Help Wanted: Input & Guidance on integrating Arm board, Wince, touchscreen to my digital lab supply.

[Maddhung73]

Hi everyone my name is Mike, and I got hooked on electronics about 7 months ago and now Im a fricken freak....lol, Im sure all you can understand that phase?!?! Anyway you guys have an awesome website, and Im honored to be a member! Ok heres what I have, I bought one of those programmable dc/dc converters off of ebay a month back and the farther I got into building a custom enclosure, the more I disliked the 2x16 run of the mill 44780 display, so I came across a cheap Symbol/Motorola barcode scanner at an auction the other day so I bought it cuz it has an Arm core processor that runs 640mb ram, 4" touchscreen, 53 key board, wifi, blutooth, and Windows CE 5.0. So got home n ripped it apart hoping to find some type of ttl, serial, data lines of some sort, I couldnt see any but also Im rather wet behind the ears electronics wise yet. Ok so the dc/dc supply has ttl/ serial outputs and it comes with software intended to be able to control the outputs of power supply via GUI interface on PC. Do u guys think it is possible to boot the lab power supply software via an auto/start function thru windows ce embedded, or it also has sd card built in. The microcontroller in the lab supply is only 8 bit, but it would only have to transmit voltage, and current values to the Arm processor with windows on board. There is next to no info on the web in regards to the power supply, I had to scrape and scrounge to find the manual and software download for it. So I am hoping someone with interfacing skills will read this. Basically I want the Arm/Windows to boot the GUI software for the lab power supply and be able to control it and view it via the 4" touchscreen onboard. Since I couldnt find any serial connectors on the barcode scanner motherboard, I did however find serial and usb pinouts on the ass end of the barcode scanner/ mobile computers battery. Am going to bypass the battery eventually but to get started I went ahead and soldered a serial connector to the before mentioned battery pinouts...weird huh I know...the battery has pinouts on both ends to allow for placing the whole scanner gun/ mobile computer into a serial/ charging dock that connects to PC. Their are 17 pins on the batteries ass that connect to the charging/ data cradle, I soldered a 25 pin serial connector to the battery so I can tap into RS232, usb, 3.3v OUT, and 12v and ground IN, it also has 5v detect. So if anyone has knowledge they wouldnt mind sparing some of their own time I would greatly appreciate the much needed help, it really sucks when none of your friends are into electronics...no one to talk to about them or anything....thousands of Google hours!!!! lol, thanx everyone in advance and if you need better shots of the motherboard just drop me a message. Take care, Michael....Maddhung73

 

[Fish4Fun]

Hey Mike! Welcome to the forum!

Wow, I am not even sure where to start......Oh yea....the scanner....I think you might be biting off more there than you want to chew...not saying what you want to do is not possible....but it could take weeks/months of research to work it all out....then again it might be more straight-forward than I am thinking....in either case I would suggest you consider one of the SOC (System On A Chip) "prototype" boards that runs an OS compatible with the software your bench supply uses (I would bet it has open-source code for at least one Linux variant) .....the SOS systems (like the Rasberry-Pi) have existing interfaces for things like monitors, keyboards etc as well as user I/O pins and various easy to access serial ports for exactly the kind of thing you want to do....AND, most importantly, they have TONS OF SUPPORT available in many forums and wiki's.....Very likely someone has already done all of the heavy lifting for you.....Think of it like this....if someone "gave you" an Intel 286 processor based PC from back in the 80's with NO hard drive or software how long would it take you to cobble together the pieces to make it do anything useful? That exercise would likely be a couple orders of magnitude easier than attempting to salvage an embedded microprocessor from a mature product....again, NOT saying it can't be done....but for $40 you can buy a Rasberry-Pi or something similar that will very likely do what you want to do right out of the box....

I know, I know....you think you want to do it as a learning experience....or to prove that you can....and I certainly respect both notions....but there is SO MUCH cool stuff in electronics to play with....I hate to see someone just starting out head down a path that has the potential to at best overwhelm them and potentially sour their taste for the hobby altogether....Honestly I would suggest just going ahead and ordering a bench supply....I drug my feet on buying a "real" bench supply for over three decades.....I built various bench supplies from various old transformers....and later from old ATX supplies etc, etc.....and then about 5 years ago I got tired of constantly fiddling trying to get this or that voltage/current and I ordered a 30V 5A CV/CC bench supply (If I remember it cost ~$60 delivered).....Since then every time I sit down to test this or that it is like taking two Asprin....no pain at all, LOL. Anyway, certainly no reason for you NOT to use your converter....but if you want to control it via a dedicated PC I would suggest starting with something with TONS of support....

Good Luck!

Fish

 

[Maddhung73]

Thank you for the advice Fish4fun I appreciate the quick feedback, yea I wouldnt even mess with it but I went into the windows ce files just a few minutes ago and that OS seams stripped down enough that I should to be able to boot my program with the CE auto-start function or a BIG possibly...lol...from the sd card. I removed the barcode scanner module from the motherboard and I was sure it was gonna freak out on me hardcore, but it booted up into windows with no hiccups to my surprise!! Now Im headin back down into the lab to remove all the scanner jibber jabber and barcode software n maybe just do a fresh install n be done with it...lol, but I cant believe how smooth that windows 5.0 ce is on that thing, but cool man have a great 3 day weekend, I know Im gonna.....yea I got that thing for next to nothing so no need to tiptoe around it like I usually do, Im rippin into her and if she goes she goes...if not oh well...lol, they cost like $3 or 4 thousand a piece for one of those son of a bitches, the windows mobile ones are cheaper Ive read but I LOVE this shit man I wish I woulda had more time earlier in life to get into electronics, how long have you been into tronics? do it for a living or strictly hobbie and relaxation???

 

[Fish4Fun]

WOW, I take all my Nay-Saying back....if you have booted it into windows and can interface with it then you are already WAY farther than I thought you would get....So carry on!

@electronics...definitely a hobby....built my first AM transmitter from a kit back in the mid 70's....I was young enough to think building the kit meant I knew everything there was to know about electronics and radio....have spent the last 40 some odd years trying to figure out exactly how much more there is to learn, LOL.....I would say I now have a fairly firm grasp on how little I know about radio! As for electronics....I would say persistence is my strongest suit.....It might take me a decade or two to finally gather all of the information I need to complete a project...but most of the projects I start eventually end up complete....or, more correctly, complete enough to suit me.....and as it is a hobby, that is all that really matters I probably shouldn't mention this....but just a few years back I figured out a way to make light using electricity! I am keeping the information on the down-low until I think the world is ready for it (Shhhhhh......) LMFAO!

@Hobbies.....My problem is I have too many hobbies, lol. Basically if it involves making or building something it is on my list of hobbies....I have a small metal lathe, small mill, welders, presess, plasma cutters, 2 CNC routers (desk top + medium format)...working on a 3D printer...tons of wood working stuff....home brewing....blah, blah, blah......If you have not yet been infected by the CNC bug you should really get inoculated...if you catch that hobby it will rock your world.....

@The scanner.....yea, I noticed that you were tinkering with a piece of equipment that someone along the line had paid a lot of $$$$ for....I wouldn't post anything with the serial number on it ;-)

@relaxation.....I don't think I know that word, I will add that to my list of words I need to look up ;-)

Again, Welcome to the forum! & Good Luck!

Fish

 

[Old Steve]

I'm shocked and amazed that this is coming together so easily. I read Fish's first post and agreed with him, but now I agree with his second one.
At this stage, it should be relatively easy to auto-boot your PSU software. Nice work so far.
I'm not at all familiar with Windows CE5, so can't help in that regard, but I'm definitely watching this one. Good luck.

Edit: Does CE5 have a 'Startup' folder, or an equivalent of 'HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Current Version\Run' in the registry?

 

[Maddhung73]

I'm shocked and amazed that this is coming together so easily. I read Fish's first post and agreed with him, but now I agree with his second one.
At this stage, it should be relatively easy to auto-boot your PSU software. Nice work so far.
I'm not at all familiar with Windows CE5, so can't help in that regard, but I'm definitely watching this one. Good luck.

Edit: Does CE5 have a 'Startup' folder, or an equivalent of 'HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Current Version\Run' in the registry?

Old Steve I just got home and am heading down to finish the power supply to power the logic motherboard, because as of now and I am using the battery for the scanner but that isnt going to pan out down the road so need to bypass battery, and the touch screen seperately from my actual bench supply, I will look into the registry for the lines you posted....thanx Steve and thanx everyone for the replies, off to the lab I go to see if I cant start a fire!!! Lol