KermMartian wrote:
that's you're


wrote:
I've got an old Creative Zen Nano 512mb music player that can be sacrificed.


Hehe I sacrificed my old Creative NuVo 128MB MP3 player learning how to use a hot air gun for SMD soldering Very Happy It still works, but it's a mess.
Awesome.

Would this happen to be the SilverLink: Question

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=400081221800&fromMakeTrack=true&ssPageName=VIP:watchlink:top:en
BigBubbaX wrote:
That is indeed it, good luck.
Phew, it's done... Graphing Calculator

I couldn't find/get a silver-link so I left out the programming option.
Ended up just going with the mp3 player, it's the most usable function to me.

Overall it turned out pretty well, considering I cracked the screen, fried the power button, and corrupted the memory Laughing....

<edit>The mp3 player's screen is broken, but still works alright... Confused Very Happy

I left a stand-by camera running while working, but it mostly got the boring stuff (me desperately trying to get the mp3 guts to fit, man it didn't seem like it would be that hard in concept Rolling Eyes ) and when I started actually soldering the 30-gauge wire, it ran out of tape... Surprised

Got some nice pics nonetheless, I plan to make a Youtube vid and a small webpage or two....

Thanks for the support, suggestions, etc. Smile
Cool! If you have a spare screen, some 30awg and 24awg wire, and a steady hand with a soldering iron, you can swap screens and replace the ribbon cable with 8 or 10 wires, but if not then you're pretty much SOL on the screen. Sad At any rate, can't wait to see the pictures and video clips that you come up with.
I've fixed most of the original quirks (screen doesn't show that it's been sliced, made more room for the controls, replaced the faulty power button...)

but now the player randomly turns off... Sad
The player sometimes doesn't get through boot, when it does it only stays on for < a minute. And it turns off unintentionally, because none of the settings are saved from one random shutdown to turning it back on.

I blamed a bad joint on the power line, but after opening the case and fiddling with the wires and not getting a reaction (EX: when wires are tensed at the joint that I soldered, it turns off)...
Now I don't know what's up.

Does anyone have a situational idea? (like, mp3 players use more energy while booting, and it shuts off during boot a lot, so there isn't enough power...)

Current thoughts:
-Its the pressure of the case and the calc pcb making some joint not work (not as likely anymore, I open the case and took the pressure off and nothing changed...)
-I messed up some other component while soldering (yeah, probably)
-The power line
-Bad Joo-Joo?

Everything else still works, I can use both the calc and the player at the same time without any obvious problems.

I'll get some pics and vids of the problem and post back later.
Thanks in advance!!! Very Happy
Since you mentioned all the power stuff, did you try putting in a fresh set of AAAs to see what would happen? Don't forget that if you're using rechargeables, you're getting 4.8V instead of the 6.0V from alkalines.
Hmmm. Changing the batteries didn't fix the problem, but it did change it.

I don't have any in-package new batteries, but a bunch that are near full and some rechargeable ones (I haven't used the rechargeables yet)

Each different battery effects how the player turns off. On one battery it would get all the way into the music, and shutdown during a later song. Another just caused the screen to flicker instead of hanging halfway through boot. and one must have been dead, because nothing happened. Confused

TGIFriday so I'll have some time to work this afternoon. I'm going back to the idea of a bad power wire, so I guess I'll get two fresh lines, solder them to the power terminals and see if anything changes...

oh, and there's a youtube video consisting of the setup and me rambling on in the background...
The intro is confusing, it's the beginning I made for the finished vid plus a Bsod...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TYv_XaDuBgU
Try hooking up the MP3 player to a separate AAA battery (not one of the 4 being used by the calculator) and see if it works any better.
@Ultimate Dev'r
I've tried sever different batteries including rechargeable ones...
Thanks though!
BigBubbaX wrote:
@Ultimate Dev'r
I've tried sever different batteries including rechargeable ones...
Thanks though!


But did you hook it up to a battery independent of the calc's batteries while it was installed in the back of your calc?
Ah, Gotcha. No, I haven't.

I'm running ref for a robotics tournament for most of this weekend, I'll try to find some time Sunday to keep trouble-shooting.

<edit>
Spent 17 hours total working at the competition, 8 setting up Friday, and 9 being a referee Saturday. Saw some cool bots!
</edit>


Thanks!
Also, don't forget to release any hot (+6V) rails between the two sections before you connect the independent source, otherwise you might have some nastiness from unexpected potential difference across components.
Laughing Huge sigh of relief.....

Fixed it. I'll edit this post when I get the details together!

(It's software AND hardware related, I didn't see that one coming!)
BigBubbaX wrote:
0x5 Huge sigh of relief.....

Fixed it. I'll edit this post when I get the details together!

(It's software AND hardware related, I didn't see that one coming!)
Huzzah! So does that mean that everything's working properly, now that you've fixed the screen? In addition, this post means you can bump instead of needing to edit once you get those details together. Wink
So far (<20 mins testing) it's working flawlessly!

What happened:
-I replaced the power lines and used the same battery.
-It worked fine for about 2 mins, and then the original problems popped back up.
-Then I noticed that it most certainly turned off when I advanced a track or two or hit the forward button the the turn wheel in general.
-This got me thinking about memory. I figured that advancing a track means that it has to read from the memory chip. And a derailed track of though highlighted that it usually shuts down during fairly heavy memory reading tasks.
-After a review of the two little black chips (one is memory, the other a processor, but I can't tell them apart) I found an infinitesimally small piece of solder between two wires off of one (probably shorting it). An exacto knife got it out fairly well.
-The problems didn't stop....
-I was about to reformat it (fat32 or fat) when I remembered an online post that said to format Zens in fat16, which wasn't an option in the uber-limited microsoft format utility.
-Went online Googling (it's a word, trust me) and eventually ended up with a ton of Creative Zen downloads. While searching I got a post about firmware for Zens, didn't know that there were different firmwares so I checked mine. Turns out, it had that very first firmware made for that mp3 player...
-Decided to update the firmware. Didn't work, got an error.
-Eventually found this:
http://www.mycreativefansite.com/2007/08/solution-semaphore-timeout-issue-on-zen.html#comment-form
-That fixed it, and once the new firmware was on it, everything's worked just fine.

My system for testing it it to turn the volume up to max and listen to all of the songs loop about four times. Smile

A side-effect: it also fixed the volume up button, which was a bit sluggish before...

Shew, that's about it!

Thanks for the tips, if you guys hadn't brought it up and given advice I wouldn't have gotten it fixed.

EDIT:

New theory:

I finished testing the music player, it worked fine.
But I replaced the front of the calculator ontop, it returned to the same buggy state... Sad
I took it out and had to flex the pcb near the turn wheel and the power contacts before it started working at that flawless level.
Maybe it's the pressure of the calculator messing it up, and when I 'fixed' it all I did was work with it until whatever was messed up got bent back into shape.....Confused

(It works again, but I'm afraid to put it back into the calculator)
Any ideas? Neutral
Don't double post. Next time, I simply delete the second post outright rather than merge them.
KermMartian wrote:
BigBubbaX wrote:
0x5 Huge sigh of relief.....

Fixed it. I'll edit this post when I get the details together!

(It's software AND hardware related, I didn't see that one coming!)
Huzzah! So does that mean that everything's working properly, now that you've fixed the screen? In addition, this post means you can bump instead of needing to edit once you get those details together. Wink


Kllrnohj wrote:
Don't double post. Next time, I simply delete the second post outright rather than merge them.


Based on Kerm's post BigBubbaX could've construed that it was okay to double-post.
@Kllrnohj:
Sorry, didn't mean to cause trouble. Sad


--Next chapter in the iGraph chronicles--
Ripped out the mp3 player from the hot-glue and replaced the power button for a third time, seemed the only thing I hadn't tried since the problems started.
I'll test it, glue it back in (lightly) and if that works, see how it and the calculator get along.... Rolling Eyes
BigBubbaX wrote:
@Kllrnohj:
Sorry, didn't mean to cause trouble. Sad


Not a big deal usually, but its happened so much lately its way easier to just delete the second post than manually merge them. Just don't do it again, ok? Acceptable double-post is if more than ~24 hours has passed since the last post.
  
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