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interesting component..maybe some uses for arcade builders...

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severdhed:

it may be a while until i get to mess with these things, but if anyone gets one and does something cool with it, please post pics and your impressions of the unit.

Neverending Project:

I was thinking about this on my way to work this morning, just sorta daydreaming about how much it would cost to make a small run of some type of microcontroller based POV "wand" designed for arcade use. The parts would certainly be cheap enough, and a PCB would be cheap also - in large enough batches. A driver would be relatively easy to write, which could take the output from your front end of choice and send it to the serial/parallel/USB port of this the device (it could be designed to use any of these ports). So it seems like it could display the name of the game, number of credits, anything really.

But then I had a forehead smacking moment. If this is designed to be attached to a fan, or some other spinning unit, then communicating with it while in use might be a challenge. I mean if the thing is spinning, how is it going to be plugged into a COM/USB port on your PC?

Sure, we could get all "brainstormy" and come up with workarounds using phone-cord-spinny-thingys and such... but in order to make it cheap to buy/make and easy to use, it needs to be easily attached to a stock fan. Am I missing something?

This is why the unit needs to be pre-programmed, no?

**Edit: I just re-read SavannahLion's post... yup. You already said what I was thinking. You could use a bluetooth chip and communicate that way - but that adds significant cost, not to mention some additional weight on the PCB.

Neverending Project:


--- Quote from: SavannahLion on July 31, 2008, 04:03:38 pm ---Perlmonk, I'm not saying software is going to be a problem. What I'm saying is that the programming on the fly needs to overcome an engineering obsticle. The cable looks like it's got three pins, so my (other) guess would be that programming is done through the three wire power cable for the fan. In which case, one would probably have to build an additional circuit that would switch between feeding power to the fan and programming the fan. Or, possibly even drawing power from the USB bus to power the fan? ...
--- End quote ---

But the problem as I see it would still remain - even if you came up with a circuit to switch between power and serial communication. The three wires are most likely not even hooked up to the LEDs. They are probably powered from a battery on the "wand". How could the three-wire power cable even be connected to a spinning fan?

SavannahLion:


--- Quote from: Neverending Project on August 01, 2008, 04:02:37 pm ---Sure, we could get all "brainstormy" and come up with workarounds using phone-cord-spinny-thingys and such... but in order to make it cheap to buy/make and easy to use, it needs to be easily attached to a stock fan. Am I missing something?

This is why the unit needs to be pre-programmed, no?

**Edit: I just re-read SavannahLion's post... yup. You already said what I was thinking. You could use a bluetooth chip and communicate that way - but that adds significant cost, not to mention some additional weight on the PCB.

--- End quote ---

Yes. Exactly. My original speculation on how it was programmed is correct, the programming cable is plugged directly into the spinning portion of the fan. I was hoping that the fan was programmed through the three pin wire and it used some sort of simple rotating collar (kind of like a telephone line untangler). I thought maybe this was due to the circuit receiving power in some way. Anyways, this discussion got me annoyed so I went looking elsewhere and found what I was after.

The cable is a five pin adapter that plugs into the spinning portion of the fan.
There is no mention of a battery, I also don't think this is a viable source of power anyways. Who the ---fudgesicle--- wants to tear apart their PC fan just to change batteries?

Detailed review of the fan
Manual for the fan and software

And lastly, I've uploaded a picture of how the cable plugs into the fan. It comes from the Burnout PC review.

Forget about humping together a software solution, it has very limited use without solving the hardware issues.

fixedpigs:


--- Quote from: ChadTower on July 31, 2008, 03:40:49 pm ---My road bike is matte black... so I definitely try to stay off the road at night. 



--- End quote ---

chad...

where are you...chicago...?

how'd you get a hold of that javelin...?

and you shouldn't be riding at night without lights regardless of what colour your bike is... ;)


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