Ext Connector Source, Serial/tv-out

[nubie]

Edit: Success on serial cable, see lower posts.

I found some Cellphone data cables cheap here:
http://www.axshop.com/

I bought these two:

*This is the one you want*SAMSUNG E810/E818/P518/P510 USB-Data-Cable + Driver

This is just a straight through USB cable with the wrong pins
SAMSUNG E720/E728/E628/P738/P730+ USB-Data-Cable + Driver

and a USB extension A Male to Female and a mini mic for like $12-13 including shipping.

Just a thought if you wanted to make your own TV cable, they also sell a 5' S-video cord M-M you could cut one end off and solder to one of these data cables possibly.

I will report back here when I find out if they work with my GP2X.

 

[Empyre]

Always nice to see "To provide the lowest prices available to customers, all sales are final and no refund will be offered." on a website.

Especially when they doctor pictures of thier products too.

 

[slygamer]

And they only ship to the US.

 

[nubie]

And they only ship to the US.

​

Sorry, Washington State is pretty close to those of us on the west coast though.

And the prices are good.

 

[nubie]

Hi, I just got home and had a chance to check out those cables, I really wish I had a camera with a macro lens to take pictures.

I was wrong on the USB EXT side, it only has 5 pins total, and no room for more.

They are similarly wired in that they have one wire connected to to connectors on the EXT side of the cable. But the Serial one has 6 wires, and the USB style has four (possibly USB only??).

I can't say anything about whether the pins are actually connecting, but all I had to do to get the Serial style (SAMSUNG E810/E818/P518/P510 USB-Data-Cable + Driver) fit with only a light filing to get it past those "tabs" in the GP2X.

 

[nubie]

On the checkout of this: SAMSUNG E720/E728/E628/P738/P730+ USB-Data-Cable + Driver, I found that the 5 wires are running straight through the cord, at least they read out a 0Ω reading on the other side to the pins in the USB connector. Bad news for the GP2X, but good news if you needed a high-quality USB cable for some reason, like connecting Xbox controllers to your PC for instance.


On this one: SAMSUNG E810/E818/P518/P510 USB-Data-Cable + Driver Good news, All the pins are accounted for and there are PCB boards under the covers (which are removable with two philips-head screws) so we could modify it into a serial cable and re-enclose it in the shell.

This one also has a chip that appears to be a line-level chip (like MAX232 surface mount, and the PCB has all the pins leading to copper contact patches that are *labelled*) I don't recall any numbers on the chip, but I will be checking into it.

Edit: the copper patches were labelled DTS/RTS/Tx/Rx . . . Etc. I have high hopes.

I ordered another one for myself, at $5.24 what have you got to lose? I don't know how many more they have, they certiantly cost more than this on eBay.

The shipping is atrocious, presumably because their warehouse is stocked full of crap like this and they can't reach it. I was qouted that my order today would be shipping on the 18th, in 9 days from now. Shipping reaches my house in under a week from Washington state though, so I will have a backup if I toast this one.

Kudos to GP32z.com, they just got me a replacement GP2X for the one that crapped the firmware on me, I really like that it came pre-loaded with fw 1.2.1, I got the TV-out happening, but it is as crappy as can be, I am going to attempt filing down the very front of the GPH TV cable and maybe bending the clips in hopes of getting a secure connection, I might even resort to JB weld to build up one side and then file it down to get it to fit more snugly. I don't think it will come to that though, the cable fits firmly, just the pins aren't reaching their contacts.

 

[nubie]

I fixed the TV-Out cable that came from GP32z.com:

I fixed the TV-out!!

check it out, couldn't be simpler, picture won't budge now.

I haven't tried the sound, but the way I did it couldn't help but make all 24 pins connect solidly.

I don't know what would happen if I did just the paper bit without the filing, it might not work.

You probably need a file to do it my way. (a regular metal file, don't worry they should be cheap enough, or ask someone you know to borrow theirs, or use some sandpaper on a board.)

Just go click on the link already.

 

[nubie]

I am starting to hack into the cable now.

I have put these here for reference, the PCBs are both labeled, nice.

It looks like I will have to connect terminals 21 and 23 myself, but it should be simple enough. I don't know what the IC chip is for, I assume line level (max232), but I will be testing the voltage before I connect to my GP2X with it.

It seems like we can easily use this connector to make a custom PCB and get it soldered directly to the back of the terminals, then we could surface mount some connectors for USB, Jtag, Serial, and TV.

This is the stock e810 data cable from axshop.com

PC side (9-pin D sub) PCB labeled contacts with 14pin surface mount IC:

Red - VCC
White - R
Green - Txd
Yellow - DTR
Back Side of PCB:
Black - Ground
No Connect - DSR
No Connect - RTS
Blue - CTS



EXT side PCB pins connected
(all are available, just the PCB traces don't continue to the other pins):

Black - 2/12
White - 14
Blue - 20
Red - 22

Back side of PCB:
Yellow - 24 (goes to the only connection between the sides, and then reaches terminal 24)
Green - 13

Just for reference, these are the pins before I get into hacking up the cable. I don't have a camera.

Edit:first problem run into, according to these:
http://wiki.gp2x.org/wiki/EXT_Port
http://wiki.gp2x.org/wiki/USB_Host_BoB_Schematic

The numbers go backwards, my PCB states terminal 24 as the one they call 1.

I am inclined to believe the Samsung connector, but I guess it doesn't matter what we call it, as long as it works.

 

[nubie]

SUCCESS!!!

The connector found *Here* for $5.24 with shipping, is ALL that is required to make a serial cable.

It includes the DB9 for the PC side, the EXT connector with all 24 pins, and a PCB for each side, The PC side has the line-level (max232) AND all pins wired to labeled contact patches.

I got it connected and here is my out put:
(you can see where it hangs on boot until I removed the SD, they gotta fix that.)

U-Boot 1.0.0 (Nov 25 2005 - 22:51:36)                                    

U-Boot code: XXXXXXXXX -> XXXXXXXX  BSS: -> 03FA3048                                                  
DRAM Configuration:                  
Bank #0: 00100000 63 MB                      
Flash:  0 kB           
NANDrobing at 0x9c000000                         
Flash chip found:                
         Manufacturer ID: 0xEC, Chip ID: 0x76 (Samsung K9F1208 64Mb)                                                                   
1 flash chips found. Total nand_chip size: 64 MB                                               
Get Environment from NAND offset 0x70000 ...                                           
*** Warning - bad CRC, using default environment                                               

In:    serial            
Out:   serial            
Err:   serial            

SD found : SD Frequency is 12MHz                               
mmc_init_once 0              
(without MBR)            

### main_loop: bootcmd="nand read 0x1000000 0x80000 0x180000; bootm"                                                                   
Hit any key to stop autoboot:  0                               

NAND read: device 0 offset 0x80000, size 0x180000 ...  1572864 bytes read: OK                                                                            
## Booting image at 01000000 ...                               
   Image Name:   MMSP2 Linux Kernel                                  
   Created:      2006-01-07   7:46:08 UTC                                        
   Image Type:   ARM Linux Kernel Image (gzip compressed)                                                        
   Data Size:    837579 Bytes = 817.9 kB                                       
   Load Address: 00008000                        
   Entry Point:  00008000                        
   Verifying Checksum ... OK                           
   Uncompressing Kernel Image ... OK                                   

Starting kernel ...                  

Linux version 2.4.25 (root@localhost.localdomain) (gcc version 2.95.3 20010315 (                                                                               
release)) #2825 2006. 01. 07. (Åä) 16:44:27 KST                                              
CPU: Arm920Tid(wb) revision 0                            
Machine: MagicEye-MDK                    
Warning: bad configuration page, trying to continue                                                  
MP2520F FCLK: 199065600 Hz, M = 0x49 P = 1 S = 0                                               
MP2520F UCLK:  95846400 Hz, M = 0x60 P = 0 S = 2                                               
MP2520F ACLK: 147456000 Hz, M = 0x98 P = 0 S = 2                                               
MP2520F PCLK:  49766400 Hz                         
On node 0 totalpages: 8192                         
zone(0): 8192 pages.                   
zone(1): 0 pages.                
zone(2): 0 pages.                
Kernel command line: root=/dev/mtdblock3 rw                                          
Console: colour dummy device 80x30                                 
Calibrating delay loop... 99.32 BogoMIPS                                       
Memory: 32MB = 32MB total                        
Memory: 30200KB available (1091K code, 756K data, 280K init)                                                           
Dentry cache hash table entries: 4096 (order: 3, 32768 bytes)                                                            
Inode cache hash table entries: 2048 (order: 2, 16384 bytes)                                                           
Mount cache hash table entries: 512 (order: 0, 4096 bytes)                                                         
Buffer cache hash table entries: 1024 (order: 0, 4096 bytes)                                                           
Page-cache hash table entries: 8192 (order: 3, 32768 bytes)                                                          
CPU: Testing write buffer: pass                              
POSIX conformance testing by UNIFIX                                  
Linux NET4.0 for Linux 2.4                         
Based upon Swansea University Computer Society NET3.039                                                      
Starting kswapd              
Journalled Block Device driver loaded                                    
devfs: v1.12c (20020818) Richard Gooch (rgooch@atnf.csiro.au)                                                            
devfs: boot_options: 0x1                       
JFFS2 version 2.2. (NAND) © 2001-2003 Red Hat, Inc.                                                    
i2c-core.o: i2c core module version 2.6.1 (20010830)                                                   
i2c-dev.o: i2c /dev entries driver module version 2.6.1 (20010830)                                                                 
I2C: MMSP2 algorithm module loaded.                                  
<6>I2C: Adding MMSP2-I2C-Adapter.                                 
I2C: Successfully added bus                          
ttyS0 at MMIO 0xc0001200 (irq = 48) is a MMSP2                                             
ttyS1 at MMIO 0xc0001220 (irq = 52) is a MMSP2                                             
ttyS2 at MMIO 0xc0001240 (irq = 56) is a MMSP2                                             
IRQ_DISP Number = 0                  
Console: switching to colour frame buffer device 40x30                                                     
MMSP2 mmsp2_RGB0 framebuffer driver start                                        
MMSP2 mmsp2_RGB1 framebuffer driver start                                        
pty: 256 Unix98 ptys configured                              
MMSP2 DualCPU Interface Driver                             
MMSP2 Video Post Processor Driver                                
register device MMSP2 GPIO KEY OK                                 
MMSP2 battery check Driv                     
MMSP2 Real Time Clock driver                           
loop: loaded (max 8 devices)                           
ac97_codec: AC97 Audio codec, id: WML18 (Wolfson WM9711/9712)                                                            
mp2520f.c: Using NAND S/W ECC                            
NAND device: Manufacturer ID: 0xec, Chip ID: 0x76 (Samsung NAND 64MiB 3,3V 8-bit                                                                               
)
Creating 5 MTD partitions on "NAND 64MiB 3,3V 8-bit":                                                    
0x00000000-0x00080000 : "Bootloader"                                   
0x00080000-0x000a0000 : "Param"                              
0x000a0000-0x001a0000 : "Kernel"                               
0x001a0000-0x019a0000 : "Filesystem"                                   
0x019a0000-0x04000000 : "Extend"                               
usb.c: registered new driver hub                               
Linux video capture interfa                        
CX25874 ID = c3              
MMC/SD Slot initialized                      
NetWinder Floating Point Emulator V0.97 (double precision)                                                         
FAT: bogus logical sector size 65535                                   
FAT: bogus logical sector size 65535                                   
MMC/SD Card Detected                   
Partition check:               
mmcsda:SDI time out!!                     
###[mmcsd_slot_mmsp2.c:305]->sdi_interrupt:wake_up                                                 
CMD17 failed, ret = -5                     
end_request: I/O error, dev 3c:00 (mmcsd), sector 0                                                  
SDI time out!!             
###[mmcsd_slot_mmsp2.c:305]->sdi_interrupt:wake_up                                                 
jffs2_scan_eraseblock(): Node at 0x015773fc {0x1985, 0xe002, 0xe0021985) has inv                                                                               
alid CRC 0x00000044 (calculated 0xd7cd6a7b)                                          
VFS: Mounted root (jffs2 filesystem).                                    
Mounted devfs on /dev                    
Freeing init memory: 280K                        
CMD17 failed, ret = -5                     
end_request: I/O error, dev 3c:00 (mmcsd), sector 2                                                  
SDI time out!!             
###[mmcsd_slot_mmsp2.c:305]->sdi_interrupt:wake_up                                                 
SDI time out!!             
###[mmcsd_slot_mmsp2.c:305]->sdi_interrupt:wake_up                                                 
CMD17 failed, ret = -5                     
end_request: I/O error, dev 3c:00 (mmcsd), sector 4                                                  
SDI time out!!             
###[mmcsd_slot_mmsp2.c:305]->sdi_interrupt:wake_up                                                 
SDI time out!!             
###[mmcsd_slot_mmsp2.c:305]                        
CMD17 failed, ret = -5                     
end_request: I/O error, dev 3c:00 (mmcsd), sector 6                                                  
SDI time out!!             
###[mmcsd_slot_mmsp2.c:305]->sdi_interrupt:wake_up                                                 
SDI time out!!             
###[mmcsd_slot_mmsp2.c:305]->sdi_interrupt:wake_up                                                 
CMD17 failed, ret = -5                     
end_request: I/O error, dev 3c:00 (mmcsd), sector 0                                                  
SDI time out!!             
###[mmcsd_slot_mmsp2.c:305]->sdi_interrupt:wake_up                                                 
SDI time out!!             
###[mmcsd_slot_mmsp2.c:305]->sdi_interrupt:wake_up                                                 
MMC/SD card ejected                  
CMD17 failed, ret = -19                      
end_request: I/O error, dev 3c:00 (mmcsd), sector 2                                                  
CMD17 failed, ret = -19                      
end_request: I/O error, dev 3c:00 (mmcsd), sector 4                                                  
CMD17 failed, ret = -19                      
end_request: I/O error, dev 3c:00 (mmcsd), sector 6                                                  
unable to read partition table                             
Register SD: 59MB                
INIT:  version 2.84 booting                          
Started device management daemon v1.3.25 for /dev                                                 
Mount proc and devpts filesystem                               
Expand RAM file system image                           
INIT: Entering runlevel: 3                         
Last login: Thu Jan  1 00:00:14 on ttyS0                                       
-t and -C not supported                      
-t and -C not supported                      
-t and -C not supported                      
mount: Mounting /dev/discs/disc0/part1 on /mnt/sd failed: No such file or direct                                                                               
ory  
rm: cannot remove `/mnt/sd/gp2xboot.img': No such file or directory                                                                  
rm: cannot remove `/mnt/sd/gp2xkernel.img': No such file or directory                                                                    
rm: cannot remove `/mnt/sd/gp2xfile.img': No such file or directory                                                                  
SDL_SYS_JoystickInit       

 

[nubie]

Just to keep everything in one spot, here is a PM I sent about how to get this wired up, feedback here would be appreciated:


Thanks for your interest, I sold my GP2X with the cable, unfortunately before I got pics.

To wire it up, if you got the same one I got, then the labels on the circuit board that plugs into the GP2X are backwards.

I.E. :

The pin Labeled 24 is really pin 1, and on to the end, where the pin labeled 2 is really 23, *according to the wiki*.

So, find the pins labeled 1, 2, 3, and 4 on the circuit board that plugs into the GP2X (only 2 is labeled if I recall correctly), these are *actually* pins 24, 23, 22, and 21, in that order.

The first one on that side will be pin 1 according to the board (to reduce confusion I will now only use the pinouts printed on the circuit board)

So on the side of the board with the "2" pin, those are the even side, and the odd side is on the back.

I start at "pin 1" on the "odd" side and connect as follows, Ground (black), Tx (Green), and then power (Vcc, RED), on the other side I hook up the Rx line to the solder pad labeled 2.

Your colors may differ, so look under the shell on the PC because the wires are labeled, Vcc(power), Gnd, Tx, and Rx, on the board there.

If you get Tx and Rx backwards, don't worry, just switch them under the PC side shell, the solder pads there are so much easier to swap.

I would be very careful with those pins because they aren't connected and can wiggle and touch if the solder is a big blob, get good at soldering or have a friend who is experienced in soldered-in modchips do it.

Since the line-level is only what the GP2X itself puts out, the only real harm from touching should be a permanently high or low signal (no communication), unless you manage to short out the power to the ground, (NOT recommended). Keep the Red and Black wires seperate when the GP2X is on.