N4 USB OTG again - Nexus 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

Has somebody tried just reverting the changes of the fateful commit and just trying to figure out it it works - even partially - then?
The "mako does no 5V" change simply removes /system/etc/permissions/android.hardware.usb.host.xml (see the commit). So, in theory, just pushing the file into /system/etc/permissions on a rooted device should revert that change by itself... and allow us to test the hardware for OTG compatibility.
Since I'm not currently rooted, I haven't done this already, but would someone go ahead and just try? If it doesn't power devices, it might work with a USB hub at least. But trying something unfancy like a USB keyboard first would certainly prove whether it works at all.

It's been tried, and all pushing that xml does is say OTG works. It doesn't actually make it work

jacklebott said:
It's been tried, and all pushing that xml does is say OTG works. It doesn't actually make it work
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Fair enough! I thought that it actually enabled the system to try USB host mode, since I figured that baseband Android just has USB host crammed into its software innards anyway and just needs to be aware to start doing it.
Well, obviously not. Sad panda.

Related

Is the USB master? Can I connect external HDD etc?

I wonder if the USB on the Nexus One allows me to connect an external hard drive. I'm only talking about data transmission with externally powered USB-devices. The N1 doesn't need to power USB-devices for me to be satisfied.
And if not: could the deficiency possibly be mended software-wise, or is it a limitation of the hardware itself?
Thanks beforehand!
no it cannot be the host. Read this on a google forum, someone posted the link as an answer to a similar question yesterday.
Thank you for your answer, britoso!
But oh, what a pitty!!!
Can't it possibly be fixed by booting with another software driver or something?
What's the point of removing this ability? It seems completely ridiculous. It gains nothing at all to "un-specify" USB host capability:
"Now, I have my files on this USB memory stick and here's the Nexus One. Oh, what's the use. Google didn't care at all about this kind of scenaria..."
Well, let's see what can be done with bulky wireless adapters and stuff like that then, to mend this unnecessary fail of the N1... I probably need to use a PC running Windows and a cable internet in order to have any use at all of the N1. Was this the purpose of this deliberate design "feature"?!?
this feature was not removed, but simply never implemented into the Android OS (afaik). if USB was host that means anything connected to it would have to draw power from the Nexus One's battery. Im sure HTC does not want this, because some things connected to USB can put incredible stress on a battery.
I thought the inability was due to a USB design that will allow charging, but doesn't allow hosting.
(at least that what I gathered about the n900 and why it couldn't act as a host.)
edit: nevermind nokia opted to skip on the go support to get the product out faster.
I don't know if there's a hardware limitation in place, but even if there isn't, the software does not support it.
There's an app for the n900 to add host support in the maemo repository. Don't know if it works though. I've always thought host support was due to the software.
Go here:
http://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=738
Sign in with your google ID. Vote for the feature by clicking the star.
(While you are there, click on "Back to list" and browse for other issues/features you care about and "star" them too...)
Its been accomplished on the Droid... Host mode works, but as there are no drivers, anything that runs over usb will turn on / charge but not connect.
http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/10/droid-gets-a-usb-hack-allowing-it-to-control-printers-and-camera/
mikecyber said:
Its been accomplished on the Droid... Host mode works, but as there are no drivers, anything that runs over usb will turn on / charge but not connect.
http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/10/droid-gets-a-usb-hack-allowing-it-to-control-printers-and-camera/
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Thanks for posting this as I saw this on another site and came here to raise awareness. I've heard that someone got a USB keyboard working over USB host. Could someone try this out on their N1?

[Q] Using desktop/Laptop as a USB drive for Update

This is kind of a question and also kind of a suggestion.
I have seen a lot of info in the forums about using USB Host cables to update xooms, but I have heard no mention of using your PC as a USB drive for the update. I am sure there is probably a good reason for this, but I thought I would ask anyways and see what the response was.
Is it possible to mount your PC hard disk, or possibly a USB drive that is plugged into another port, on the xoom and place the update file there? I tried Googling some info on doing this but was not sure what I should be looking for.
You could put a mac in "drive" mode and do this... in fact, I'm going to try it now... thanks for the idea!
* edit: since my mac drive is hfs, I'm betting it won't be readable by the xoom.... do I care enough to repartition a small section to make it FAT32? nah.
No this won't work for a variety of reasons. Honestly the crazy ideas people come up with just to avoid rooting.
Sent from my Xoom using XDA Premium App
Well I would root, but I use my xoom in such a manor that I am not willing to risk having it out of commission for a few days, if something was to go wrong.
I think using a USB hub would work. Haven't tried though. But the principal is you have your xoom usb cord and plug it into the hub. Then plug your FAT32 USB into the hub. Now they are linked together. Hubs are cheap and can get them anywhere and most likely you have one and its worth a try. Let me know if it works.
@prime said:
This is kind of a question and also kind of a suggestion.
I have seen a lot of info in the forums about using USB Host cables to update xooms, but I have heard no mention of using your PC as a USB drive for the update. I am sure there is probably a good reason for this, but I thought I would ask anyways and see what the response was.
Is it possible to mount your PC hard disk, or possibly a USB drive that is plugged into another port, on the xoom and place the update file there? I tried Googling some info on doing this but was not sure what I should be looking for.
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Click to collapse
I'm pretty sure this wouldn't work because you have to boot your xoom from the usb device you are using, basically like way back when, when you use to have to shove a floppy into a computer before starting it to redo some of its bios work. You're basically trying to load an "os" like file from your external harddrive (well a flash drive really) and pluging the Xoom into your computer is a whole other concept.

Have you ever had this requested?

I want to be able to plug a standard usb webcam "type" device into my A500.
I bought off a usb microscope off Ebay. It is recognized under windows xp - 7 as a usb hid device. It did not even come with a driver disk, since everything recognized it automagically. I tried it last night under 3 different linux distro's and they detected it with no issue.
Does anyone know of a way? It would be so much easier to carry the tablet with me, vs a laptop, not to mention much better battery life so I can be in the field longer without a recharge.
I think the A500 needs root for it to go into host mode. Do you have it rooted? I don't think I have heard of any webcam device working on Android with a simple plug and play, but who knows.
[email protected] said:
I think the A500 needs root for it to go into host mode. Do you have it rooted? I don't think I have heard of any webcam device working on Android with a simple plug and play, but who knows.
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Oh yeah I'm rooted, running a custom rom. I'm not scared to get my hands dirty either if someone knows of a solution
Hello, I'm looking also to find a solution for a webcam. But no lock so far.
Once I tried one on a older tablet running 1.6 and it worked but as it had the drivers build in loaded but I had to use a special camera apk.
So I think we need to have two things (maybe this is obvious for you)
1) the correct drivers loaded (we need to find them)
2) The correct app that let us choose the usb camera as I think they enumerate starting as 0... Or can create one
But to me the hardest part is finding the correct drivers.
Could you share the a link to that ebay microscope ? I might get one of the same so we can play with the same thing.
Thx

[REQ] implement USB Host APIs in KI/KJ firmware

Hello everyone,
I have nothing even close to development knowledge, so I have no idea if and how this can be done. Seeing what you guys cook together here though, I am quite sure that what I request should be possible.
As most of you will know, Samsung has removed the USB Host APIs from it's newer firmwares. No one kows why, but a lot of SGS2 owners, including me, dearly miss that feature. (I need it for chainfires DSLR controller)
I love to flash the newest firmwares, am eager to see whats new, and want the improvements they bring. So what I'm asking for, is for someone to "extract" that usb host-functionality from older firmwares and put it in a (cwm flashable ?) package that enables the funktionality for any firmware.
Since our hardware supports it natively it should only be question of software/kernel, right? Would love to see this happening... would hate to flash back to an old firmware.
Any help welcome! Would buy people bringing a solution a beer! cheers
works fine for me on KI3...? I use the usb host function often to transfer photos to a usb for work..
rbimdxe said:
works fine for me on KI3...? I use the usb host function often to transfer photos to a usb for work..
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I don't really know how it works, but there seem to be different functioanlities. The new firmwares still are usb host enabled, which means you can still connect thumb drives, etc.. though as chainfire states here: http://www.chainfire.eu/articles/103/_SGS2_KI_Samsung_removes_USB_host_support_patches_bootloaders/ 3rd party aplications have been blocked from making use of this functionality.
no one?
...well I guess if it could be easily done chainfire would already be on it. please let me know if anything comes up!
there is a thread concerning this in the epic 4G forums. seems like they don't get usb otg at all, which is why that problem generates some more interest over there. chainfire himself contributes to their discussion. for everybody interested, let's follow what's going on over there. if they find a solution i'm sure we can apply it to the gs2.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1265221

OTG Support

While i was thinking is it possible to make OTG work on Touch Pro 2?
Any Software or ROM or Kernel updates will do?
You mean like USB Host Mode?
I don't think anyone looked into it. Android or WinMo...
arrrghhh said:
You mean like USB Host Mode?
I don't think anyone looked into it. Android or WinMo...
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Yeah , that is whats making me ask it, it would be awesome if that Hapenned., by the way is it Possible?
nikhil.pgm said:
Yeah , that is whats making me ask it, it would be awesome if that Hapenned., by the way is it Possible?
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(Almost) anything is possible with enough time and determination...
Has it been done already? Not to my knowledge.
'Theoretically' you should be able to get this working. Like Arrrghhh said, anything is possible. I did get a usb otg cable for the rhodium (well, not FOR the rhodium, but 'theoretically' it should work) and found that this function is supported in the specs for our processor chip.
There are drivers and a pretty good source of information here: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=480899
I never advanced past the point of realizing that while our phone 'probably' has the hardware to receive input from usb devices it cannot provide them with power to function. You seem to need to use an externally powered usb hub for those drivers to do you any good, and there really isn't anything On-The-Go about carrying around a usb hub and its power adapter! So it was at that point that I gave up. But, there is probably all the information you need in the thread I posted above to get you started.
Please post your findings if you have success/failure
Caldair said:
'Theoretically' you should be able to get this working. Like Arrrghhh said, anything is possible. I did get a usb otg cable for the rhodium (well, not FOR the rhodium, but 'theoretically' it should work) and found that this function is supported in the specs for our processor chip.
There are drivers and a pretty good source of information here: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=480899
I never advanced past the point of realizing that while our phone 'probably' has the hardware to receive input from usb devices it cannot provide them with power to function. You seem to need to use an externally powered usb hub for those drivers to do you any good, and there really isn't anything On-The-Go about carrying around a usb hub and its power adapter! So it was at that point that I gave up. But, there is probably all the information you need in the thread I posted above to get you started.
Please post your findings if you have success/failure
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Surely i would, leme work on that!
does the Froyo Build support OTG?
nikhil.pgm said:
Surely i would, leme work on that!
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Click to collapse
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1250199&highlight=7
its said that OTG isnt working in the Build
So does Android generally support OTG without any software support?
Can i get OTG support by just running in Android? ICS or CM or GB or Froyo?
[i m working on the Win6.5 OTG, ordered Host cable, waiting for it to arrive..]
nikhil.pgm said:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1250199&highlight=7
its said that OTG isnt working in the Build
So does Android generally support OTG without any software support?
Can i get OTG support by just running in Android? ICS or CM or GB or Froyo?
[i m working on the Win6.5 OTG, ordered Host cable, waiting for it to arrive..]
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Click to collapse
That thread isn't talking about host mode, that thread is talking about transferring files via USB mass storage mode....
At any rate, I'm pretty sure the software simply supports it. Getting the hardware to talk properly is the hard part (again, as far as I understand it...)
arrrghhh said:
That thread isn't talking about host mode, that thread is talking about transferring files via USB mass storage mode....
At any rate, I'm pretty sure the software simply supports it. Getting the hardware to talk properly is the hard part (again, as far as I understand it...)
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i got the Female cable, but it never took the flash drive, dont know why? Tried Zeno's Drivers and Also Leo's too but its not working out, does it require an external power supply?
any one got it working ever?
nikhil.pgm said:
i got the Female cable, but it never took the flash drive, dont know why? Tried Zeno's Drivers and Also Leo's too but its not working out, does it require an external power supply?
any one got it working ever?
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Click to collapse
No one ever got it working, I thought I made that perfectly clear...
I'm not sure what you need, again there's probably quite a bit of legwork that you'll need to do in order for it to talk on our devices. I don't think you can just "use" the LEO drivers in this case - however, adapting them might be a good place to start.
nikhil.pgm said:
i got the Female cable, but it never took the flash drive, dont know why? Tried Zeno's Drivers and Also Leo's too but its not working out, does it require an external power supply?
any one got it working ever?
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Click to collapse
I thought I read somewhere that the TP2 can not provide power. You had to use a powered usb hub + device to have a chance at getting it working.
The downside being that you had all this stuff to haul around if you wanted to use an OTG cable.

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