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Help TV-Out on the Droid

I will go see Ape and have him do it for me. I am way to ***** to rip my Droid apart. Thanks for the pic, setting it as wall now, will upload screens of it in a few.
 
CAP201001252207.jpg
 
Typically you're gonna have a few pins, or even a single pin, driving a serial data connection to a video controller which acts as the driver for the LCD, and that chip sends the signals to the LCD by a ribbon cable. can anyone can take a look at their board and confirm this? backtrack from the LCD ribbon and see where it goes.
 
GuiltyPixel said:
this has gotten way off topic though. if you want to check out my stuff, see Guilty Pixel Studios: Photography and Digital Art or demarchand on deviantART
my dA account is the best way to get ahold of me usually. even if im busy, i usually check that place.

otherwise, i guess we should return to the OP topic: droid video out.

didnt mean to snipe your thread Apeman, just kinda happened I guess.
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Eating: Cheezie Chicken Ramen

Explain, please...the visual I'm imagining is making my brain hurt. ;)
 
@CRPercodani
No, not detailed enough, need a macro shot of that host board with the shields removed.

@Redflea
Its a thing I learned when deployed in Korea. Take ramen, boil it in chicken bullion or broth. Sear a chicken breast [boneless] and slice it into thin strips. Toss the chicken in it like a salad, then melt plain old cheap american cheese slices on top and serve. Can dust it with cayenne pepper for spice. It sounds strange but its one of the most delicious things I've ever tasted.
 
ugh... bad intel as usual.

thats not an lcd driver, its a 4 wire low voltage touch screen i/o.

it only controls positional input. not video output.
 
GuiltyPixel said:
@CRPercodani
No, not detailed enough, need a macro shot of that host board with the shields removed.

@Redflea
Its a thing I learned when deployed in Korea. Take ramen, boil it in chicken bullion or broth. Sear a chicken breast [boneless] and slice it into thin strips. Toss the chicken in it like a salad, then melt plain old cheap american cheese slices on top and serve. Can dust it with cayenne pepper for spice. It sounds strange but its one of the most delicious things I've ever tasted.
Click to expand...

LOL...my wife is Korean, born and raised there and she's never suggested that combo. I'll have to run it by her... :D
 
Ok forget activating the alternate video output channels. The kernel needs to be compiled with the flags set to enable them, the board needs to have the pins for said channels expanded with appropriate feedback components and such in place, which will probably not work externally due to EMI, environmental changes to resistance of the leads, etc. They've gotta be mounted near the OMAP3430 itself, we're dealing with real low tolerances here. The 3530, the one available to ppl who aren't GSM OEMs is nearly identical, runs the same kernel, etc. There is a manual for it here: http://focus.ti.com/pdfs/wtbu/SWPU114W_FinalEPDF_09_29_2009.pdf see page 2123 for Display Subsystem specs if you're curious.

Leeching the video signal for the LCD appears not to be an option either, since the LCD driver is also integrated. The OMAP sends pixel data directly.

Our only hope here at this point (unless you have very talented friends somewhere who can interface the parallel or serial LCD signals) is that the rumored next gen model will in fact implement HDMI onboard as some have speculated.

I, unfortunately, am in over my head when it comes to this. I understand only part of this section of the manual. I'm not that much of a hardcore hardware hacker. I like my software and simple hardware like UAVs and stuff.
 
Sorry to be the bearer of bad news. I came to find a solution, not run into the Great Wall of PhD Engineering. But that's what happened.

Maybe some of those MIT guys can crack this problem and find a way to tap the existing video signals without the resultant voltage drop making them useless.

Good luck guys.

-Ashley

p.s. I'll be around after I get my Droid and at least share any apps I write, but I'm not touching that OMAP. I might order a BeagleBoard to play with though. On that note..

@Apeman
I'd recommend you take a good long look at the BeagleBoard or other OMAP 3 development board as a platform for your concept. It may not work for the Droid phones, but you could always design your own augmented reality system from scratch on one of these, and all of the I/O subsystems are cleanly exposed with connectors in place. A little bit of C/C++ and some creative hardware use could lead to a pretty awesome device. Augmented reality systems we use in surgery and in the military kick a lot of a-- and I'm sure you can find an industry who needs their own. A standard PC architecture might be a good starting point as well. Say, a netbook, with your own custom sensor packs and HMD. Cheap, easy, familiar territory.
 
Nice work Guilty...That was some fast research. I hope something is till possible for Video Out on the Droid! @ Apeman, talk to those guys at MIT about it!

Oh, and your 8 bit American Jesus is pretty damn good Guilty!
 
Way to go Pixel!

Yea, if you go look at the end of page 1 (I think...) we were looking at the TI board. I actually am currently using the Beagleboard, but having a little trouble installing other OS's and the Svideo (Which I was going to use for the video connection) is a real pain.

Will post when I get back from MIT ---Probably around 10 PM Eastern
 
Sorry guys, no MIT this week. Dad's sick and didn't want to drive into the city. Oh well, will go next week and if no one will drive me, I'll walk the 25 miles :P
 
Did you guys give up the "USB option"? I have TV Out natively on the n900, but came accross this vid for the n800, with what looks like USB/WiFi TV Out. It may be all software based? The video has contact info at the end:

YouTube - Nokia USB Monitor

...maybe they can point you in the right direction? Or at least find more info on the web.
 
Apeman said:
That was a fake HMD in that video...... I guess I will continue to look into USB video, though.
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Well my point was that I do not believe that the n800 had TV Out "from the factory", but the functionality was added later by that project team.
 
Im not sure, but I do not think that is the case. TV Out depends on the board, not the software. Any modern day OS (With GUI) has to have monitor output, having that be a TV, the OEM supplied screen, or a regular monitor.
 
Apeman said:
Im not sure, but I do not think that is the case. TV Out depends on the board, not the software. Any modern day OS (With GUI) has to have monitor output, having that be a TV, the OEM supplied screen, or a regular monitor.
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It goes without saying that the hardware must be there, but again, the n800 was not released for sale w/TV out, and as far as I know, hardware was not added for that video.
 
I don't think you understand..... Nokia did not specifically make the N800 supoort Video output, but it did anyways. In the same way the Texas Instruments board that Motorola used to make the Droid supports video output, BUT they decided not to allow users to access this, not by software blocks, but because there is plastic/metal/whatever in-front of it. The Droid can support video output...... if you take the whole thing apart and hope it works, and if it does you would have the device taken apart.
USB looks like the only option right now, so if anyone tries it, please post! Once I get the money, I will buy some different cables to test it out.
 
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