OESF Portables Forum
Everything Else => Distros, Development, and Model Specific Forums => Archived Forums => PocketPenguin => Topic started by: Da_Blitz on August 07, 2006, 02:11:20 am
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Well i have just been doing some research into the chipsets we can use. as you may knom i mant to use as few manufacturers as posible. the reasoning behind this is two fold, it makes things simpler and if we can get one part in small quantities then it is likly we can get several differnt chips from them in small quantities
now that thats out of the way, i have some corrections for some of the hardware, it has been stated that there is an upper limit on the flash and how much we can have in the system, this is untrue. it turns out we can have more but the interface the requires "glue" or in other words extra circutry. what this means is there is a posibility to use the 32Gbit flash chips that samsung has on thier website
one thing i have looked into is the current situation with the DDR RAM, i have made some intresting discoveries with regards to this and have decided to go back to using mobile DDR RAM only instead of offering the normal ram as well. this puts a cap on the upper limit the design will have, effectivly limiting it to 256MB (4 chips) the reasoning behind this is that the 1Gbit chips were twice the size of 2x 512Mbit chips and consumed more power, the funny thing is that depending on how it was wired up 2x 512Mbit would consume more power, however we would need 8x chips to hit 512MB. this may sound wierd to go to the solution that has the potential to chew more power but with a couple of tricks it can be made to use as much power as the 1Gbit chip
we do this by using 32 bit chips rather than 16 bits, with the 16 bit chips we would have them in parrallel to make a 32 bit bus to keep the performance up. instead we will have the chips one after each other so that unused chips can be put in a low power state. now this iswhere the low power chips are really good, unlike thier PC targeted cousins they can be put into an ultra low power state where they dont refresh thier memorey contents, the power consumption in this state would barley light an LED. unfortunattyl i dont think we will be able to take advantage of tis feature due to linux's cacheing system and how linux allocates memorey (basically we would need to defragment the memorey to try and use as few chips as posible)
the other advantage the mobile chips have is that thier normal power requiremnts for most tasks are lower than normal chips, when not acsessing the contents of one of the chips it can be put into a low power state saving power blah blah ... you get the point.
Now at this point you are all probelly thinkin, "well he is talking about ram and power why didnt he put it in that post about saving power by turning off LED's" well here is where i start talking about the design decisions behind which chips i have selected.
first up is the HDMI chipset. now this is a bit contravesal as it includes encryption but what you porbelly dont know is that its backwards compatible with DVI, however it is most likly compatible with VGA (even with an adaptor) so a second connecter will have to be put somewhere. thu adavantag the HDMI gives us is that it transmits both videa and audio, meaning we will be able to put that 7.1 chipset that has been mentioned to geed use, it also supports SPDIF which has been asked for.
this chip is great for us because it takes a VGA signal and gives out a HDMI compatible signal, it handles the encryption and everything else, as far as i can tell all we need is a key and perhaps not even that (besides you could always "clone" the key from your HDMI DVD player) the funny thing is because we have the chipset bieng fed by a vga signal we can route that to a connector and have good old VGA support. nice and simple no software required.
next we come to bluetooth, part of my "minimum spec". as i have said i wont to use a enhanged data rate chip, the reasoning behind this is that it is lower power. the anoying thing about this is that it needs an RF shield which means more things to manufactuer. the solution, buy a prebuilt module from infeon that has the RF shield built into it. nice and samll and is basically an "attach an antenna" design that also offloads part of the processing (up to HCI it says)
now for another explanation of some of my design decsions. i am trying to use single chip solutions to reduce the cost, both in terms of cash and board space (mostly board space). lukily for us neally ever second generation chipset for every RF protocal you can think of has a single chip solution.
back to where the story left off. i know i am running out of serial ports (async and sync (SPI and ttl rs232)) however does anyone fancy a gps reciver, i have found a single chip solution that looks very nice and also reminded me that phones are supposed to come with GPS so that you can be tracked by "emergency services" [begin silent wisper] or the CIA/NSA [/end silent wispering]. now i would like to be as complient as posible so i might have to include a chipset like this, however we are running linux so i recomend you setit up to tell them you are on the moon . more seroslly thogh it would not be hard to make it report a location under user control if you are that scared about it, and it would nicly round off this design
ok the next one we have is very very nice, infeon also make phone chipsets based on arm up to 250Mhz. not bad at all, the advantage is that this thing has serial ports on it and can help us extend the IO of the iMX3. it can also be used to offload part of the processing of whatever we desire as well as allowing the phone to work without the iMX3. it supports multiple antennas and HSDPA so we can get stupidly high download speeds. We could build a PDA around it if we needed
the problem is that nearly everything is a single chip solution so it will be hard to find a chipset without the ability to hook up a screen and keypad. it does mean that if we needed to we could have 4 SD card slots . i am thinknig that this should be connected to 4 buttons and the mcrophone/speaker as well as a gpio line from the iMX3, when the iMX3 drives the line high the chip knows that the iMX3 should make all the descions otherwise pickup the call when the button is pushed, i would also connect the secondary screen to this processor as it would mean that we could display the incoming number when the iMX3 is unavlabile to do an adress lookup.
this is by no means complete, it still requires alot of thenking on how to design the solution, the actuall problem hasent even been outlined yet (i wiill leave it until we have all the hardware decided)
i am also thinking of micron for the actuall image sensor, how many mega pixels do we want?
flash is flash, i am thinking of using samsung beacuase of the insane denisities they have
anyway hera are the links to the hardware i have been talking about:
http://www.infineon.com/cgi-bin/ifx/portal...ageTypeId=17099 (http://www.infineon.com/cgi-bin/ifx/portal/ep/channelView.do?channelId=-81674&channelPage=%2Fep%2Fchannel%2FproductOverview.jsp&pageTypeId=17099)
http://www.infineon.com/cgi-bin/ifx/portal...ageTypeId=17099 (http://www.infineon.com/cgi-bin/ifx/portal/ep/channelView.do?channelId=-65235&channelPage=%2Fep%2Fchannel%2FproductOverview.jsp&pageTypeId=17099)
http://www.infineon.com/cgi-bin/ifx/portal...ageTypeId=17099 (http://www.infineon.com/cgi-bin/ifx/portal/ep/channelView.do?channelId=-65315&channelPage=%2Fep%2Fchannel%2FproductOverview.jsp&pageTypeId=17099)
http://www.samsung.com/products/semiconduc.../K4X51323PC.htm (http://www.samsung.com/products/semiconductor/MobileSDRAM/MobileDDRSDRAM/512Mbit/K4X51323PC/K4X51323PC.htm)
http://www.samsung.com/Products/Semiconduc...Flash/index.htm (http://www.samsung.com/Products/Semiconductor/NANDFlash/index.htm)
http://www.micron.com/products/cmos/ (http://www.micron.com/products/cmos/)
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Linear Technology have created a very useful power control chip that takes in 6 - 40V (e.g. from firewire or external power supply), or a regulated 5V from USB, charges a LiIon battery and provides power for the actual device... it will seamlesly switch between power sources, so it makes powering a portable device a doddle. Part LTC4089 or LTC4089-5.
http://www.linear.com/pc/productDetail.do?...78,C1089,P21672 (http://www.linear.com/pc/productDetail.do?navId=H0,C1,C1003,C1037,C1078,C1089,P21672)
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For audio devices, Micronas have some very sophisticated multi-channel devices with built-in DSP functions:
http://www.micronas.com/products/by_functi...ex.html&l=71987 (http://www.micronas.com/products/by_function/index.html?backurl=%2Fproducts%2Findex.html&l=71987)
they have a new "MAP-M" device which is described as a dsp + digi+ ana system on a chip
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more than likly we will have a linear devices chipset in there, the MAP chip seems intresting, it offers more outputs than some of the other chips i have seen as well as making them more flexible. i dont belive the DSP will be of much use without someone willing to write firmware but it could be nice for a bounty
back to the charger, sounds nice but we will need another one as well as it is likly that we will need 1.8v 2.5v 3.3v and 5v for usb
well back to the music chip i havent heard of them which is also a bad thing. that means i havent seen thier chips avalible from comman distributors which might mean they are hard to get, however i am intreseted in thier single chip dvb-t tunners, but this is still a function better served by USB unless there is board space (you dont want it then dont get it soldered on)
The MAS (http://www.micronas.com/products/by_function/mas_35xyh/product_information/index.html) chip looks promising with its inbuilt decoding and mixing of AC-3 and dts as well as spdif input/output/bypass and i2s interface, ithe other chips are intresting in that they can work without firmware, the firmware is just for aditonal features the others have built in bassadjustment and the usual other features in ROM which is nice, get an audio file or two on board and it is quite posible that we could see some nice plugins (i am hoping for the decoding like tho other chip but i belive it will most likly be effects related)
in facti think i just found a distributer. more info latter. whoever i would like to hear somenes comments on having a DSP unit in this thing considering that there will most likly be no extra stuff unless you buy it from the chip maker or write it yourself
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FYI, Ironwood do all kinds of interesting adaptors for prototyping, such as BGA sockets - quite useful when you're prototyping and need to replace a blown SDRAM bga device!
https://www.ironwoodelectronics.com/ (https://www.ironwoodelectronics.com/)
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I'd like to make a point.
Now that I have PDA-Phone, making it so that the phone can operate separately from the PDA seems like kind of a stupid idea. No offense.
To accept a call, you first have to know that there IS a call. This means a ringtone. That needs the OS and the daemon. To even connect to the network, if you're on a contract, or keep more than about $15 of credit on your PAYG phone at any time WITHOUT PIN protecting the MicroSIM, You've either got a very good and complex reason, or you're pretty thick.
To enter the PIN, you need either a full keypad, or to do it from the OS, like with Windows Mobile on the Universal. . . Since we're not having a full PhoneChip-controlled keypad, there's no point in making it possible to recieve the calls you can't hear without activating the PDA.
It's a good idea in theory, but it's a bit of an x86 to do in practice. The first o2 XDA (HTC Wallaby) could do this, and the Phone chip could control the LCD accordingly. They haven't bothered in the later versions, so they much have had a good reason why. I think, honestly. . It's more important to get a decent set of open source tools for phones, something that does currently not exist. . Than worry about a feature that is to be honest. . a bit complex needing time and thought that would be better spent on other areas.
All in one shielded Bluetooth? Fantastic. Don't suppose it's EMP proof? XD GPS? Good idea, I'd use it since I'm just starting Geocaching. If no-one else wants it, lose it. You can get a Bluetooth GPS for £40 these days.
256MB RAM, yeah, that's cool. Current trend is for 128mb so 256 still keeps us ahead. Not to mention it's DDR not the usual SDRAM.
The Camera? What's the max that the dedicated bus can handle? The 3.2MP sensor in the N73 is nice, but then I'm happy with the 1.3MP in the Universal.
2MP if you can get it and it'll fit on the Bus, 1.3MP otherwise. 3.2 is a bit excessive when we'll be using it for 3G-Videophone and Video-over-IP aswell. Hail UMTS2100!
The HDMI chipset looks good, I'm continually plugging my Zaurus and my Uni into my VCR (I have a complicated home cinema system that centres around a VCR) and playing music with it, so a HDMI port makes my life for Video playback alot easier (Yeah, my DVD player just broke.)
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actually the ability to make a call without the cpu is a saftey feature, i belive its a requirement that any phone can dial 000, 911, 119 or any other emergency phone number as long as there is a connection to any cell phone tower, it dosent matter how much credit you have or if you dont get covereage with your provider, as long as there is a signal, also some phones never go below 10% on thier battery so that they can make an emergency call. this all works even if you have stuffed up the PUK code
actually we can quite easily make the gsm chip handel the phone stuff, you connect all of that stuff to the gsm chip and write the firmware to control it, then have the main CPU bo able to control it as well, if the main CPU is off (we can tell by using an IO pin) then the GSM processor takes over all of the functionallity (basically reciving a call and making one) sure you dont get the nicefeatures such as who is calling but i dont use them and people did survive without them
dont forget that it is posible to have 2 devices listening to the keypad at the same time
jurys out on the camera, we will see if it stays in the final design
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If we're connecting up to the full keypad then go for it! And if we keep the external "Samsung" screen on the back then we can still show caller phone number, and the number we have dialled, and the Pin Code request. . etc.
Jury out on the camera? Ok, I don't know what that means 100%, but I think they should remember that it's pretty much a requirement for a 3G phone that it can do VideoCalls. . . Otherwise there's not much point in it being 3G (Yes, I know about the Data speed, and I only use 3G for videocalls XD Data costs too much.)
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i have always thoght that video aclls were a bad idea, how do you keep the camera still?
anyway it means that the camera is undecided, and looking at bieng droped
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. to be honest I'm not that keen on the camera to begin with. Video calls aren't an issue for me, and mostly phone cams (due to tiny lenses) take crappy pictures. A cheap usb pencam can do as well or better, and the cameraless phone/pda would be banned from fewer places (not to suggest that my pda goes tohigh security or high profile places, just pointing out a trade off)
At any rate, it is power, durability useability and a good OS I'm looking for ( the penguin would be a novelty for this alone) and that stuff seems covered so far
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The camera oesn't have to be perfectly still. Slight movement isn't a serious problem on a CIF resolution 10FPS video call. It's designed so that Bodly Language, Facial features etc can be seen via the other end. Using a USB webcam, would it still be possible to make videocalls? Believe it or not, Since they're the same price on my Tariff, I videocall as much or more as Voicecall, defiantely more when I'm in a well-covered UMTS area. It's much less impersonal than a voicecall is, even though video calls are hardly likely to win you an Oscar for best picture quality.
If it gets dropped it gets dropped, nothing I can do about it. XD
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mm, i do hate calling people to begin with, and i convey more infomation through tone than body language
im happy to use a webcam instead, i am aiming more for desktop replacment or mini laptop than phone type features, thats why there is the enphisis on data transfer (EDGE, HSPDA, UTMS)
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just came across some more info, turns out freescale make a wifi chip, i havent seen it but i hope they still make it
link: http://linuxdevices.com/news/NS4915836559.html (http://linuxdevices.com/news/NS4915836559.html)
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So. . You're an Anthropologists Nightmare, or an Anthropology Student's dreamboy?
If a USB webcam can be used by the phone as a video source for 3G videocalling then I'm happy for it to be left off.
Data transfer over GSM is less of a concern for me, and probably for anyone who isn't rich and who has looked at the rates charged by their Cell network.
£3 a megabyte? Maybe in an emergency, say if the rest of my accesspoints are down, or to do a quick websearch while very AFK.
The point of a phone is to call, If I want the internet 80% of the time I'll be within range of TheCloud, or at home. 99.999 percent of the time when I'm out, it's not urgent enough to necessit spending a ridiculous amount on browsing for it.Targeted for internet-use is probably a bad plan. You may not like convergent technology, but most people do, and it does have it's advantages. Zaurus replacement First, Phone Second, xG handheld browser. .465th.
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So. . You're an Anthropologists Nightmare, or an Anthropology Student's dreamboy?
If a USB webcam can be used by the phone as a video source for 3G videocalling then I'm happy for it to be left off.
Data transfer over GSM is less of a concern for me, and probably for anyone who isn't rich and who has looked at the rates charged by their Cell network.
£3 a megabyte? Maybe in an emergency, say if the rest of my accesspoints are down, or to do a quick websearch while very AFK.
The point of a phone is to call, If I want the internet 80% of the time I'll be within range of TheCloud, or at home. 99.999 percent of the time when I'm out, it's not urgent enough to necessit spending a ridiculous amount on browsing for it.Targeted for internet-use is probably a bad plan. You may not like convergent technology, but most people do, and it does have it's advantages. Zaurus replacement First, Phone Second, xG handheld browser. .465th.
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Noooooooo!!!! I just got unlimited gsm (at dialup spedds, I admit) for $25 us per month. gsm data tranfer is definitely a big deal for me. I could live with out it (in fact I do, as I haven't yet got my voq to talk to my Z--time constraints, in part) but it would be very nice not to have have to.
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nonononono!
I'm NOT saying we shouldn't put it in! Just that we should make sure it's fine as a phone TOO!
There are Cheap Data placs over here too, but if you get a Data Price plan here, it don't do phone calls.
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we have to start thinkning internationally (esp. ferret-simpson) and relise that in the rest of the worsd things may be diffrent
over here in australia its 20c per KB and 1 sms costs 20c (last time i checkd, might be out of date) basically it was cheaper to use msn than sms
if you own a buisness you basically get given unlimited gprs for free, but for individuals you pay quite a bit, unless you are on a capped plan (ie spend 200 but only pay 60, i dont know why they dont make everthing chepaer instead )
the main aim is "mobile office" so phone functionallity takes a backseat to data transfer. in any case its a software thing and dosent really have any impact on the design at all (as all gprs modems i know of can do voice and voice can do gprs))
in any case it appears that we have too many divergint factions here. its time for me to decide very specifically what the motivation and aim is and as a sneak peak i will say mobile office again
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what I have now (though it clearly needs better integration--mea culpa) is a cell plan for a flat fee plus a data plan over the phone for an additional flat fee. It all works on a standard (north america +world triband atm) gsm phone using a sim card.
It would be very cool if the PP could handle phone and data over gsm and made use of my sim card. This would get me down to 1 device, or 1 device plus headset.
I would be ok with using either my voq or my nokia 6310 or other such gsm phone as a phone + modem for the PP. Possibly the need for the PP to access radio frequencies worldwide might dictate this approach. i don't know.
Maybe it would be better, in a large sense, to put energy into software that talks to cell phones and cell phones as modems rather than making hardware to replace the phones. I can go either way, so long as I can get things to actually connect (I need to spend more time on the voq stuff...and my isp tech support people have no clue at all about connection info at their end).
I guess, as usual, I'd suggest that making the PP the best pocket workstation possible should be the priority, and the other stuff (phone and modem) should be done in a way that conforms to, rather than distorts, the primary goal. However, at the very least, good connectivity software might end up becoming an issue...
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In terms of licensing stacks etc. . This is probably slightly illegal. XD (Unless you own a Universal aswell) But if you used the same hardware as in the Uni for the Modem/phone, and I mean EXACTLY the same Ram/Rom chip, processor and chipset. . If Universal Linux gets phone support, so will the PP. . just a thought. Because, You could UPLOAD THE HTC PHONE ROM!
I'm just not going to make comments about hardware design any more, You guys are all on a totally different wavelength to me.
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In terms of licensing stacks etc. . This is probably slightly illegal. XD (Unless you own a Universal aswell) But if you used the same hardware as in the Uni for the Modem/phone, and I mean EXACTLY the same Ram/Rom chip, processor and chipset. . If Universal Linux gets phone support, so will the PP. . just a thought. Because, You could UPLOAD THE HTC PHONE ROM!
I'm just not going to make comments about hardware design any more, You guys are all on a totally different wavelength to me.
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.....which brings us back to the good cellphone connection software and leaving the gsm to the phone, rather than as a part of the PP, right?
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well the funny thing is that the phone on the PP would look exactly like any other phone you can throw at it, wethier it be over bluetooth or usb. the only thing that is diffrent is how the audio is routed
if it comes down to it i guess the order i would want to see implemented (for a work station) is buetooth, wifi, gsm simply because the bluetooth allows a gsm connection and can be made to do tcp/ip. at a minimum i would like to see wifi and bluetooth
i am starting to change my mind on modules a bit, after looking at the size of some i am starting to like the idea a bit more, the only real problem i have with them is the hieght which at this point in time could become a factor to consider
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- I'm with adf ... camera is a lark. My current phone takes pictures and I never use it, except for the picture thing when someone calls (grin)...
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Yeah i find it handy every now and again (i finally got a phone with a camera, because i dont have a camera) but i think it will most likly be dropped
i still want to include the pinout for an image sensor however as there are a couple of trics you can do with it if you are creative
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http://www.cieonline.co.uk/cie2/articlen.a...d=1486&id=15639 (http://www.cieonline.co.uk/cie2/articlen.asp?pid=1486&id=15639)
"Ultra low power graphics and co-processor
Silicon Motion is continuing to expand its mobile graphics product line with the introduction of the SM502, available in the UK from Sabre Advanced Microelectronics.
The SM502 is an enhanced version of the SM501, with increased 2D and video acceleration performance and ultra low power consumption for resolutions up to 1280 x1024. It has a flexible bus interface supporting a direct connection to 32-bit embedded CPUs or PCI 33/66, and dual ZV port with ITU656 support for multiple data stream capture and real-time display and colour space conversion capability.
Other key features include a programmable panel clock (PCLK) for frequency customisation to support standard and non-standard panel timings; integrated I/O; 0 or 8MB integrated memory; and LCD, CRT or TV support with flexible display configurations.
The SM502 is pin-to-pin and software backwards compatible with the SM501.
Sabre
www.sabreadv.com
Silicon Motion
www.siliconmotion.com"
it hasn't appeared on SM's website yet.
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How about this display?
7" TFT at 720 x 480
http://www.johnlewis.com/Audio+and+TV/Came...67/Product.aspx (http://www.johnlewis.com/Audio+and+TV/Cameras+and+Camcorders/Cameras+and+Camcorders/Photo+Frames/819/230404067/Product.aspx)
it'd be nice to know what the actual display module inside is, but since we know the finished product is GBP170 it means it should be possible to buy the display for maybe GBP80?
has anyone identified whether its possible to buy the display from a Nokia N800 as a separate module for a reasonable price?
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i just managed to pick up a sl-6000 for a good price (237 USD ) and the 4" screen on that is about the max i would want to go. maybe a 5" widescreen format but no way a 7" screen.
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Here is a new chip(set) from Broadcom that integrates BT and 802.11a/b/g, and even FM radio! Unfortunately, I think Broadcom is one of those Linux hostile manufacturers.
Broadcom Combo Chipset (http://www.broadcom.com/products/Bluetooth/Bluetooth-RF-Silicon-and-Software-Solutions/BCM4325)
And, here is the equivalent from TI.. TI's also supports 802.11n
TI Combo Chipset (http://focus.ti.com/general/docs/wtbu/wtbuproductcontent.tsp?templateId=6123&navigationId=12762&contentId=29993)
Bill
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those chips look great however both are linux hostile companies and will only ship in large quantityies ot OEMs
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try to just get a datasheet for any of thier parts it is nearly impossible.
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so as promisedi am designing the power supply at the moment however some other chips poped up that could be nice
Return of the finger print reader: http://www.atmel.com/dyn/products/devices.asp?family_id=609 (http://www.atmel.com/dyn/products/devices.asp?family_id=609)
allows for psedo mouse support (its basically a laser mouse with a wierd sensor)
anyway back to power, at the moment i am looking at getting a power supervisor, the davantage of these things is they pack alot of diffrent power regulatiors for diffrent pourposes, they are small and can be heat sinked eaisly and they normally pack extra goodies (the freescale one has audio in and out, a RTC, power on at certin times of day, lithium ion charger and a USB PHY that supports client and host, but requires an NDA so it wont happen )
the design spec at the moment is between 5v to 18v input, if you dont want to care about polarity then i could add a rectifier however most chargers are "standard" and use the same polarity and the regulator is just waste heat and board space, if you dont trust yourself to get the right charger then charge over usb.
current wise i am looking at at least one chaneel that can do 1A @ 5v for USB, for the rest of the support circutry i am unsure, it depends how i partion the devices however there will most likly be a .5A for the cpu and .4 for the RAM with .15A for several of the extra chips (ie audio, bluetooth). i will make sure wifi gets the power it needs
i will try to give each subsystem its own regulator (the chips i am looking at are 7 channel) so that you can fully turn off any subsystem you are not using (audio comes to mind)
one thing i may be able to swing is a proximity detcetor for the keyboard, using the backlight itself, LEDs can be used as solar cells, yada yada yada, look on hackaday.com for more details
for refrence i like the natinol semi LP3941A, it does the full LED driver, I2C programability and has backup battery support as well as Liion charging and its 11 channel !!!! (http://www.national.com/pf/LP/LP3941.html)
one thing that has come up is that this will be mainly a 3v system, so any I2C connections on board will be 3v, however i may be able to swing it to the 5v usb line to make them 5v, not really much of a problem due to the nature of the bus but it could play havoc if you dont get the voltage you were expecting (meeats TTL requirements but not cmos off of the top of my head or the other way around)
the natinol has a problem in that it cant go above 5.5v so it would be a 2 chip solution (not really a problem, it only means i need to put an extra chip between the power plug and this thing so that regulator would be off most of the time)
apart from that the natinol semi chip is rock solid and requires little in the way of extra parts, 4 ar required, then one capacitor per Vout, so its safe to say this part is done
check the next post for whats next
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ok i decided to lump a couple of things into this next section, a USB PHY because its easy, the DDR RAM because its a JDEC standard, so all ddr ram chips of the same capacity use the same pinout (and theni can match it to the power supervisor), look at the CPu and what it needs and thats it
after that its flash (im looking at samsung) buletooth, wifi then the phone part
if i forgot somthing please post, im having a mental itch that i cant place
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Ok found this from cypress: http://www.cypress.com/portal/server.pt?sp...l&showall=false (http://www.cypress.com/portal/server.pt?space=CommunityPage&control=SetCommunity&CommunityID=209&PageID=215&gid=9&fid=285&category=All&showall=false)
its a usb transreciver (PHY) that we need for all off board comms (ie OTG or USB Host)
ddr ram is fine, its a 1.8v chipset witha max power disipation of 1W (basically if the cip is fried), and 150ma max current draw (270mW max under normal conditions)
as for the power budget, at the moment i am working on 4.1v @ 2000maH so 8.2W times that by the effcincy of the power supervisor (90%) and we get 7.38W, thats a handy figure to know however what is more intresting is the 8.2W rating, it allows us to detirmine runtime
8.2/<total board current draw> = runtime in hours
so if we had 4 ram chips (256MB of RAM) the battery could power the ram for 8 hours aprox (8.2/(270*4) ~ 8 hours)
cant find the cpu current draw anywhere (quite bizare that they wouldnt mention that) but keep in mind all my calcs are for Maximum current draw or worst case senario (ie like a c1000 @ 624Mhz playing moives)
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and they normally pack extra goodies (the freescale one has audio in and out, a RTC, power on at certin times of day, lithium ion charger and a USB PHY that supports client and host, but requires an NDA so it wont happen )
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don't entirely write off the chip - the NDA might only be temporary if it's freshly out, as they may simply want to track who's trying to use it to ensure that any changes to the device can be tracked by customers.
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well considering the imx already has a RTC built in its mainly tho transreciver and the audio stuff which is easy to cover elsewhere
natinol semi also offering pricing and samples also pushes it up as well
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- Could we bump the battery capacity or is 2Ah all there's space for?
- The cypress.com thing says USB is suspended while on battery. Can that be right? What's the point of having a connector that's unusable when it's not plugged in? Or do you have some razzle-dazzle to address that and I'm simply not understanding?
- That power chip looks spiff. And less than three bucks per. Sweet!...
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i had an idea or two to put a large battery in there and add more capacity by having a thin teminal and a unit with no display connected by somthing wireless.
that way you only deal with the thinner client that i suppose could charge off the main unit so it only needs a stardard battery (when not in use doc it) and have the other unit as a 3d arrangement of boards (ie common bus, just buy the modules you want) so you can pack it with any IO options you want or as much storage as you want
just keep that werever handy. i liked this idea because it then becomes a central store for your files, if you can connect you PC to it then it would charge but give you acsess to your docs or if you had X set up then you could login and run your apps more securly
however i dont think people would like that idea, but to me its like a bluetooth headset and a mobile, except its not a voice thin terminal
not sure about the usb thing, i didnt qutie catch the drift of that. can you reexplain it (i will take a look at it again latter, been awhile scince i slept)
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(USB is in suspend mode when the handheld is being powered from the battery)
- This appears on the page you link to above, about they cypress USB module. Of course it has the lowest power consumption in the industry ... it's turn off unless it's plugged in! (grin) I haven't read the data sheet for clarification on that, though.
a thin teminal and a unit with no display connected by somthing wireless
- I'd be against this because I don't trust wireless to be secure. If it is secure, too much of the precious resources (power, etc) are consumed enabling that security, and reducing available bandwidth, tanking response time. I'm not against it from an ergonometric perspective, and it sounds pretty cool otherwise...
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but why would you want the usb module to be on if its not in use?
i dont belive in encryption in the lower OSI layers. i dont know how much it will chew into the power budget but i do know it wont reduce bandwidth. it still needs work but all tehes ideas are partof a larger one to basically make computers "wearable" and make them disappear
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USB: The specs made it look like the unit is offline if not plugged into mains, as opposed to not plugged into an USB device. I don't see the utility of having an USB that won't work unless the PP is plugged into the wall.
WIRELESS: I don't see how one could secure comm amongst a distributed wearable system without putting the encryption at a pretty low level. I'm all for preventing random sniffing from seeing what's on my display or accessing my storage. There's too much potential for abuse if things aren't locked down.
- I would also think the transmitters would take more power to drive than wires, further penalizing battery life.
- I don't see the win here, other than the "cool" factor. Or am I missing something?
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Fujitsu E-Paper Display (http://www.fujitsu.com/global/news/pr/archives/month/2005/20050713-01.html)
This would be so cool to use, if it was available.
Could you imagine using something like it for the keyboard keys... When you press the Shift key the keyboard would adjust to show the proper characters, or even the FN key or Alt.
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wireless is good because its convinient, but i do like high bandwidth wires (and low latency)
ideal world would be a bat belt design with extendable cables and wireless for everything else. say an apen wifi acsess point so you can do public file serving and vpn acsess for any of teh real services (might as well just bridge the ethernet and wifi together then bring up the ip on the bridge connection, solves some problems and creates a copule more)
i really must dig up my notes on the design plan for the software layout
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Fujitsu E-Paper Display (http://www.fujitsu.com/global/news/pr/archives/month/2005/20050713-01.html)
This would be so cool to use, if it was available.
Could you imagine using something like it for the keyboard keys... When you press the Shift key the keyboard would adjust to show the proper characters, or even the FN key or Alt.
[div align=\"right\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a][/div] (http://index.php?act=findpost&pid=163919\")
Here's something that looks cool.. Unfortunately, color E-Paper besides being a nonproduct at this time, has a very slow refresh rate.
[a href=\"http://inventables.com/Product/ConceptStudio.asp?i=1&t=9]Origami DVD Player[/url]
Origami Cell Phone (http://inventables.com/Product/ConceptStudio.asp?i=5&t=3)
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looked at this thread for some refrence material and did some rechecking of chips
looks like that linear devices chip (that dose usb and inpu power handeleing) fits well with a uC supivisor controller chip (ok not really a suporvisor chip but it does have programable outputs which is what i want)
for ref:
http://www.linear.com/pc/productDetail.jsp...78,C1089,P21672 (http://www.linear.com/pc/productDetail.jsp?navId=H0,C1,C1003,C1037,C1078,C1089,P21672)
http://www.freescale.com/webapp/sps/site/p...p?code=MPC18730 (http://www.freescale.com/webapp/sps/site/prod_summary.jsp?code=MPC18730)
that takes care of any to all power problems i have at the moment, has a tiny part count (less than 20 passives in total) and is fairly flexible, only problem i see is making sure the correct voltage is avalible on boot, reading the docs now. perhaps it can be hard coded otherwise i will chuck a pic in there (planing to anyway)
the atmel fingerprint reader looks good as well, acts as a mouse which is a handy feature, know i am undecidede about this but the fact that it could be used as a mouse makes it more useful, and it defnattly is good as a quick unlock feautre
ref:
http://www.atmel.com/dyn/products/product_...sp?part_id=3609 (http://www.atmel.com/dyn/products/product_card.asp?part_id=3609)
had another look at the i.mx31 flash interface and the good news is that it can do more than 2GB of ram. i discovered it dosent map it into main mem but instead you make a request to the nand controller and then puts the page you want in the 2K of sram designated as the buffer, it says glueless up to 2GB so it shouldnt be too hard to extend that for those who want it
as for audio the micronos stuff is good. but it dosent state how to get them
ref:
http://www.micronas.com/products/by_functi...tion/index.html (http://www.micronas.com/products/by_function/map_44_460xa/product_information/index.html)
http://www.micronas.com/products/by_functi...tion/index.html (http://www.micronas.com/products/by_function/map_54_560xm%2C_map_44_460xm/product_information/index.html)
i think the big win is the power stuff,both chips are avalible as samples and you can buy them direct from manufaturer, so far total projected cost for the power subsytem is about $10USD
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great, so when can I buy a PP?
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According to the original timescale, about 9 months ago?
Lets be honest here, DB. No marketspeak, no insane ideas about wearable computing or wireless thin cleant crap.
The original idea was for:
An upgraded and open source Zaurus-3200 and HTC-Universal intermix. I've been using the Universal for a year now, and I'm perfectly happy with it. The linux port is reaching maturity - when we started this it couldn't use the screen.
I hate to say it, especially since I was one of the primary proponents around the inception; But this is NEVER going to get done. If anything does, it'll be nothing like the original idea which was to replace the Zaurus BEFORE they stopped making it, in order to encourage Sharp to actually upgrade the machine. That plan is over. There are readily available devices that cater for most of our individual needs, and with SDIO support partially available we might see that those last few are completed as well.
Wouldn't it be more sensible to stop wasting time on the vaporware dream of the "PocketPenguin" and work on something more constructive, like porting software to the devices we DO have?
Enough's enough, guys.
Graham Simpson.
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seems you had diffrent ideas to mine
btw i am a hardware guy not a software one, so its do this or do nothing
this past year or so i have been working non-stop in real life to the point where my doctors are telling me to take it easy, considering i have never been a healthy person (thats why i see the doctors so often) to begin with this is fairly major news to me. so now little by little i am dedicating time to some of my projects.
it will take time but i am doing this for me not you, there are a couple of free designs out there for arm bassed boards and they might fit what you want and need better
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Just to put at bay feelings of this sub forum's demise.... I bring forth this comentary :-)
Well, given the way things have changed, I'm assuming that the devices chosen back in '07 are no longer valid. Maybe this forum could be resurrected with some brainstorming about chips and chipsets available.
For instance, TI is coming out with some new stuff that integrates quite a lot of functionality an relatively few chips.
Maybe use th OMAP4 for the base processor, and the WiLink for the Bluetooth/WiFi/FM/GPS functionallity?
Screens really haven't progressed as much as one would like.. I'd really like to see a High speed color E-Paper.. But I dream too much I guess. The OLED based screens are starting to become more feasible though.
I'd still like to see a design that has the Cell radio be optional, and be change able easily. Can you say GSM or CDMA? Is there any way to merge the ideas presented here with the other people trying to accomplish very similar things?
Software wise.. Even though I'm a bit leary of either, maybe OpenMoko or Moblin/MeeGo/UbuntuMoblin? Don't really like RPM though.
The new Nokia looks like a nice device, but here in the US it's kind of a non starter because of the limited carriers available that are compatible with it.
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I have been wondering whether the netwalker PC-Z1 is hackable, I'm sure there must be more I/O and high speed data lines that would allow connection of more devices - USB/3G/wimax/GPS etc.
I do note that the openPandora seems to be finally shipping!
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I do note that the openPandora seems to be finally shipping!
Not yet. End of this month/early next month it should start.