Development is going well.
Tim, Tom, Brian and Mike, I have sent you direct messages.
If anyone else wants to experiment all the details so far are on my github pages
73 Colin. G4EML
Minitiouner
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This forum is run by the BATC (British Amateur Television Club), it is service made freely available to all interested parties, please do not abuse this privilege.
Thank you
Re: Minitiouner
Thanks Colin! I have sent you an email.
Re: Minitiouner
Hi Colin,
Looking at all the information you have supplied, I cannot see the wiring diagram from Pico to tuner (V2). All the rest seems straight forward to get a working system. I am thinking of having a go and get a pico W. I think you are trying to keep the network pins free which looks like a future proofing idea. Seeing as power for the tuner comes from 12v you are also leaving the possibility of a wireless connection! The next thing I am wondering is which Pico to get, with legs, without legs - which means more soldering? or one which could have the network module plugged in as well.
Well done with all the work.
Martin G8LCE
Looking at all the information you have supplied, I cannot see the wiring diagram from Pico to tuner (V2). All the rest seems straight forward to get a working system. I am thinking of having a go and get a pico W. I think you are trying to keep the network pins free which looks like a future proofing idea. Seeing as power for the tuner comes from 12v you are also leaving the possibility of a wireless connection! The next thing I am wondering is which Pico to get, with legs, without legs - which means more soldering? or one which could have the network module plugged in as well.
Well done with all the work.
Martin G8LCE
Re: Minitiouner
Hi Martin,
There is a lot of progress going on with this project that may not be evident on the forum. Watch this space!!
The PDF diagram on GitHub shows all of the connections needed. However next week I should have some adaptor boards available to allow the Pico to be fitted to the V2 Minitiouner. Noel has said he will also arrange to make them available through the BATC shop. I will probably have a small quantity of fully assembled boards as well.
We initially weren't sure if people would want to upgrade their V2 minitiouners, but now that we have both TS outputs working and supported by Tom's OpenTuner it is something that people may want to do.
Eventually the new PicoTuner PCBs will also be available in the shop.
I doubt that WiFi will be supported soon. So the Pico W is probably not needed, although it will work OK.
I always buy the Pico version without headers as it can be surface mounted, wires can be directly soldered to the edge connections or pins fitted as required.
My adaptor boards are soldered directly to the Pico, surface mount style so the pinless version is needed for those.
The ethernet is for future development, the wiznet hat is quite cheap and can fit on top of or underneath the Pico.
Colin G4EML
There is a lot of progress going on with this project that may not be evident on the forum. Watch this space!!
The PDF diagram on GitHub shows all of the connections needed. However next week I should have some adaptor boards available to allow the Pico to be fitted to the V2 Minitiouner. Noel has said he will also arrange to make them available through the BATC shop. I will probably have a small quantity of fully assembled boards as well.
We initially weren't sure if people would want to upgrade their V2 minitiouners, but now that we have both TS outputs working and supported by Tom's OpenTuner it is something that people may want to do.
Eventually the new PicoTuner PCBs will also be available in the shop.
I doubt that WiFi will be supported soon. So the Pico W is probably not needed, although it will work OK.
I always buy the Pico version without headers as it can be surface mounted, wires can be directly soldered to the edge connections or pins fitted as required.
My adaptor boards are soldered directly to the Pico, surface mount style so the pinless version is needed for those.
The ethernet is for future development, the wiznet hat is quite cheap and can fit on top of or underneath the Pico.
Colin G4EML
Re: Minitiouner
I don't recommend getting the wifi version [as some of the io lines it uses are being or will be used]. We have purposely not used the io used by the Ethernet hat. That's not been fully tested yet either.
Best wait for the project to be ready before ordering anything but the basic pico which Colin and Benno's adaptors work with.
Mike
Edit. Seems that I was looking at incorrect info on the wifi on pin use
Best wait for the project to be ready before ordering anything but the basic pico which Colin and Benno's adaptors work with.
Mike
Edit. Seems that I was looking at incorrect info on the wifi on pin use
Last edited by g0mjw on Wed Feb 14, 2024 5:23 pm, edited 2 times in total.
Re: Minitiouner
I've just corrected some erroneous information that I posted elsewhere about the Pico W. Apologies for the confusion. It should be pin compatible with the standard Pico. Various Pico options are being looked at, so it may be better to wait. At the moment, there's no guarantee that anything other than the dual TS USB connection on a standard Pico will be developed.
Here are some Pico options:
The standard Pico.
.
The Pico W (Wifi)
.
The WIZnet Ethernet hat to fit on a standard Pico.
.
The WIZnet Ethernet chip integrated onto a Pico. Three different Ethernet chip options are available.
Brian
Here are some Pico options:
The standard Pico.
- 1.jpg (86.54 KiB) Viewed 1731 times
The Pico W (Wifi)
- 2.jpg (87.92 KiB) Viewed 1731 times
The WIZnet Ethernet hat to fit on a standard Pico.
- 3.png (150.03 KiB) Viewed 1731 times
The WIZnet Ethernet chip integrated onto a Pico. Three different Ethernet chip options are available.
- 4.png (186.05 KiB) Viewed 1731 times
Brian
Re: Minitiouner
Having read the latest infomation on the g4eml / PicoTuner Git Hub site, I have a question.
If one core of the CPU is busy with the USB and thus USB is 1.1, is there any future for using the network interface instead? Changing the CPU's job from USB to network.
Not knowing about the programming this may be a silly question but I thought I would ask. The addon board might take some of the work on and reduce the CPU load.
Martin G8LCE
PS This also would make possible POE!
If one core of the CPU is busy with the USB and thus USB is 1.1, is there any future for using the network interface instead? Changing the CPU's job from USB to network.
Not knowing about the programming this may be a silly question but I thought I would ask. The addon board might take some of the work on and reduce the CPU load.
Martin G8LCE
PS This also would make possible POE!
Re: Minitiouner
The ethernet interface chip would take on a lot of the work of maintaining the connection, so it shouldn't add a lot of load on the Pico. In any case the USB interface would not be in use at the same time, so in practice ethernet might well be easier than USB.
The host software (OpenTuner or Longmynd etc. ) would need to be changed to handle ethernet Comms.
Colin G4EML
The host software (OpenTuner or Longmynd etc. ) would need to be changed to handle ethernet Comms.
Colin G4EML
Re: Minitiouner
Hi Colin. Will the new BATC Pico Tuner (when the boards are available) be compatible with Portsdown 4 please?
73, Russ.
73, Russ.
Re: Minitiouner
We hope so. I would wait though in case of changes. Also the PD4 can't do two transport streams, at least not as far as I know, so there is little point changing at the moment. There will probably be quite a few surplus FTDI modules about if you are building a new V2 Minitiouner.
Mike