Hi!

I have had my empeg for 2 weeks now, and i love it. But i want more features ;-) - Now i want to build a CD-Changer emulator for my Sony cd-changer. A friend and i would be able to make an RS232 interface to it, but i don't have the programming skills to make the software. So my question is now, would anyone be willing to help making the software for the EMPEG if i could reverse-engineeer the electronics to make an interface ?

I'm assuming you've read the FAQ entry on this subject?

If you do manage to pull this off, it would be an interesting and impressive project. Make sure that you figure out a way to overlay your CD changer controls atop the AUX input screen on the empeg. Then document and photograph everything so that others can duplicate your work.

It actually doesn't seem that un-doable to me... In college, a friend of mine designed a device to do exactly what you are talking about, only using the parallel interface instead... It essentially watched the port, and when it saw certain ascii digits, it used the first nibble of the byte to grab the x-axis and the second nibble to grab the y-axis, thus giving him a way to in effect "push" the buttons on a 4x4 remote electronically (16 button Max). all you would need to is wire the damn thing correctly to make the appropriate contacts when the correct byte was sent through. I.E. button a1 would be ascii byte 136 or binary 10001000. Button a2 would be ascii 132 or binary 10000100. Get the gist? I'll try to dig up the circuit for you.

Not exactly on topic, but this is another cool circuit...

http://www.ee.washington.edu/circuit_archive/circuits/PCIR/Welcome.html

OK... I still can't find it... I'll try and call Jay sometime tomorrow and see if he still has the circuit and software. (will have to be rewritten as it's in pascal)

Meanwhile, this is a another weird, albeit kinda cool, project.

http://www.cedmagic.com/tech-info/remote-control/f-g-remote.html

Sony Unilink info:

http://users.ntplx.net/~andrew/unilink/

More info (general info, but whomever posted the initial question might have his solution by now): http://www.chipcenter.com/circuitcellar/askus/apr00/Q3_00_25.htm


Bruno

Great guys, i'll be talking to my mate about this later today.

the site http://www.cus.org.uk/~cleggy/ has A LOT of info on Unilink. THey have sorted the Computer used as a CD Changer with a headunit, and mapped out nearly all of the commands used on the bus. There is someone on the BBS that has done a computer controlling a changer, but the main emphasis of their project is a mp3 changer emulator.

I, like yourself, am interested in the empeg controlling a changer unit.

Hmm... The link doesn't seem to work at the moment, but i'll try it later.

Try this.....

http://gnunilink.sourceforge.net/

I found it while looking at other options for an mp3 player for the car (PJRC) it looks very interesting, I am wondering if with a bit of tinkering if we could get the PIC to send controls to the empeg so it can be controlled by the sony's remote. Again for me hardware is ok, but software ???? Right over my head.

Willing to offer any help I can give to this project, I am planning to try the PIC project anyway as an alternative to my noisy XA-300.

How exciting, my first empeg project.

Cris.

UMMM, having re-read this group, feel a bit thick, you want to add a sony cd changer to the empeg. One has to ask why, but could help with my little venture from the software point of view.

this sounds really interesting...
I'd like to see this play out to something...
I haven't used C in a while, but I'd like to help if at all possible...

Great, i now think i have sufficient information to start playing around with it... The First step will be makine a Unilink -> RS232 converter and make it work bi-directional under windows, when i have that working i'lll post the code and hope someone is willing to try and help me (read: make the linux code) with my ideas for the project.

Has anyone that is having a go with this project got very far at all with it?
Ive got the hardware built, now just have to learn some PIC programming skills!