Not quite a500 topic, but to do with an android device that someone besides myself may find
interesting.
http://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/fxi-technologies-develops-cotton-candy-on-a-usb-stick/
Its an USB stick called Cotton Candy, it carries a fully functional chipset running the Android operating system inside it. All it needs is a USB cable to draw power and an HDMI cable to connect to a screen of some sort. With Bluetooth and wifi for mouse or keyboard.
Practical......probably not
Cool toy.......definately
There was a discussion about this on Slashdot a few days back. The general consensus seems to be that it's got too low specs for being of much use in general tasks, like e.g. a carry-in-a-pocket HTPC, and that it's not thought fully through and lacks several important features to really make it useful for development. Though, it's still better for development than having to use your tablet or phone, and it's helluva lot faster than the emulator included with the SDK.
I cannot think of anything I'd use it for, but it sure is a neat idea, and definitely will be useful atleast for someone.
Link to the Slashdot article and comments if you're interested: http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/11/11/18/2117254/dual-core-android-pc-now-comes-on-a-usb-stick
Thought that was pretty cool.
Also read about this the other day. run honeycomb on a laptop http://phandroid.com/2011/11/19/ins...android-market-on-your-asus-eee-pc-or-laptop/
Ok, so here's my dilemma. I want a convertible tablet pc. Problem is though, I think all of the ones on the market are poop. They either run android (I don't see the point still) and iOS, or are clunky and rediculously expensive. But I had a extremley bright idea. Buy whatever laptop I like, slap a touchscreen on that *****, and be happy. Keep in mind that as a poor college student with no job, I will probably never be able to afford this
1. Take apart laptop completley, Rip out the green bullcrap.
2. Mod case to be suitable as a convertible...or just look cool.
3. Rverse USB port to face inside
4. Close USB off from the outside
5. Get a USB Touchscreen conversion kit, which im sure come in many different flavors (Capacitive, Multitouch, Resistive), or better yet use a connector designed for computer internals, making #3 and #4 useless.
6. Add 3rd party accelerometer for Poitrait/Landscape orientation
7. Find a suitable hinge (or make one) and replace it
8. Boot laptop, install drivers for touchscreen and accelerometer
9. Pat myself on the back for custom making a tablet PC?
In my opinion the hardest part would be modding the case to be suitable as a convertible tablet, which can't be too hard. I have access to MIG/TIG welders, sheet metal cutters, grinders, ect. and I know people who know how to use them, so working with metal shouldn't be too dificult. In fact, I probably could just build a case myself from scratch. I also have alot of experience with plastic, so that's not a problem although I'd prefer to use metal for structural parts.
Touchscreen conversion kits seem to be all over the internet with a quick google search, and it shouldn't be too hard to find high quality capacitive touchscreen panels.
Walcom Bamboo Stylus because I'm a G
Accelerometers that work with windows I don't know about, but it cant be too hard Amirite? You can find ANYTHING for sale on the internet.
If I do do this however it will probably be in the summer (when I have a job). The only probelm I might have is the internals, seeing as I've never handled computer internals before. My brother did build his computer though, and I have a friend who also builds computers. It dosen't seem too hard compared to the other stuff like modding the case. While the laptop is dissasembled I'd probably put the parts in ziplock bags to keep them away from dirt and debris while I'm not using them. As long as I'm careful I don't thinkim going to mess anything up.
Good idea or no?
Good idea. Just keep in mind that the whole thing would be much heavier than a regular tablet, so holding it in hand would be difficult.
I have seen an EEE PC modded with a touchscreen, but the keyboard part was still there.
Just get a transformer lol...
What is wrong with Android? What is it you need to do that it won't?
My other idea would be to tell you most android devices are capable of running linux too?
Sounds like alot of work..and there are suitable models on the market, but if you wanna do it?
By the time you get around to it I wonder where technology will be...
PS ziplock bags? NO! Get some static bags..ziplocs are crazy static-charged! Honestly though, sounds like you are a good deal away from being able to deconstruct and reconstruct a laptop..the integrated circuits are ridiculously small and fragile..
PPS The hardest part might be actually getting the accelerometer sensors to function..which is where android comes in..you have to actually write some code into your operating system that will recognize and react accordingly withing the right parameters in your code..devs on this sight have problems with accelerometers that otherwise worked on a stock rom on OEM machines, god knows what it would take to get one working on a machine that never intended to have one by design?
That is all
What's old is new again
It's funny we did something similar a few years ago to build PC's into cars and trucks. For that application and at that time it made sense. Today we essentially just make custom docks for COTS tablets so that they integrate with the car.
If you're opposed to Android and other mobile OS's my suggestion is to start looking around craigslist for convertible tablet/laptops like those from HP and Dell or look for a cheap HP slate. I've seen gently used Slates going for around $200-300 and they run windows 8 reasonably well. I've seen convertibles close to that price as well.
Unless you are just dead set on a fabrication project i'd strongly suggest taking advantage of off the shelf hardware and mass production pricing and spend your extra time and money learning how to get the most of of those components.
If you do go ahead with this then weight and cost will be your biggest issues. I think a better twist on this would be to figure out how to make a transformer type of dock for other popular tablets. If you can make them well and make them cheap then sell a few and buy what you really want.
The reason I don't like android is because It's not a desktop OS. I'll be building this tablet-y thing for graphics/image editing, word processing and a little bit of gaming in between and I'm not 100% sure about android graphics programs. I like to keep it simple and use MS Paint, then GIMP if i need a more powerful program. I'm also a windows fanboy and it's what I've been using ever since I was 2... I also like to build things.
I hate the transformer prime. I want a convertible tablet, not a tablet and a little dock thingy...won't serve my purposes.
I didn't know Ziplock bags are staticy by nature. Thanks for the tip.
As far as the accelerometer, I don't know much about them but if it's super difficult I'm probably not going to bother with it. I'll maybe install a switch?
It's hard to beat windows for functionality but you might check out paint.net as a free replacement for paint.
Over all though I get the idea that you're a little in over your head on this.
Sent from my HTC Flyer using XDA App
LexusFman said:
I hate the transformer prime. I want a convertible tablet, not a tablet and a little dock thingy...won't serve my purposes.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Have you seen the Eee Pad Slider?
Also, Adobe photoshop for android = $10
https://market.android.com/details?id=air.com.adobe.pstouch&hl=en
LexusFman said:
The reason I don't like android is because It's not a desktop OS. I'll be building this tablet-y thing for graphics/image editing, word processing and a little bit of gaming in between and I'm not 100% sure about android graphics programs. I like to keep it simple and use MS Paint, then GIMP if i need a more powerful program. I'm also a windows fanboy and it's what I've been using ever since I was 2... I also like to build things.
I hate the transformer prime. I want a convertible tablet, not a tablet and a little dock thingy...won't serve my purposes.
I didn't know Ziplock bags are staticy by nature. Thanks for the tip.
As far as the accelerometer, I don't know much about them but if it's super difficult I'm probably not going to bother with it. I'll maybe install a switch?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Dude, I've got photoshop, an office suite, and tons of games, I'd never have to touch a PC again..I am a graphic designer by trade! I can even watch hulu (something not supposed to be capable of on android platforms), I've got a nice stylus and a full qwerty keyboard and mouse- I'm working on the OG transformer not the Prime, as far as I can tell the Prime was pushed too quickly and has issues with all of it's radios due to the metal shell..the TF101 does not have these issues, and the TF700 (basically the prime with the GPS and radios fixed and better resoultion) is available if you don't want to go for the OG transformer.
Seriously sounds like you're trying feverishly to open a can of worms to get a windows tablet when in reality there is no need and windows is given a run for it's money with the new ICS android on the way. Trying to unlock a windows phone after unlocking a whole bunch of Android devices would quickly turn you off of Microsoft as an OS IMO, that's what made me an Android fanboy (I was a windows guy previously, now I'm leaning more and more towards linux/android for their open source code user-friendly programability). But, if you are determined to do something the hard way = the expensive and labor/time-consuming way, no one is going to stop you
Just remember- in the world of technology things are done: Right, Cheap, and/or Fast. BUT, you can only choose two..
I've done this already with a eeePC 700.
1. The resistive touchscreen. You'll need a stylus for that.
2. Typing with a stylus is horrible.
3. It was heavy. Even when it was only 7inch screen. The battery made it heavy. (but I had 9hours of battery life)
4. You couldn't navigate the boot menu (without an external keyboard)
5. Resistive touchscreen is crap for drawing, because you still want to support your hand on the screen while drawing, which you couldn't do.
6. Moving Items around sucked (no drag and drop)
and many more.
I used it in my bed, for browsing. was good enough, until the touchscreen cable snapped. (I didn't have an external keyboard, so I had to open the tablet, connect the keyboard, and navigate the boot menu when I had to)
Hope this helped. Though it was fun to build it and use it, it's not what you would call an 'every day' tablet
romitkin said:
Good idea. Just keep in mind that the whole thing would be much heavier than a regular tablet, so holding it in hand would be difficult.
I have seen an EEE PC modded with a touchscreen, but the keyboard part was still there.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I don't think it would be much heavier, in fact I think the idea is perfect for modification of a netbook. It would probably be cheapest. since so much case modding is required and so many enclosure fabrication resources are handy, to put together a frankenstein out of 2 or 3 broken netbooks. Find someone who smashed the screen of one netbook, another one who fried the board of theirs, find a total-loss broken tablet PC (like dropped in lake michigan level of total loss so it will cost pennies) and get the ribbon cable and swivel element from there. I think if this idea is applied to a netbook it would be excellent in size and weight as well as functionality. And with the x86 version of android's progress, it could even be running android like a tablet in screen out mode, and change to webtop mode when its swiveled. Put a netbook mobile broadband card in there, many netbooks have open card expansions under the screw-out panels underneath, if not you would have to choose between wifi or taking the wifi expansion out in favor of a mobile broadband card, and certainly make sure that the card is supported by your wireless provider if you choose to go the mobile broadband route. With verizon or sprint you will most likely have to acquire a mobile broadband card out of a netbook that was originally sold by the company, but be sure to check and make sure the MEID is clean before paying anything for one, if the seller defaulted on a contract they used to acquire it, you might as well flash the thing to cricket or metroPCS and use them as your mobile broadband carrier. With either wifi or mobile broadband, as well as bluetooth, don't forget the antenna! yeah that thing you have to unhook from the other side of the card to take it out, you need that. (oh yeah, bluetooths are included as expansion cards sometimes too, if so you could always remove this to make room for the mobile broadband if you don't use bluetooth. I sure don't and probably wont until they drop the rediculous prices of non-audio bluetooth interfaces to acceptable and competative levels.)
That project actually sounds pretty freakin cool, the type of thing I'd do if I wasn't already swamped with projects. Definetly keep us posted if you decide to go through with it, as I pointed out, if you build it from netbook parts it should be well within your budget, netbooks run much cheaper then notebooks already, but a netbook is comperable in power to most current android devices and thus is suitable to handle most things you'd use a tablet PC for, just not high powered stuff like compiling code or rendering animation or playing 3d online games.
Edit: I'd like to add and point out that as a regular user of an acer netbook running ubuntu, it is wise to refrain from excessive multitasking, the atom had to sacrifice a bit of things we've become accustomed to in notebooks to meet the low power consumption and operating temperature requirements, and a lot of those things are things that mostly benefit multitasking. You will not be happy if you try and run a jillion programs at the same time.
That being said ubuntu's new primary UI, I forget what it's called evolve or something like that, it is an excellent UI for netbooks, perfectly space-optimized, especially in the vertical range which gets filled quick on lil netbook screens. I'm not sold on it and prefer to go with gnome or xfce on desktops and normal-sized notebooks, but it is top-notch on a netbook. I'd also recommend not messing with the accelerometer at first and including it later as it may be a pain to implement correctly in comparison to the limited amount of functionality it brings to the table. I'd rather have something that works personally that I can make additions to then pull my hair out trying to throw everything in the first time right.
---------- Post added at 10:14 AM ---------- Previous post was at 09:47 AM ----------
Will_nonya said:
It's hard to beat windows for functionality but you might check out paint.net as a free replacement for paint.
Over all though I get the idea that you're a little in over your head on this.
Sent from my HTC Flyer using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Have to LMAO @ this comment. If users would ever actually push developers to release for the linux platform, especially hardware manufacturers (which is ridiculous since all they would have to do is release their code open source, or even just parts of their code and the community would do the rest. Doesn't matter much tho, it's mostly crappy chinese hardware that isn't supported by linux, and their HQs more then likely don't speak enough english to be able to request anything, beleive me I've tried to contact MSI before.... most hardware worth running is fully supported tho)
But point is, I feel like it is extremely cumbersome whenever I'm forced to use windows, apart from trying to use unsupported hardware or cross-platform software (although wine and mono have made GIGANTIC leaps in usability). I pretty much never have to deal with drivers, updates to all software happens automatically, it's become so self-maintaining that I'm ashamed of how lazy of a linux user I've become. When I actually do have to do something even remotely advanced I have to think for a minute about it. Usually the only thing that really requires a lot of getting under the hood that I ever have to do is when I set up my audio-production setups which is even a lot easier now that they have dedicated repositories for them, and when set up correctly the real time preemptable kernel will run circles around any windows or OSX setup latency-wise. I was pulling lower latency with computers recording with ardour, and sequencing/synthesizing/sampling with seq24 amSynth, and qsampler, 5 years older then any PC I would test it against running windows with Reason and Protools. the Jack audio drivers that allowed software to plug audio inbetween applications directly across the PCM was just icing on the cake.
Windows is good software, but linux has certainly surpassed it by leaps and bounds. Windows still rules for gaming because of directX and industry unwillingness to port to linux, but the period of time right after Microsoft declared it was removing directX support from XP on further releases saw linux catch up with windows for a little while as they rushed wine to support the newest directX making it actually possible to actually run new releases under windowsXP even. Curses microsoft, foiled again! And off topic, but furthermore, I can't believe people still pay so much money for that god damn talking paper clip, openoffice.org ftw!
As I said windows isn't bad software, I said before in these forums actually that if windows ran a microsoft controlled repository to distribute all software for windows through, like linux, it would have similarly non-existant problems with viruses. Having people go around the wild-west of the internet downloading and installing programs from there without even thinking about it is just asking for the malware and adware problems windows experiences. Windows is good software, linux is just much better software.
Too complicated...
On a second thought how about moding a cheap Tablet with better parts. Is it even possible like are the parts such as a processor, camera, or the radio chip available for tablets and phones.
Why dnt you get a transformer?
In my opinion, it would just be better to settle for an table, prices are gonna drop really soon. The market for Eee PC's alike has diminished since the release of the ipad.
This is a wonderful opinion. The things mentioned are unanimous and needs to be appreciated by everyone.
A lot of things to doo, better start with a simple tablet and try to upgrade it if possible... dont know if its possible btw.
I did something almost like this.
Took apart a dirt cheap acer aspire one with a small 8 GB SDD.
Small 280 Atom 1.6GHz cpu and cheap intel GMA gpu.
Inverted the screen
Added a extra 512MB ram and inserted a 16GB SD card.
My battery however did not stand up to the task so i ordered a 9 cell pack.
It ran quite stable with 6 days standby or 12hours of heavy usage.
The lack of a accelerometer however made it a pain for quite a few games.
But i did have a vague plan to get value's from it into the android OS using a AVR and a few other cheap parts.
Many manufacturers still produce cheap atom notebooks like these.
But hardware specs have gotten better and better, so you should be able to pick one up for cheap still.
http://www.axiotron.com
Soooo 2008...
I'm doing this with an old pentium 3 thinkbook. I know its not really that great of a computer but it at least redeems it as a usable device.
sounds interesting will looking forward for it....
Good Idea!
The Razer ForgeTV looks to be a strong contender that could unseat the FireTV for modding, provided the software is open and hackable. There are a couple big reasons: Gigabit Ethernet, USB 3.0, and a Snapdragon 805 processor. This makes the device much more viable as a network attached storage device, in addition to faster media playback and access generally.
In addition to this, if the ForgeTV is capable of installing apps to an external storage device, the USB 3.0 speeds should kill any issues with performance that come with the limitations of USB 2.0.
The only real hardware disadvantage to the ForgeTV is the lack of optical audio out, which can thankfully be overcome with a usb soundcard, if that is really a huge issue for some people (it is for me- I like using spotify through my receiver without turning on my TV).
The biggest concern is the implementation of Lollipop. How the software will be locked down and what restrictions this places (specifically on bluetooth devices like wiimotes that do not work past android 4.2, and any issues caused by lollipop's handling of external storage and sdcard access) is a concern as always, and I'm sure there will be numerous issues to overcome on that front.
In any case, I'm excited for the release, and will certainly be picking one up when they go on sale. Let's use this thread as a place to discuss the transition, as I'm sure a lot of people will be jumping from the FireTV to the ForgeTV if the software proves flexible enough.
I'm definitely intrigued by this device. Hoping for a device with HDMI pass through, but other than that this device has everything I'm looking for. Really excited about a device that is Googlecast ready. USB 3.0 and gigabit Ethernet are big as well. Hopefully this won't be like some android phones and stay way behind on updates. That would be the main benefit of the nexus player over this I believe. As long as it's rootable, we should be ok.
Is there a capability to put another OS on the Remix Tablet? Pure android, Windows or linux would be great to have on this tablet, I couldn't find a thread that discussed it.
The tablet is having graphical distortions, volume issues and issues closing the screen with an app running. Looking to have something different if possible.
Right now, and in fact for months the answer is unfortunately no.
Which is a shame, because it's an interesting piece of kit let down by, amongst other things, an absolutely woeful implementation of AndroidOS.
It would be fantastic to try a different ROM or even a different OS, they'd unlikely be as ham fisted and cack handed in UI choices and user experience than the one deemed suitable by Jide's laughably titled quality assessment team.
I've just found my ultra tablet in a cabinet. I've been searching Internet for information if any custom rom has been made for that tablet but no luck. Anyone spotted something?
Here is a [BOUNTY] you will not want to miss out on. First complete set of instructions on how to totally jailbreak the HD8 2020 or HD8 2022 gets a cool $1000 cash once the instructions are completely verified. And another sum of equal or greater value upon full testing.
Here are the details:
The device should have no remnants of the old OS visible to the user. The interface should look as close to stock Android as possible. Setup menu, some file manager application, and a few other applications should be available if necessary. There should be no ability to side load other apps.
I am looking to push one app onto the device, which is being developed. That application is a specialized audio player taking advantage of the very decent audio properties of the HD8 2020 or 2022. The app will take a LOT of the processing power so all radios will be turned off and fixed to be non-functional. USB will work and stay in debug mode for updates and additional data xfers. Graphics will be used at a minimum. Much of the compute power of the device will be tasked with calculations and playing audio. Some of which will be calculated on the fly. Please reply if you have any further questions.
There may be other paid design/programming activities associated with this project.
I hope this is a joke.
Rortiz2 said:
I hope this is a joke.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What part is unclear? This is not a joke.
The purpose of this request is to limit the functionality of the tablet for safety of the individual using my product. Taxing the processor to do other things will take away from all of the work the processor must do maintaining the functionality of the device plugged into the USB C port that I am designing. It is not yet clear that the device needs to be rooted. At least the GUI menu needs to be closer to Android stock. I really presume that current work is fairly close to what I will need except for the following: Turn off radios permanently, replace the menus with something better than currently offered, and prevent loading other software.
Current setup that I have makes some noise, (popping) on the audio output that is not so good.
rhandel said:
What part is unclear? This is not a joke.
The purpose of this request is to limit the functionality of the tablet for safety of the individual using my product. Taxing the processor to do other things will take away from all of the work the processor must do maintaining the functionality of the device plugged into the USB C port that I am designing. It is not yet clear that the device needs to be rooted. At least the GUI menu needs to be closer to Android stock. I really presume that current work is fairly close to what I will need except for the following: Turn off radios permanently, replace the menus with something better than currently offered, and prevent loading other software.
Current setup that I have makes some noise, (popping) on the audio output that is not so good.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm sorry to be the one to burst your bubble of illusion but I'm afraid that if all you want to do requires root, you can start by buying another device (and make sure it's not from Amazon).
Your idea sounds cool, stock Android and forget about FireOS, the usual dream of Amazon Fire users. However, this is not possible in recent generations since Amazon made sure to close all the backdoors that helped us unlock older generation tablets. This includes patching the LK vulnerability (amonet), disabling bootrom mode (with efuses), always updating security patches (Amazon has always been a stickler for this), and among other very extreme security measures.
In short, the devices you are talking about are not unlockable and I really doubt that in the future they will be. My personal recommendation; try to find one of the early Amazon Fire HD10 2019s, which can be temporarily unlocked and have several ROMs based on AOSP (LineageOS, ArrowOS).
Thank you for the impassioned recommendations. I get that, and now have a better appreciation of the task.
Do you have any recommendations for newer hardware that can fill the bill? This project requires octicore hardware or better because of the need for speed/performance of newer processors to do the heavy lifting. I have had several other Android devices (off brand Chinese attempts at hardware), that are too under powered for the purpose and have too many bugs to be considered.
Here are the basics: I am looking to push one app onto the device, which is being developed. That application is a specialized audio player taking advantage of the very decent audio properties the device. The app will take a LOT of the processing power so all radios will be turned off and fixed to be non-functional. USB will work and stay in debug mode for updates and additional data xfers. Graphics will be used at a minimum. Much of the compute power of the device will be tasked with calculations and playing audio. Some of which will be calculated on the fly.
All of this can be done on an RPi 4 but I am looking to shave costs off of the device. I don't NEED android. It's a means to an end. Development costs are not the issue but ongoing costs adding to product cost are.
Rortiz2 said:
Your idea sounds cool, stock Android and forget about FireOS, the usual dream of Amazon Fire users. However, this is not possible in recent generations since Amazon made sure to close all the backdoors that helped us unlock older generation tablets. This includes patching the LK vulnerability (amonet), disabling bootrom mode (with efuses), always updating security patches (Amazon has always been a stickler for this), and among other very extreme security measures.
In short, the devices you are talking about are not unlockable and I really doubt that in the future they will be. My personal recommendation; try to find one of the early Amazon Fire HD10 2019s, which can be temporarily unlocked and have several ROMs based on AOSP (LineageOS, ArrowOS).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Can we put this information somewhere easy to find for people (like me) searching for ways to "free" the newer generations? I have spent quite some time to find information about rooting possibilities for the 12th generation of Fire 8 HD and not been able to find it. But here, in a Thread certainly not meant fo me, i found them
MarvinGS said:
Can we put this information somewhere easy to find for people (like me) searching for ways to "free" the newer generations? I have spent quite some time to find information about rooting possibilities for the 12th generation of Fire 8 HD and not been able to find it. But here, in a Thread certainly not meant fo me, i found them
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
MarvinGS,
The bottom line is that the prospects are fewer and fewer because of the tightening down of the Android system. And the very custom hardware used in many new devices. It is NOT as trivial as it used to be. And intentionally so. Amazon has a vested interest in keeping things from people like you and I.
I am looking for cheap hardware to make a larger project and will probably go with dedicated hardware to get the features that I need. I was merely looking for the video and some light computing to be done by Android. The devices still don't have enough power to do what I need them to do.
RAH