[DEV] Hardware observations

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bcpk

Senior Member
Feb 11, 2010
460
19
Would it be possible to map it so that the volume keys work in their intended function when the home key is held?
 

DebauchedSloth

Senior Member
Jan 27, 2008
459
76
Would it be possible to map it so that the volume keys work in their intended function when the home key is held?

Can't see why not, but probably have to hack the source to do that. If Cyanogen were ported, wouldn't take long.

Buttons are pretty easily solved.
 

DebauchedSloth

Senior Member
Jan 27, 2008
459
76
One other data point, the partition structure of this device looks to be very similar - the same? - as other android devices.

I'm really short on time right now or I'd take a crack at getting Cyanogen up. Anyone else interested in hacking this?

Anyone already working on it?
 

Malk3rs

Member
Nov 30, 2010
18
3
Has anybody been thinking about how to get audio input support? I would love to be able to make voice calls or use skype on this thing. I know there isn't a mic built in but might it be possible to input one? Via headphone jack USB ala myTouch or Wing, or possibly on the potential bluetooth the NC might be hiding? I have ordered one but I am in Ecuador until February so I can't help with it sitting in my house in the states 2000 miles away.
 

pokey9000

Senior Member
Apr 17, 2007
767
396
Austin
Has anybody been thinking about how to get audio input support?

Maybe. I have a theory that some sort of audio is available on the proprietary jack. The floating voltage I see on 2 of the pins could be for mic phantom power. That's what this thread is for: hardware observations. Anyone else want to dig into it?
 

occip

Member
Feb 3, 2009
42
142
more information about hardware

Hi,

I dig in kallsyms and i find 3 things :
The accelerometer is a kxtf9
The touchscreen is a cytts ( www dot cypress dot com/?rID=44238)
The board seems to be named "boxer"

We need the panel and backlight drivers (and few gpios) and we wiil able to build a kernel from scratch. Other hardware is pretty common with the omap3 platform.

More to come ...

Occip
 

clockworx

Senior Member
Jun 7, 2009
191
22
Hi,

I dig in kallsyms and i find 3 things :
The accelerometer is a kxtf9
The touchscreen is a cytts ( www dot cypress dot com/?rID=44238)
The board seems to be named "boxer"

We need the panel and backlight drivers (and few gpios) and we wiil able to build a kernel from scratch. Other hardware is pretty common with the omap3 platform.

More to come ...

Occip

Did you see the ZDNet teardown? They had some closeups with chip numbers there, not sure if it might help.
 

aludal

Senior Member
Aug 17, 2010
315
12
Capitola CA
fineoils.blogspot.com
Interesting. I have the same GPU (OpenGL) information on my DroidX and yet the NC has "Frame buffers: unsupported" whereas its "supported" on DroidX.

Also noted that the Sensors section is fairly sparse (again in comparison to my DroidX)
It IS very interesting. If not to say scandalous. Unsupported Frame buffers may mean mediocre video playback and so-so UI snappiness (compared to what OpenMAX/Open GL ES 2.0 can offer when engaged in full.)
Obviously, the NC should be Cyanogened with the inclusion of all 2D/3D hardware accelerated drivers of Droid X/Droid 2, overclocked to 1....1.2 GHz ASAP.

Quadrant shows free ~100 MB out of ~500 MB, what is it? Must be B&N watchdogs protecting an NC user from using Amazon, Borders shops. Obviously, they don't work, so find and get rid of them, what are you guys waiting for? Do your local dump and clean your NC.

Framebuffer 'not supported' must be because exactly this reason: there's no memory allotment for FB big enough to keep several (4....16) fields/hires screens in cache for smooth hires video and UI transitions
 

TheTodFather

Senior Member
Aug 9, 2010
692
57
Huntsville
So why do you think BN would intentionally not use supported frame buffers?

Perhaps some of the reasons things are not optimize for performance is because they where trying to squeeze every ounce of battery life out of this? I thought that our cpu chip was designed for 1ghz, obviously not but my first thought was that this was designed as an ebook so like I said previous it is dumbed down for battery performance. So I would love to see, as all us, a ROM that will take advantage of all the potential. I'm most curious about what can be done with this cpu.
 
Last edited:

dahonda

Member
Aug 3, 2007
6
2
It's clear that the NC is based on TI's ebook reference platform. Given the amount of TI silicon in there I wouldn't be surprised if TI cut them a deal on this WiFi module such that it was cheaper than another company's WiFi-only one. It's not clear what's inside the module, and for all we know there is no BT/WiFi switch, which would make it impossible to run anything but WiFi.

As long as the module has a switch, it wouldn't make any sense for BN to hard-disable the bluetooth. There aren't that many connections just to get BT data, and I'm pretty sure the OMAP doesn't use those connections (1 GPIO, 1 UART) for anything. It would only cost a few PCB traces and maybe a pullup resistor or two, less than a couple of cents at scale.
After dig around with omap iplementation sites, this link look interesting. it appear that I ca not post URL link yet so here come the text.

omappedia.org/wiki/Wilink_Android#BT_in_Android_file_system
 

dahonda

Member
Aug 3, 2007
6
2
Update on poking in the dark for bluetooth driver.

So far I have compile the kernel using B&N release with bluetooth support and drop that kernel into the NC, it boot up but seem to be sluggish. However, even when the support for bluetooth is there but the hardware not available.

This lead to me from the new firmware.bin from Ti site into /system/etc/wifi to see if the NC will activate bluetooth hw from the firmware. the firmware is not working with NC, maybe the wireless tool that come with the NC customized for that specific NC firmware.bin Need to get more generic tools for activate wifi and BT

I have extract the raw internal disk and will overlay the kernel over that with tweek in rc.init to change the boot from internal drive to SD and will try again.

In one of the setting file in NC they do specify the BT control script to be /system/lib/firmware which follow the same guideline that Ti have. I have comb through the config file on NC and did not see any explicit setting that disable bluetooth, in fact they leave all those file default.
 
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pokey9000

Senior Member
Apr 17, 2007
767
396
Austin
So far I have compile the kernel using B&N release with bluetooth support and drop that kernel into the NC, it boot up but seem to be sluggish. However, even when the support for bluetooth is there but the hardware not available.

The TI BT is usually enabled by a GPIO. Did you build that in? How did you determine that the hardware wasn't available?
 

dahonda

Member
Aug 3, 2007
6
2
I mean the bt hardware not activated. I did include GPIO and uart support in kernel compile.

If you run dmesg in the shell it show all the device get activated at kernel boot. Gpio layer is there but no detection of Bluetooth. I will post the output of dmesg with custom kernel for review here.

Sent from my LogicPD Zoom2 using XDA App
 

wumpus11

Member
Nov 28, 2010
31
4
I have comb through the config file on NC and did not see any explicit setting that disable bluetooth, in fact they leave all those file default.

Just a thought, but have you looked at "Bluetooth TI wl127x rfkill power control via GPIO":

kernel/drivers/misc/wl127x-rfkill.c
kernel/include/linux/wl127x-rfkill.h
 

Analias

Member
Jun 3, 2010
6
0
Touchscreen sensitivity when plugged into charger

I'm wondering if anyone has seen this? When plugged into the wall charger my NC touchscreen starts acting weird. The keyboard starts showing multiple keys for each touch, all around the key I wanted. I also noticed that hovering over the screen eventually triggers a touch event. It only happens when I use the wall charger and not with the USB plugged into the PC.

I tried recalibrating, and that seemed to help a bit, but the problem still happens.



Not sent from my rooted Nook Color, although I could have :D
 

Homer_S_xda

Senior Member
Dec 5, 2010
427
61
I am seeing the same issue. I have to unplug it from USB before attempting the keyboard or it's like "I'm typing with dead people, very nimble dead people."

Homer
 

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    Post here about anything you might have found out about the internal NookColor hardware.

    Here's one to start with:

    Look at dmesg under Android. The wireless driver is TIWLAN, and a little Googling correlates the line "Chip ID is 0x4030111" with a WL1271, a TI part with 802.11b/g/n, bluetooth, and FM. However, as far as I can tell Bluetooth isn't anywhere to be seen in the Nook ROM.

    This document shows the typical setup for the WL1271, which is for WiFi to connect to the host through SDIO (one of the SD/SDIO/MMC interfaces) and Bluetooth and FM to go through a UART.
    1
    Agreed, Bluetooth FTW. We could be one kernal injection away from BT!
    1
    Update on poking in the dark for bluetooth driver.

    So far I have compile the kernel using B&N release with bluetooth support and drop that kernel into the NC, it boot up but seem to be sluggish. However, even when the support for bluetooth is there but the hardware not available.

    This lead to me from the new firmware.bin from Ti site into /system/etc/wifi to see if the NC will activate bluetooth hw from the firmware. the firmware is not working with NC, maybe the wireless tool that come with the NC customized for that specific NC firmware.bin Need to get more generic tools for activate wifi and BT

    I have extract the raw internal disk and will overlay the kernel over that with tweek in rc.init to change the boot from internal drive to SD and will try again.

    In one of the setting file in NC they do specify the BT control script to be /system/lib/firmware which follow the same guideline that Ti have. I have comb through the config file on NC and did not see any explicit setting that disable bluetooth, in fact they leave all those file default.
    1
    Actually, the droid incredible does not have n support. Check out the verizon page for it. The support evidently cannot be handled through a firmware update. If the hardware is not there, aka. the peripherals that handle the high speed communications, then software cannot do anything for it. I think.

    Wow.... aside from not being relevant, you are also wrong.
    http://phandroid.com/2010/06/20/fcc...oid-incredible-froyo-could-be-on-the-horizon/
    http://androidforums.com/htc-incredible/279459-did-inc-ever-get-802-11n.html

    And finally, i AM an incredible owner, and can connect as an N device on my router...