I see. Any reason why you cant use the composite/s-video out into that convertor box you (or was it Lukeyson) have that hooks up your cameras to the ICC?

I think we both have one.

No reason. The VGA input will be a better quality picture, and Luke's doing it because he's run out of inputs.

I see. How good is the resolution of the ICC panel? Comparable to a modern laptop TFT or more like the mid 90's passive matrix LCD's?

Also, are there any off-the-shelf components that will convert a standard non-interlaced VGA signal into RGB SCART? I've only come across a microchip that claims to be able to do it:

http://www.semiconductorstore.com/cart/ ... 66#details

In a word, s**t. It's only 640x480 that we're putting in, but on the screen it's less than that, which I'd guess would be whatever the NTSC standard is.

And yes, there's a place here in Newcastle that does converters of all sorts. The VGA to RGB is not cheap - but this can do Hi Def which is a bit of overkill:
http://www.converters.tv/products/vga_to_rgb/232.html

Maybe this could do it too:
http://www.converters.tv/products/vga_to_rgb/40.html

I thought I put this picture up earlier, and if so, then here it is again.




Lukeyson

Yeh I saw that pic before, and it looked quite disappointing, colors dull and kinda blurry. Was hoping that it was better in real life.. But i suppose with moving images its not bad, cant be much worse than analogue TV's we lived through the 80s, 90s with.

Actually, I think the colours are pretty good in real life. The colours are admittedly washed out in that pic. But it's the res that lets you down, although it's acceptable for the size.

FYI, auMatt has been able to identify the chip that does the RGB output on the colour ICC screen thanks to some hi-detail pics I took of the circuit boards ages ago. He's been considering on-and-off doing some R&D to find out if he can get an RGB sgnal direct off the board. If that's the case, that opens up the possibility of using an after market LCD screen that can take the low-res RGB signal as an input 1, and give you the option of having a 2nd hi-res input from an alternate device.

Given limited means, he's not had the opportunity to buy an ICC just to chop up for experimentation. But it's something that might be achievable given enough funding to prove the concept.

I'm suprised ASL haven't taken a crack at it.


Lukeyson

I've had an awesome day.

Firstly - the case. We had an old IBM case on a scrap heap that I salvaged today. Only a half-height case, about 9cm tall, bit it had stand-off locators for mounting a Mini-ITX board so I thought I would give it a try.

A few hours of hooking in with a dremel, just as an experiment, and blow me down I came up with something that wasjust perfect for what I wanted.

It is higher than ideal - at about 9cm - but I reckon I might be ok there - but I'm going to run with it and give it a try.

It is also a little wider than perfect for the location, but given the motherboard, I can't get it any less than this.

The big winner is the depth, which was the bit that scared me the most. This box is only as deep as the motherboard, and I'll get to install the 2.5" HDD and the Power Supply on a 'mezzanine' level rather than behind the motherboard.

I figure I'll just leave the back of the box open for airflow, since it will face the rhs fender from under the boot liner and won't be seen. Should help with airflow I reckon too.

Here are some pics.


Lukeyson

 

 

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Bloody awkward dam spaces.

It's a good thing I've gone down this path, because it's clear now that neither a VoompC or a MCS case would fit in the BA/BF Sat Nav location without modification.

So I'm going to do more modification in the top-right hand corner of this image....


Lukeyson

 

 

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Oh yeah, and I did some playing with trying to fit the slimline DVD into my broken test tissue-box tray up the front as well.


Lukeyson

 

 

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I must say you're handy with fab work. You in the industry at all?

As for the ICC VGA 'output' mod, that I'd reckon would open the flood gates form some serious car stereo modding - i.e. the ICC would go, being replaced with 8"+ screens.

Nope, I'm in IT. Mate next door is a boilermaker though. But I did build a 2 x story kids cubby house in the back yard out of cross-braced 1" RHS - half the lower level is my lawn locker too. That was fun.

This was the first time I'd ever used my Dremel in anger - I must say it has paid for itself and doubled it's money in one sitting. Awesome piece of kit, I wish I'd had one sooner. It was purchased for, and will be seeing action later, on some Mirror Indicators I'm planning on putting into my BA scalps.... (exterior-modifications-f15/au-ba-bf-mirror-indicators-t74979.html)

I hacked the back off the case today. Results were fantastic - enough for me to start fabricating the mount plate in earnest now.


Lukeyson

 

 

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Heya Luke, no time no speak

I've been playing with the factory LCD since starting with my Carputer, and have a spare working controller board here, which I could reverse engineer and play with.

There are a couple controller chips:

1) Main RGB chip, which is a Sharp IR3Y26A
2)Overlay controller, MB90096

The LCD is a 400xRGBx234 TFT unit, meaning you will need to provide 800x468 resolution to drive it proper, and get the best results. The controller board has an onboard inverter, as well as R,G, B and Common outputs to drive, well, it seems, an VGA (RGB) monitor - without having a full datasheet on the IR3Y26A, it is difficult to tell though.

I have an older NEC 320x200 LCD here to have a play with, so I will see if I can set the resolution to suit that LCD, and also check if it was a 5V panel, which seems this is what the Sharp chip is driving.

The crappy text resolution is why I went for a Transflective NEC NL8060B21-03 8.4" LCD, very crisp, and gets better in direct sunlight too.

Interesting project you're busy with, I decided on the Commell LS-372 3.5" motherboard, with a Core-2-Duo T7100 (1.80gig) cpu, 2gigs of ram, and a OCZ Apex 60gig SSD.

From power-on, to windows desktop is 21seconds....fast bootup was a major priority for me, as well as having ample processing power. This unit is very small, physically same size as a 3.5" harddrive, and Synrax Australia stocks them. Fairly exxy, but well worth the price - the newer LS-373 is virtually the same, with mini-pci express vs mini pci slot. Chipset is the nice Intel 965GME.

Herewith a few datasheets that might help Matt - I guess if we can find out what max resolution the IR3Y26A can drive, we might have a chance - seems retrofitting std 800x480 7" LCDs should work fine with the info that we have.

Looking forward hearing from you.

 

 

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@ Lukeyson - show auMatt this, he might be happy

Was difficult to get, but, here is the IR3Y26A datasheet - have a look at page 25 for a typical application circuit:

Pins:
4 -> Common out
29 -> R out
33 -> G out
35 -> B out
48 -> Sync out

 

 

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Nice sleuthing mrbean. You've dug up some good info.

I sort of stopped playing with this spare controller once I got the NEC transflective display, much better than anything else in direct sunlight. The Display can be driven directly via LVDS from my Commell motherboard, but I opted to get a Digital View ALR-1400 controller instead, it seems the Genesis controller chip on the ALR also have video overlay capabilities - you see where I'm going with this? Hehe. So much to do, so little time.

Great work on the paddle-shifter btw, I think you can put my name down for one - you going to roll this out, d_m? Been following your development with great anticipation.....