PSP internal HDD mod with 80GB 1.8" ipod harddrive (or any other usb drive)

[nez]

ya but you need a PDA laying around this is for a HDD to be in beaded were the umd drive is.
Do i have to buy a 200 buck one or can i just make my own. will either of these do the job.Go to Fry's they have the programmer's sitting out on display just cut the cord and stuff it your pants leave the store flash the PIC return it. Or just bring you laptop and PIC use the Programmer at the store.
http://www.instructables.com/id/Business-Card-PIC-Programmer/
http://www.instructables.com/id/JDM2-based-PIC-Programmer/

[gr8npwrfl]

I have that compact flash usb host card.

It is only usb 1.0

the drivers are for Pocket PC only

There is no documentation on the hardware

You would have to also design a CF interface for the PSP

If you are going to start with hardware then maximm makes a chip that is a USB host controlled through
an SPI port. Since the memory stick is also controlled through and SPI port then that would be the easiest
hardware to interface to the PSP.

It has the drivers done for it.

http://www.maxim-ic.com/quick_view2.cfm/qv_pk/3639

[cwn723]

But the thing is, if we interfaced it through the memstick port in SPI, it would  only be capable of 16GB, which is the max able for the memstick to read.

[gr8npwrfl]

Nope,

Dark Alex already removed the memory limit we can read 256 gig through the memory port

[nez]

oh i thought he did that but i was shot down by skeptics. so i checked and the limit is off os far as memory. but what about read speed and power and stuff.

[gr8npwrfl]

SPI is every bit as fast as usb 2. It would be the ideal way to get a software interface because the library for talking to the SPI port already exists.

We either have to install true usb host or we have to build a device with usbhostfs installed.

I am looking at both.

The pic has a usb host & slave in a chio  and I have the source code for usbhostfs and I am looking at combining the two.

I am also studying the maxim chip to see how hard that would be.

[Luke]

this is really intresting

[nez]

a i see where you are coming from i never though of that. man i think you may be the first person who has a clue on what to do.
oh the maxumin chip sounds great i found this little info.

[full disclosure: I've only worked with FTDI COMx USB with my AVRs.]

In this modern age, isn't the cute thing to be one of the "classes" that Windows supports? And can't that be done fairly easily with the Maxim offering? E.g.,
Quote:
How many endpoints does the MAX3420E support?
The MAX3420E contains four endpoints:
EP0, bidirectional CONTROL endpoint, 64 byte FIFO.
EP1, OUT BULK or INT endpoint, 2x64 byte double-buffered FIFOS
EP2, IN BULK or INT endpoint, 2x64 byte double-buffered FIFOS
EP3, IN BULK or INT endpoint, 64 byte FIFO
With these endpoints, it is possible to build USB peripherals that support popular USB class drivers, such as a Human Interface Device (HID), Mass Storage, Picture Transfer Protocol (PTP), and Printer.


So you pretend to be one of the supported classes. Hmm--I don't see comm port in there anywhere--I thought that was built-in to XP?

Quote:

How does my Windows application talk to the MAX3420E?
A Windows application talks to the PC's USB host controller through a driver. The driver may be built into Windows or it may be custom. Windows includes built-in drivers for standard device classes, such as Human Interface Devices (HID) and Mass Storage Devices. If your firmware supports one of these standard classes, your customer does not need to load a custom driver.
If you are designing a device that does not conform to one of the built-in Windows standard device classes, the end user must install a custom driver when your USB device is plugged in the first time.

Does Maxim supply a custom Windows driver?
No.
What example code does Maxim supply?
You can find example C code for implementing a HID application on the Maxim website at USB Enumeration Code (and More) for the MAX3420E. This example code emulates a PC keyboard, which types a text string into any Windows application that accepts text (e.g., Notepad) whenever a pushbutton is pressed. By conforming to the standard HID class, the application runs without a custom Windows driver. Regardless of your target application, most of this example code is USB 'boilerplate' that can be used as a starting point for your code.
I want to design a MAX3420E-based device that does not conform to a standard Windows class. What do I use for a Windows driver?
There are two alternatives:
Write the Windows driver yourself. This is complex and difficult, recommended for specialists only.
Purchase a general-purpose driver. These typically consist of the USB driver and a companion library of C functions to access the driver. Drivers are matched to the VID (Vendor ID) and PID (Product ID) in your device descriptor.
Microsoft has announced a general-purpose BULK driver for USB in the upcoming "Vista" version of Windows.
How does the MAX3420E compare with USB 'serial bridge' chips?
USB serial bridge chips connect to a PC using its USB port, but appear as a virtual COM port to the application running on the PC . A custom driver, supplied by the chip vendor, is required to do this COM-USB transformation. A Windows application that talks to a serial (COM) port (e.g., HyperTerminal) can be used to talk to an USB-connected device using this method.
The advantage of this approach is that no enumeration firmware or host driver is required. The disadvantages are in performance, flexibility, and support:

Performance: Because the bridge approach emulates a serial port, the maximum achievable bandwidth is about 1 Megabit per second, well below the USB signaling rate of 12 Megabits per second.
Flexibility: The serial-USB bridge chips are hard-wired to emulate serial-port devices. They are not capable of implementing standard Windows class devices (like HID) or custom device types.
Support: A product you design using one of these chips will require the companion driver to be installed by your customer. Because it is a custom driver, it is not guaranteed to work with future versions of the operating system. If you choose this approach, try to make sure that the vendor is committed to supporting the driver for the lifetime of your product.
What are the advantages and disadvantages of the MAX3420E approach?
The disadvantages are that firmware is required for the MAX3420E controller and that Maxim does not supply a custom Windows driver. Instead, Maxim supplies example firmware to illustrate how to conform to a standard Windows device class (HID), and thereby to use a built-in Windows driver.
The advantages to the MAX3420E approach are performance, flexibility and support.

Performance: The MAX3420E SPI port (its interface to the controller) can run up to 26MHz. If the controller supports a high SPI clock rate, the MAX3420E can support USB transfers up to the maximum available full-speed bandwidth of 12Mbps.
Flexibility: The personality of a device using the MAX3420E is entirely determined by its firmware. Therefore, it can implement any type of USB device.
Support: Once operating systems natively support general USB (BULK) transfers, the need for serial-USB bridge chips will rapidly diminish.


(above from http://www.maxim-ic.com/appnotes.cfm/ap ... umber/3597 )

I hear you on the Maxim phantoms--big fanfare, samples in hand and tested, production quantities never show up at the distributors.

It certainly looks like they put quite a bit of effort into the supporting documnetation, such as the completely-worked HID "panic button" example.

Lee

[unicorn]

i thinkg the best solution is going to be the gumstix, it cheap runs linux support usb host and is very small.

site seem to be down now but you can google it , this is what a plan to use on my psp.

[VoX]

I think SPI and the USBhost chip is the way to go, build an easy POC and make it smaller by changing to smaller components ect.

[gr8npwrfl]

I am glad to see some other people are putting as much research into this as I am.

So far the Maxim chip seems the best solution to me because I was working on the design
with the PIC and found that the PIC only supports a single usb device at a time.

Therefore we can't use the PIC as a bridge with usbhostfs without adding a second usb chip
and we are damn near building a whole separate computer system which will draw to much
power to make it really usable.

[cwn723]

Ok, then we can try doing it through SPI. I will help you as much as i can, but arent we going to need to right firmware for the chip that makes it do the functions we want it to do?

And as you said that the PIC doesnt support two usb devices at a time, i was saying using a USBhost controller, and then it is going to need to be bridged to a PIC to tell it what functino to do at what time.

[nez]

The gum stix is realy small but with out more info it is hard to say.but one good out come would more mods can be done with this chip.touch screen mastered plus HDD dual screens endless.just need to make a linux distro. i guess you have to add your own usb ports or what is there only one on the board.
 

2/ Part numbers for the 24-pin flex connector

FH12A-24S-0.5SH(55) Digikey part HFK124CT-ND

The 24-pin flex connector was added to the verdex motherboard in response to customer demands for a daughtercard on the 120-pin side of the motherboard that provides UART, USB host etc function on the 24pin/120pin side of the verdex motherboard as these functions are normally "60-pin" type functions.

With a flat flex cable, it should be easy to bring those functions from the 24-pin flex connector onto a custom board on the120-pin side of the verdex motherboard in order to reduce the thickness of the board "sandwich".

Additionally, for very simple gumstix implementation scenarios, (e.g. connecting say an I2C sensor to a gumstix), the 24-pin flex connector is lower cost & easier to integrate than the 60- or 120-pin connectors.


Gumstix added the 24-pin flex connector to address several issues:

1) being able to get a console while the motherboard is otherwise in use without the physical limitations of the tweener.

2) USB Host
3) Battery for RTC.

4) Daughtercards that need a flex connector.

this is all i can find the data sheets will not show up nor the schematics.

[pax]

ok i dont really know if this will help but im trying to get my head around this thread and i've been doing a bit of research and found out that alot of devices which aren't natively usb hosts like car stereos are able to host a usb mass storage device like an mp3 player. alot of them use a  "VNCL1 USB host chip and accompanying prototyping modules like the vdip1" apparently the vdip1 can apparently interface with any microcontroller and allow you to plug in and read any usb mass storage device.

[cwn723]

Yeah, im trying to do it with there other board, the VDIP2. I was talking to the people at Vinculum,  i have written code for the PIC which need to be bridged to it. I just need a programmer which i am about to buy, and ill be home free. The only BOMS device i have is 128mb though, so im gonna need to buy a bigger BOMS device for it to look impressive. I almost have enough money for the supplies, just need about $20 more, which i should be able to get in the next week or two.


And i was just wondering, i dont think an ipod hard drive with usb case will fit in the back of a psp, unless we made case modifications.

[gr8npwrfl]

I have some very tiny usb hard driver boards, coupled to a 1.8 inch drive should fit in the back of a psp.

It just depends on the driver hardware to go with it.

[nez]

cwn723 i dint know if you gave up or what not, I am glad you have been pushing along.

[gr8npwrfl]

Ok just finished a whole bunch of reading.

It is .75 inches wide by 3.14 inches long. It will fit in the UMD drive bay.

The gumstix xm4 has multi usb host built into it. The only thing we would have to do is wire up the connector for usb to it.

It comes with a complete embeded linux WITH usb host stack.

It supports usb 2.0 with 12mbit transfers.

The complete development environment is supplied with the board.

We can compile usbhostfs system into it and flash it onto the board.

With this unit NO software has to be written for the PSP.

It runs from 3.3v so it could be powered by the PSP.

It would be compatible with irshell.

The compiling of usbhostfs would be fairly simple.

It also already contains the drivers for Human Interface Devices.
That means you could plug in keyboards, mice, joysticks
You drive size could be as big as 256 gig because you could use a sata hard drive.

The person selected to do the software for it would have to buy a console interface
and a network interface to compile the software. Once it is compiled then you can
flash the code to the xm4 motherboard and run just from that.

The xm4 board is $129.00 and maybe about another $10 for parts to do usb.
Then the cost of the external hard drive and interface boards.
I have seen the interface case for as little as $14.00
And then the cost of the hard drive.

OR

The xm4 board is $129.00 and maybe another $10 for parts to do the usb
1 custom cable and use your IPOD as storage. That way the battery in the IPOD
powers the drive, and do not power the hard drive from the PSP.

One person would have to spend $300 for the hardware to compile the software

[VoX]

Sounds good, Have you got all the parts already to complete the mod?

[nez]

i tkink the crusher of the idea is

One person would have to spend $300 for the hardware to compile the software

[gr8npwrfl]

No I don't have the hardware.

I will have to see how my sales go on EBAY in order to set the money aside to do this.

Part of the development cost would be to buy the jtag unit in order to program the sticks.
Then I would have to flash the individual sticks for everyone.

Trying to figure out the logistics of all this to make it fair to everyone

[VoX]

I might join into, I'm selling some stuff too so I will need to see how that goes. This sounds like a very interesting project

[gr8npwrfl]

We can do all sorts of things with this.

We can add additional storage as sdhc cards or compact flash

We can put hardwired 100 base t networking

We can add bluetooth

There any number of extra boards that have software to drive them and because we are interfacing through linux and usbhostfs we can add the functionality.

There is already a driver for linux that uses the dual shock control pad, all we would do is compile in the driver and plug in the joystick.

There are already bluetooth drivers so the PSP could talk to a bluetooth cellphone or stereo headphones or ..........


I keep reading more and basically we are putting a complete unix computer inside the PSP


We can use it as a base to do mods no one has ever thought about

Damn it would make so many additional options available to us.

[nez]

that is what i was saying.
hey can you give me the model of the jtag that needs to be bought i might buy one. or will any of these work? i will help flash i would just of course need the firmware.

http://www.instructables.com/id/JDM2-based-PIC-Programmer/

http://www.instructables.com/id/Business-Card-PIC-Programmer/

http://cgi.ebay.com/JDM-PIC-Programmer-Microchip-16F84-40-18-Zif-Sockets_W0QQitemZ250257272373QQcmdZViewItem?hash=item250257272373&_trkparms=39%3A1%7C65%3A1&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14

[gr8npwrfl]

The basics so we are all on the same page

This is the cpu board which cost $129.00



The lowest cost verdex motherboard available retail. With high performance and low cost, this PXA270-driven motherboard finds a home in price sensitive applications with high demands for communications, processing and production.

Processor:     Marvell® PXA270 with XScale™
Speed:           400MHz
Memory:         64MB RAM
                    16MB Flash
Features:        USB host signals
                     CCD camera signals
Connections:   60-pin Hirose I/O connector
                    120-pin MOLEX connector
                    24-pin flex ribbon
Size:             80mm x 20mm

With this board and a few usb connectors we can build a usbhostfs system to work with the PSP running irshell

If you want to develop software and add features or flash your board you need this: $25.00

This is only used to develop software and flash the cpu board through a serial port
from the PC



   
Add console access and a power input port on the verdex motherboard. Also allows USB connection upstream to a host computer.

Features:
              - 3 x RS-232 ports on miniDIN8 connectors
              - USB mini-B connector with USB Host signals
              - 18-bit LCD with FH21 footprint (24pin)
              - Serial function ports or GPIO lines and an I2C port on 0.100" through-holes
Connection:
         60-pin I/O header
Size:
         80x34mm
Power:
         3.5V - 5V

If you brick your cpu board you need this jtag interface board and pc interface $40.00




and $20.00 from www.sparkfun.com



The average user can buy just the first and have someone else flash the board for him. Solder on an usb connector
and they are running.

A program developer needs the first board and the second board to be able to flash his own board.

A program developer who bricks his main board with have to have the final two items.

It looks like just about any program written for linux has a build for this cpu board. It looks like there are hundreds of apps already ported to the gumstix system. All a person will have to do is select what they want to run, build the software and flash to the board.

There are perl, java, python , and basic builds already done for the system. There is another board that adds 100 base t ethernet, sdhc storage, wifi, compact flash, and bluetooth etc.

If this is what we use then we can build anything on top and then it is all compatible as well as the chance that programmers will support us in the main system. Maybe even in the standard firmware.

[*FuFa]

I would be worried about the fact that the Board that can do the whole Linux stuff runs faster than the PSP.

333 mhz vs 400 mhz

[gr8npwrfl]

AND

The main board has an input for TOUCHSCREEN

[gr8npwrfl]

we can slow the clock down to conserve power if we don't need it

[gr8npwrfl]

I am also negotiating to get a bunch of these:



This will bring all the switches to the lower PSP right under the UMD drive without soldering.

We would just remove the connector on the bottom and everything is available.

[cwn723]

cwn723 i dint know if you gave up or what not, I am glad you have been pushing along.

I havent given up, ive been working to be able to afford everything. And being that im only 15 and applied for about 10 summer jobs, which of none ive heard back from, and considering my mom just got laid off cause of the horrible economy so i cant do chores for my parents. I can almost afford the programmer, i just earned another 5 for mowing/edging my neighbors lawn, only 15 more to go!!!


Oh, and i dont quiet understand the plan with the CPU board, but that is expensive!!! my route would be about 50 bucks for everything except for the USB BOMS device.(Hard drive etc.)