Rockbox Player - Project to design and build a Free/Open hardware audio player

[casainho]

Very good news. I talked with Olimex and I got this answers:
me
> One last question, after a working prototype, would Olimex be interested
> in
> making PCBs, assembly and sell it as a gadget, like Olimex is doing with
> Open
> EEG project?

Olimex
yes, the project sounds interesting, so we can release such board

Olimex
> I think than it will be possible to release board with features like:
> AT91SAM9260 + LCDNOKIA6610 + 8MB flash + 8/16MB SDRAM + nRF24L01 wireless
> chip+audio CODEC+ Li-ion battery + charger
> + miniUSB + buttons
> in range EUR 100-120
Should we go with the L9260 dev board - 139.95 €?
http://www.olimex.com/dev/sam9-L9260.html

And with (SPI based) LCD - 13.52 €?
http://www.sparkfun.com/commerce/product_info.php?products_id=569

[spark]

yes. i guess that's the best option for v1.
i only hope the LCD has long term support or else our player will become headless.

[casainho]

yes. i guess that's the best option for v1.
i only hope the LCD has long term support or else our player will become headless.

Olimex is preparing a MOD-NOKIA6610 so I think that LCD will last on market. Olimex have some boards with it, so they have experience, good to help on make the final V1. Anyway, we will be working with dev board, they can help at deciding for any other LCD in the end.

So, what now? buy the boards and start coding?

I did buy the LCD because is not expensive. In the next 2 weeks I can buy the dev board.

I don't know nothing about hardware for programing nor debugging, can someone help? - put info here or on TWiki page?

[scharkalvin]

Is this the board?  US price seems to be $293

http://shop.gtronica.com/product_info.php?manufacturers_id=2&products_id=545

[spark]

So, what now? buy the boards and start coding?

you can buy the board if u inted to start porting right away. so far only 2 of us have approved for the processor. should we be getting more approvals especially from software experts here?

i still need to get TWiki permissions. will do so soon and update the hardware page.

[casainho]

I don't know if this is of any interest, but I just stumbled upon this product: http://www.buglabs.net/products

To pursue a cheap hardware, we should avoid that kind of things and get a custom, just as simple as we need. We should not generalize, we should focus e define what we want. I must say that a LCD+touchscreen looks very interesting, but that can be implemented later. If we work in mind to have hardware made by Olimex, there is no problem because they already have/are working on a dev board with that LCD+touchscreen.

Is this the board?  US price seems to be $293

http://shop.gtronica.com/product_info.php?manufacturers_id=2&products_id=545

See the prices directly and not on that site! Here:
http://www.olimex.com/dev/pricelist.html

So, what now? buy the boards and start coding?

you can buy the board if u inted to start porting right away. so far only 2 of us have approved for the processor. should we be getting more approvals especially from software experts here?

i still need to get TWiki permissions. will do so soon and update the hardware page.

Spark, we are just 3 interested. Me, you and scharkalvin. I think that software experts will say nothing in this message. We can ask direct questions to them at IRC.

I already talked with them about hardware:

Microcontroller: could be ARM7, but ARM9 should me the smart choice!;
RAM: for a flash player, 4 MB could be ok, 8 MB should be a smart choice specially If we will have album art - show jpeg, bmp files;
Flash memory: Have a connection for a flash card :-) and store Rockbox code and config files on 8 MB flash IC. 4 MB is +- the max size of actual Rockbox build.
The rest of hardware should be what we need/want. As we can see, that dev board surpass this minimum needs :-)

You have now TWiki permission, Mr. RogerQuadros :-)

[Bagder]

Assuming the L9260 board, where does the audio go?

[casainho]

Assuming the L9260 board, where does the audio go?

Audio goes trough I2C from MCU to TLV320AIC23 IC AUDIO STEREO CODEC and after to headphones :-) You can read more here:
http://www.rockbox.org/twiki/bin/view/Main/RockboxPlayerV1

[Bagder]

Yes, I know that you've planned to use that TI chip, but how is that codec gonna be used on the dev board?

[casainho]

Yes, I know that you've planned to use that TI chip, but how is that codec gonna be used on the dev board?

Well, we will just make a quick external board by hand. We can copy schematic, take ideas of sw and hw from others 2 projects that use that IC:
http://dspdap.sourceforge.net/hardware.html
http://www.mikrocontroller.net/articles/ARM_MP3/AAC_Player

Am I missing something? maybe I2C or SPI availability?

Nice to have Spark on team because he made DSPdap and worked with that IC ;-) :-)

[scharkalvin]

Have a look at some of the dev boards on this site.
Prices aren't bad....

http://www.embeddedarm.com/epc/prod_SBC.htm

[casainho]

Have a look at some of the dev boards on this site.
Prices aren't bad....

http://www.embeddedarm.com/epc/prod_SBC.htm

The cheap one is this, for 139$ (with RTC):
http://www.embeddedarm.com/epc/ts7400-spec-p.php

It's should be 70$ less than the: http://www.olimex.com/dev/sam9-L9260.html

[Bagder]

Obviously based on the Cirrus EP9302:

http://www.cirrus.com/en/products/pro/detail/P1066.html

[casainho]

Obviously based on the Cirrus EP9302:

http://www.cirrus.com/en/products/pro/detail/P1066.html

I would prefer to go with Atmel because of the all good things that were talked previously here about Atmel. Also with that board from Olimex, since after we can contact then to make and sell the "Rockbox Player as a gadget".
I also don't have much money. I would prefer to not use now expensive LCD's, wireless modules, buttons, batteries, etc... and just make a quick prototype, to try save money and because If we can port Rockbox to that ARM9 dev board, add another LCD, touchscreen or something other, is just a question of write software drivers! Guys at Olimex can design much more complex hardware dev boards than we need!

[spark]

Cirrus vs Atmel
Cirrus EP9302 is no better than AT91SAM9260. It does not have LCD i/f

see
http://www.cirrus.com/en/products/pro/areas/PA108.html#PA110_open

the ones with lcd i/f are in bga package. we might as well go with AT91SAM9261.

HP jack

Yes, I know that you've planned to use that TI chip, but how is that codec gonna be used on the dev board?

Well, we will just make a quick external board by hand. We can copy schematic, take ideas of sw and hw from others 2 projects that use that IC:
http://dspdap.sourceforge.net/hardware.html
http://www.mikrocontroller.net/articles/ARM_MP3/AAC_Player

Am I missing something? maybe I2C or SPI availability?

Nice to have Spark on team because he made DSPdap and worked with that IC ;-) :-)

oh no!! how could we miss the audio jack. we keep missing something or the other. audio is very crucial and should come bundled with the dev board.