New Pic From Mweston (Rev5 Board)

[lulzfish]

There are a bunch of solder pads for components with no components on them! what do they do aaaaaargh

Most of them look like hacking points - TX2 and RX2 must have something to do with transmit / receive pairs on the EXT connector, there's the JTAG, there's the extra LED pads, and I don't know what SDA / SCL / GND is used for, but it looks like some kind of communication port that he left open and labelled clearly for hardware guys to use.

 

[WizardStan]

and I don't know what SDA / SCL / GND is used for, but it looks like some kind of communication port that he left open and labelled clearly for hardware guys to use.

Data, clock, and ground. They're used for I2C communication.

 

[nikkopt]

I've been trying to identify U13 for a long time (left side of the headphone socket). Can somebody agree with me that the bottom marking is AIZ?
Or can MWeston confirm that?

 

[mali]

^The number above those letters would be more important

 

[kingoddball]

Great photos.
I would like a 'change log' or something to know the differences other than solder pad sizes.

I would like to buy a board alone if theres ever a chance. (No interest in a beagle board)

 

[EvilDragon]

EDIT 2: and what's that unfinished looking part on the upper right?!

Looks like the insulation was scraped away to obtain a nice big 0V measurement point.

Nope, that's to connect the shielding of the LCD ribbon cable so that it passes CE

 

[trooper]

I've been trying to identify U13 for a long time (left side of the headphone socket). Can somebody agree with me that the bottom marking is AIZ?
Or can MWeston confirm that?

Looks to me like A/2 or possibly 1/2.

EDIT: With possibly TWJ written above it.

Trooper

 

[urjaman]

Comparing to http://gs113.photobucket.com/groups/n213/I0S2J7KION/?action=view&current=IMG_1037-1.jpg&newest=1&co=10 it looks like AIZ with N7C written above it but i'm 0.1% sure of that (I cant find a damn thing with that data, that is).

 

[nikkopt]

^The number above those letters would be more important

not really

Tks urjaman, it's really AIZ, therefore: http://focus.ti.com/lit/ds/symlink/tpa6110a2.pdf found.

Edit: ouch, server crash . Btw, i always knew it was the amp but not which one.

 

[puppydee]

So is this one of the mass produced boards? or has there been more changes? I thought the rev 4 boards where approved and being populated?

 

[rabidpoobear]

and I don't know what SDA / SCL / GND is used for, but it looks like some kind of communication port that he left open and labelled clearly for hardware guys to use.

Data, clock, and ground. They're used for I2C communication.

So the Wii extension items (Gyroscope - accelerometer) have been shown to be basically I2C devices. So can we crack open a Nunchuck and a motionplus and have a $35 6-axis positional tracking board / set of boards? It's pretty easy to do with an Arudino, just don't know anything about lowlevel devices on Linux. Do we have complete software control of I2C port so we can write a wrapper / device driver for this?

 

[Consequence_9]

and I don't know what SDA / SCL / GND is used for, but it looks like some kind of communication port that he left open and labelled clearly for hardware guys to use.

Data, clock, and ground. They're used for I2C communication.

So the Wii extension items (Gyroscope - accelerometer) have been shown to be basically I2C devices. So can we crack open a Nunchuck and a motionplus and have a $35 6-axis positional tracking board / set of boards? It's pretty easy to do with an Arudino, just don't know anything about lowlevel devices on Linux. Do we have complete software control of I2C port so we can write a wrapper / device driver for this?

*creams jeans*

 

[eridium]

I am always amazed at how cleanly he was able to fit everything into that small form factor. It's a solid layout.

Great engineering MWeston!

Two thumbs up!

 

[rabidpoobear]

So the Wii extension items (Gyroscope - accelerometer) have been shown to be basically I2C devices. So can we crack open a Nunchuck and a motionplus and have a $35 6-axis positional tracking board / set of boards? It's pretty easy to do with an Arudino, just don't know anything about lowlevel devices on Linux. Do we have complete software control of I2C port so we can write a wrapper / device driver for this?

*creams jeans*

Reference: nunchuck+motionplus i2c

Also we're not talking about the wii remote, you don't even need to involve it at all if we have i2c. we can directly connect the gyroscope and the accelerometer boards from the nunchuck and the motion plus to the pandora, and do not need a Wii remote at all. So even some knockoff DX nunchuck should work (some don't work correctly w/ motionplus though so make sure it's compatible.)

 

[mali]

^The number above those letters would be more important

not really

Tks urjaman, it's really AIZ, therefore: http://focus.ti.com/lit/ds/symlink/tpa6110a2.pdf found.

Edit: ouch, server crash . Btw, i always knew it was the amp but not which one.

Good find! Glad I was wrong

 

[Consequence_9]

So the Wii extension items (Gyroscope - accelerometer) have been shown to be basically I2C devices. So can we crack open a Nunchuck and a motionplus and have a $35 6-axis positional tracking board / set of boards? It's pretty easy to do with an Arudino, just don't know anything about lowlevel devices on Linux. Do we have complete software control of I2C port so we can write a wrapper / device driver for this?

*creams jeans*

Reference: nunchuck+motionplus i2c

Also we're not talking about the wii remote, you don't even need to involve it at all if we have i2c. we can directly connect the gyroscope and the accelerometer boards from the nunchuck and the motion plus to the pandora, and do not need a Wii remote at all. So even some knockoff DX nunchuck should work (some don't work correctly w/ motionplus though so make sure it's compatible.)

yup, just showin that there're cheap sources out there. There's a nunchuck alone for 7 bux on DX, but with the knock off motion-pluses you'd only save like 5 bux so ya may as well just get a genuine one. Humor me for a refresher: I know we've got I2C pads on the board, but are they connected to the ext port or would we have to make our own port?

 

[WizardStan]

yup, just showin that there're cheap sources out there. There's a nunchuck alone for 7 bux on DX, but with the knock off motion-pluses you'd only save like 5 bux so ya may as well just get a genuine one. Humor me for a refresher: I know we've got I2C pads on the board, but are they connected to the ext port or would we have to make our own port?

Unless MWeston has changed something, they're not connected to the EXT port.
Also, I believe it is connected to the nubs, so anything you attach to it you will have to ensure it behaves properly and uses a different address (I2C is serially addressable: host sends out a "device 1, what is your status?" command, device 1 responds, then host sends a "device 2, what is your status?", and device 2 responds, and so on)
And hopefully the nubs also behave properly, although if there are two of them on a single I2C, that pretty much guarantees they're behaving. On the other hand, the OMAP datasheet lists 3 I2C controllers, and this is labeled I2C3, so maybe the first two went to the nubs, and this one really is a free port.

 

[Bosbeetle]

from the blog

Update: Never content to leave a question unanswered, pandoratoday.de blogger Screeny dropped Michael Weston a line to ask what this 5th board revision is all about. The reply:

Hi,

There is not much to say. We made 105 rev4 boards. I tweaked a couple things and added a lot more test points, then called it rev5.

Rev5 is the paying customer’s board, rev4 [was] for testing and for devs to work with.

Michael

so just a lot of extra measuring points