba.com/catalog/100402141/Bluetooth_To_Rs232_Adaptor_10m_Converter.html
This one can't be used because the phones are not class 1 devices (~100 mW , ~100m range) but just for the information:
http://www.alibaba.com/catalog/100402139/Bluetooth_Rs232_Adaptor_100m_603004.html
Good luck with your project!!
shmilson
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think this is the better way. Unless the phone has a USB host controller (I don't think a lot of them has, most the USB port as client. We can sync because it was the active sync from the PC that initiate and control the session, not from the phone), this bluetooth to RS232 converter seem to be the best solution. I've been looking for something like this for a while.
Thanks for the comments guys, for some reason XDA dev isnt emailing me when comments were placed!
Blue tooth seems like a cool idea, would be better able to hide the bt dongle in the robot! will get hold of one and have a play when I get more than a bunch of wires will post some pics

Shift CarPC HUD project

hey guys, i was thinking of starting this, but i don't have a Shift (as yet) and would like to ask a few questions before i get one, hopeful that some of the guys here (please?) could help answer them
My plan is very simple - plug the shift to an external screen, invert (mirror image) that display, and point it at a reflective surface on the windscreen to create a Head Up Display. so - the questions:
1) does the external VGA port work in Windows Mobile mode?
2) does the touchpad move the mouse into the area displayed by the external port in both WM and Vista mode?
3) how long does Vista or XP take to boot up as a clean install
thx for the help in advance
jo
joetheman said:
hey guys, i was thinking of starting this, but i don't have a Shift (as yet) and would like to ask a few questions before i get one, hopeful that some of the guys here (please?) could help answer them
My plan is very simple - plug the shift to an external screen, invert (mirror image) that display, and point it at a reflective surface on the windscreen to create a Head Up Display. so - the questions:
1) does the external VGA port work in Windows Mobile mode?
2) does the touchpad move the mouse into the area displayed by the external port in both WM and Vista mode?
3) how long does Vista or XP take to boot up as a clean install
thx for the help in advance
jo
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Just tinkering about with the vga output and I can confirm the following:
1) VGA-out only works on vista side (for now at least, don't know if this could be one of the things that may be possible to port over in the future, certainly not anytime soon)
2) Even if you could get VGA-out from WM side, there is no mouse support/mouse pointer on WM side, although again it is possibe the touchpad could be ported over to WM side and port mouse support from another device with a similar chipset (I believe they do exist with mouse support, mini tracker balls etc)
3) Boot time on clean install for Vista is about 90 seconds I guess, not sure about XP
So what you're suggesting may be possible in the future, but I suspect it would take a lot of work, time and effort, and an excellent knowledge and understanding of dlls, drivers and rom cooking - which I don't have!
Hope I've helped anyway.
thanks mate, that helped a lot. sounds like something too tough for me, unless i can live with it being on the XP/Vista side of things sigh
thx anyway
hi,
some VIA Epia or Intel ATOM ITX Boards are much cheaper then a Shift for CARPC use. Or there a some other solutions for carpc with integrated amplifier, radio, and standard double DIN rack mount, with intelligent power Management for car voltage.
for standard Windows use: (XP Embedded, or standard XP)
as sample:
http://www.cartft.com/catalog/il/770
the same, but with Windows CE 5 (so you can install TOMTOM and some other windows Mobile realted Software...
Http://
but other side, shift is High integrated. for Windows side, centrafuse works very well on htc shift and you can use taht as mediacenter too..
see: http://www.fluxmedia.net

[Q][Jan 20] Phone to Document Camera & Reverse Tethering

Dear HD2 Gods of XDA,
Hello! For the tl;dr version just check out the bold.
I have two questions/goals in this post. I teach high school science and I was looking for a way to avoid spending >$500 on a document camera for my classroom. I'm on T-Mobile USA and I currently have Android NAND on my HD2.
I'm looking for a way to turn my cell phone's camera into a document camera. Essentially I want to take the real time image (sound is not needed) and feed it to my projector in my classroom. I don't need to actually save the video footage, just have it appear of the screen. Do you know of any apps for Android that can accomplish this? I saw some for WM - but I finally removed WM from my phone...will I have to go back? Thoughts? Options? Opinions?
Secondly, I want to reverse tether option for my phone. My classroom is buried and I often get no signal all day at work. Right now I turn on airplane mode to conserve battery and just disconnect from the world until 3pm. I'd like to be able to atleast plug my phone into a USB port and get some data on the phone. As a teacher I can't really be on FB at work, but still being connected on my HD2 would be nice. Maybe then I'd actually buy a dock for the thing. I saw some older posts about setting up an adhoc network with android but I'm fairly inexperienced - if there's a setting or app now that can do this I think that would be easier. Again, I am sure this is possible, but I just want your opinions about how to BEST accomplish this.
Now...the complicating factors...the mismatching hardware across the board.
My HD2 Running Android
My Laptop: M11xR2 (only has DP, HDMI and USB ports) running Windows 7
Dell Projector: S-Video and VGA ports currently connected to...
Dell POS School Tower: Has the VGA connected to the projector. Runs Win XP and I'd need my tech guys to do any software installations on due to administrator lockdown on the computers at work.
What other details would be helpful? What do you think the best approach is? I'm open to flashing the phone back if it's needed.

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