Read This First Before Hacking/Modifying your Pandora

[Mithrildor]

Read this carefully before hacking.

-Hacking voids your warranty, please think if you want to keep your warranty before hacking.
-You even void your warranty when the hack is not completly done.
-Same for overvolting.
-OpenPandora ltd. may decide to not repair your Pandora when its hacked (and broken)
-Please note that if someone gives you instructions about how you need to perform a hack, they might be wrong, OpenPandora ltd takes no account for these failures, even not if the howto was posted by a member of the OpenPandora team.

Please get some knowlegde of the hardware before hacking:

Pandorawiki page about hacking (note that the info on this page might be wrong as everyone is able to edit the pages on the wiki.
Technical specs
Hardware documentation
Picture with all parts labelled

If anything goes wrong hacking:

-Dont do anything stupid trying to fix it.
-Make some pics of it and place them on the boards and let some experts look at them (You can recognize these experts by the Gp32x expert logo they have under their name on the boards)
-Contact OpenPandora ltd and give them these pics, they might want to take a look at your pandora and fix it.
-Experienced hackers only: Order replacement parts, contact OpenPandora ltd for this


This information is 100% unofficial and is to be replaced by an official topic

 

[LineOf7s]

How is this useful without a specific definition of what exactly "hacking" is (in the eyes of OpenPandora)?

 

[Asiyura]

(un)soldering things (from)to the board is hardware hacking and will void your warranty.

 

[multiplex]

How did this get pinned. <_<
I'm sorry, but this doesn't seem very useful, especially since it's a jumble of your opinion and sentences that look like you're speaking on behalf of the OP team when you aren't.

 

[danielliu88888]

If a mod has stickied this it probably means they don't see anything wrong with it. Mithrildor has been following the project pretty closely too.

 

[quote]

Why are you calling it 'Hacking'? I thought 'Modding' was the word used for modifying (!) hardware.

 

[mali]

^ You are right. Hacking sounds cooler though, maybe.
Regarding criticising Mithrildor: It's a pleasure to see one of the youngest members being so involved and active in the community work Thumbs up!

 

[peca]

^quote: Modding is about tuning design too. You can drill holes for air venting and this is mod and not void warranty. Hacking is more hardcore. Word "Hack" (AFAIK) comes from HW related field and is derived from attaching wires and probing here and there.

So in my point of view: Modding is more about changing plastics (design hacking - You may need order new case). Hacking is more about electronics (real hacking - You may need order new Pandora).

 

[Mithrildor]

@all criticism:

I dont see OP or any of you making a topic like this. Its better to have one till there is an official one so we dont get topics like:

"I broke my Pandora during hacking and OpenPandora says I voided my warranty, but I didnt know that hacking my Pandora would void my warranty, so I want new pandora"

@Mali:

Thanks

 

[multiplex]

I dont see OP or any of you making a topic like this. Its better to have one till there is an official one so we dont get topics like:

"I broke my Pandora during hacking and OpenPandora says I voided my warranty, but I didnt know that hacking my Pandora would void my warranty, so I want new pandora"

I'm sorry, but I can't see spreading potential misinformation as a good thing, even if you do err on the safe side. It's hard enough to sift the official statements from the speculation around here without going around posting pseudo-authoritative advice willy-nilly.

The links are good. Sourced facts are good. Warnings can be good, too. But I don't think you should make up sentences like "OpenPandora ltd takes no account for these failures" (while probably true (though s/account/responsibility)), when your guess is as good or bad as any other forum member's.

 

[mali]

I think we should put more emphasis on the fact that these are no official Open Pandora forums and everything said and done here is basically without blessing from OPT.

So basically it should be like I said in the other thread. Modding is for people who know what they are doing. If you fuck it up it's your own fault. OPT should have a standard warranty agreement with the customer at the time of purchase.

This agreement does not have to be renewed in a community driven forum.

Everybody presenting tutorials in this sub-forum should include a disclaimer that he is not responsible for damage if something goes wrong and that the mod _might_ void warranty. It's not needed to say it _will_ void the warranty as this is irrelevant on these boards and the Pandora owner _should know himself_ what voids warranty, as he has an agreement with OPT at the time of purchase.

If OPT didn't include a warranty agreement, it should be covered by standard laws, I suppose. But that's in responsibility of OPT to verify.

 

[Squidge]

Modding is about tuning design too. You can drill holes for air venting and this is mod and not void warranty.

You can drill holes for air venting and void the warranty too. For example, perhaps when you drill a hole you didn't remove the PCB first and shorted out some tracks.

Or perhaps your new ventilation causes dust buildup inside which causes a malfunction that wouldn't happen if the holes were not there. So your warranty is void again.

 

[peca]

You can drill holes for air venting and void the warranty too. For example, perhaps when you drill a hole you didn't remove the PCB first and shorted out some tracks.

This make me LOL :-D However there are such kins.

Or perhaps your new ventilation causes dust buildup inside which causes a malfunction that wouldn't happen if the holes were not there. So your warranty is void again.

OK, this looks reasonable, but till case not dust-proof, I don't get it as excuse. Only if there is direct coincidence, such as metal filings shorting circuit or so. Anyway my example: is just simile, is not official.

 

[Mithrildor]

I dont even remember putting modifying in my title.

 

[MDave]

In the Quick Start Guide that comes with the Pandora, it says 'Disassembling the Pandora will void its warranty.'

 

[Meany105]

this is from the OpenPandora FAQ

"Solder pads were designed into the PCB for "hacking" in extra internal hardware."

does this mean you can add stuff without voiding the warraty? note that they purposely designed it into the pandora

 

[Prometheus]

It means that they're there if you want to use them. However, as per MDave's post before yours, regarding what it says in the Quick Start Guide that's supplied with the machine, opening the unit will void the warranty.

 

[DaveC]

How is this useful without a specific definition of what exactly "hacking" is (in the eyes of OpenPandora)?

Anything that permanently changes the hardware of the Pandora is hacking and would void warantee.

Putting a sticker on the lid is not hacking but painting it pink is...

 

[FBnil]

Putting a sticker on the lid is not hacking but painting it pink is...

I didn't paint it... I just dipped it (for a very short time) in pink paint.

Most of my hacks were to get it working again (remove a grain of sand from behind the touchscreen, solve a purple screen, fix the nub, re-solder the shoulderbutton after the pandora survives a 1 m fall)
One mod I want to make is try to get the light of an old remotecontrol, then get some blinking codes from somewhere to have the Pandy turn off the television... turn off is 5 times a blink, so that should be fairly easy (can be done from shell scripts). For others, I guess I'll need C for sub second precision. But for now, I do not want to ruin the case...

 

[Swordfish II]

One mod I want to make is try to get the light of an old remotecontrol, then get some blinking codes from somewhere to have the Pandy turn off the television... turn off is 5 times a blink, so that should be fairly easy (can be done from shell scripts). For others, I guess I'll need C for sub second precision. But for now, I do not want to ruin the case...

I did this for my phone, if you look up my really old history you could see how I did it. But in brief I used the headphone jack as the power source (mine was built for my phone), and WAV or MP3 files encoded to mimic IR codes. You simply play the files and the IR transmitter does it's thing.