Gumstix Day 1

After several weeks my dad finally received his Gumstix + daughterboards.  Although the Gumstix is the size of chewing gum, it needs a massive daughterboard to do anything eg: power up.  In the photo is the Gumstix (not visible) + Ethernet/CF and Serial/USB daughterboards:

And here's my notes:

### Power
Has a very small power connector... smaller than the standard usb-hub power connector.
Requires a daughterboard eg: Ethernet/CF

### Serial/USB Daughterboard
Physically prevents MMC card.
Serial goes fast... 115200 8N1.
USB is v1 not v2.
Requires db9 to MiniDIN-8 cable (and usb<->serial for any modern computer).
Root password defaults to 'gumstix'.
Requires a gender bender to use usb devices.
Can power a single usb device, but requires a usb hub to be powered.
Stock firmware (non-bluetooth model) has:
- bluetooth driver, hcid but no hcitool.
- usb_storage driver, ext3 driver and fdisk but no mkfs.ext3.

### Ethernet/CF Daughterboard
Ethernet not enabled with stock firmware. Requires serial connection to configure.
Enabling ethernet is simple: modprobe smc91x ; ifconfig eth0 inet 192.168.3.1 up
Permanently enabling the ethernet by adding smc91x to /etc/modules has issues with negotiation on boot. Fix is to disable smc911x in /etc/modules.
Network configuration is /etc/network/interfaces and is similar to Debian. eth0 is auto and dhcp.
Stock firmware has:
- Dropbear the ssh daemon.
- Netcat (nc).
- ide-cs and relevant scsi drivers.

### Toolchain/Buildroot
Documented at http://docwiki.gumstix.org/Buildroot
Trunk doesn't seem to compile on OSX 10.5.
Compiles on Debian 4.0.

Arduino 101

The Arduino arrived this afternoon and I wanted to see it in action.  I used the simple servo control code from BionicArduino.  Here's some video action of it controlling an Evader RC car:

I still need to calibrate, wire in motor controller, etc etc.  But Arduino works as advertised.  Hoo-Yah!

Labjack U3 on OpenWRT

Installed OpenWRT on my Asus WLHDD to get some Kernel 2.6 action.  Cross compiled the Labjack U3 driver, library and examples.  Plugged it all in, and now I'm cooking with gas (mmm steak).

Control PS3 with a PS2 IR Remote

So I'm thinking my Harmony 659 should be able to control my Playstation3. I wasn't sure if the PS3 has an infrared receiver so I did a Google. Turns out it doesn't. Boo!

But then I read about using a PS2 infrared dongle with PS2->USB adapter. Had to tear my house apart to find my dongle and it's far from perfect, as only half a dozen buttons work and the power button isn't one of them. But it sure beats the hell out of using a gamepad to control DVD/BD playback. Shazam!

Upgraded HDD in PVR... fixed stuttering

I picked up a cheap second hand PVR (DS6200PVR) months back.   Turns out it's cheap because it randomly stutters/glitches video... usually during dramatic moments.  I've been watching the forum thread about it over on dtvforums about the problem.  I read that Topfield Support have firmware that fixes the issue.  But I decided to replace the HDD with a Seagate (Woo! Seagate!).  No more glitches.  Hoo-yah!

JackPilot is ugly. JackControl and JackPanel are pretty.

Was digging around jackosx cvs and I came across a bunch of quality gui stuff that doesn't seem to be in the usual jackosx download. Had to update the xcode settings to intel, then figure out the preference pane would only work as superuser, then install an included framework for the cool panel to work. I didn't get the menu agent working and it seems some graphics are bust. But checkout this awesome interface called JackPanel (similar to audio midi utility)...










And here's the PreferencePane, JackControl...

A2DP Working In OSX 10.4

My Ipod was stolen from my car in Sydney (with ipod a2dp adapter), and I broke my XDA II on a liftchair at the snow (with a2dp compatible bluetooth stack). I was without a device capable of transmitting A2DP (bluetooth stereo audio) to my rad headset - the Motorola DJ S805. Oh No!

So I revisited an opensource a2dp client for OSX over on David Connolly's blog. Like many moons ago, it only worked a little bit. But then I decided to try and tweak it and found a secret argument to the command line program.

Now it works perfectly! And I can aggregate audio from my PS3, 360 and Wii through my Mac Mini to my headset! Audio Extreme!

... Update: Leopard (10.5) supports stereo bluetooth!  Woo! But Jack broke and AVRCP isn't working. But still, Woo!