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Re: [ts-7000] Re: looking for another solution.

To: <>
Subject: Re: [ts-7000] Re: looking for another solution.
From: "Charlie Wallace" <>
Date: Mon, 18 Aug 2008 10:18:22 -0700
>> I'm not an expert on any of this yet just a review and a quick run
> down of what you have had to do so far looks to me to be a typical
> engineering project with the typical engineering difficulties.  It's
> called _research_ and development for a reason.  LOL.
>

And this is a typical response to these sort of questions, you're reminding me 
of the definition of research and 
development, however you've plainly missed the part called research, which is 
me writing to the list with my list of 
issues and seeking help, even if it is looking for another platform that 
someone else may have run into. I have 
posted questions and when i can the answers to some of them for other people, 
some remain unsolved.


> I don't see anything that you mentioned that's not capable of being
> worked on a TS-7300 or, for that matter, just about any PC-104 core.
> Point being that if you search for another core, you may find
> yourself with the same sort of issues, difficulties, and research
> efforts.

Once you've done everything I listed on the TS7300 properly, then let me know, 
otherwise you're guessing,  the 
TS-BAT3 isn't the right solution for instance, the onboard CAN that comes with 
the enclosure won't talk to anything 
other than the same part from TS, which is useless for me, which means adding 
the TS-CAN1, which means the enclosure 
no longer fits. I checked with TS before i bought anything and they'd told me 
that it ran at 1Mbps, but after i 
bought it and it didn't, some extra checking turned up that yes indeed it does, 
but only to another TS enclosure, 
they did offer to sell me the TS-CAN1 at a lower cost, they're a very decent 
shop like that, however it did only 
lead me on to the problem of having extra hardware in the box. However next 
time someone calls up and asks, they'll 
be able to give them the right answer and the possible caveat about the 
enclosure too ( if you need a second board), 
they may even make the enclosure a few mm bigger next time they go to build 
one, or perhaps they'll adjust the 
hardware on the enclosures CAN so it will talk to other 1Mbps parts.

This is why I pooled the list to see if anyone has had any luck doing what i 
want with a different board, or even 
this one, see above for your explanation on 'research'.


> How much effort and time did you invest in to the TS-7300 solution?
> Two or three months?  It may be that if you start looking at other
> platforms you will invest about the same amount of time and probably
> turn up different issues and diffiulties.  }:-}
>

Picked my TS 7300 up around last november, each time i've conquered one hurdle, 
i've hit another one, bought the 
hardware to do what i need and gone one to the next problem from there, i've 
put a lot of time into it, and i've 
certainly gotten close with it.

I replaced it with a mini PC on saturday, and had it all up and running by 
sunday since my code is cross platform 
and the drivers for all the plug in stuff i have just worked first time, i'd 
rather not have to use a mini pc 
option, but its so far viable enough to allow me to continue development until 
i do find the right board, and it 
even turned out to be cheaper with more horsepower, all i have to do is make it 
use something other than a hard 
drive, which is straightforward, i replaced the power unit with a dc-dc 
convertor with intelligent sleep and 
shutdown all ACPI.

I did have the TS box mostly working, but after having it installed for a week 
the TS-BAT3 went kaput, which meant 
i'd have to find a new solution, the dc-dc convertor i used for the mini pc 
would have worked for it, and i could 
have written drivers for it to use the sleep/shutdown modes, but then i'd still 
be faced with the other problems.

> On the other hand it's Hell yarking off down the wrong road and
> finding failure at the end because it's impossible or cosly to
> continue with a platform that just plain ole don't work.

which is exactly why i posted this to the list, i've had a couple of replies 
off list and found a couple of very 
interesting boards, i've also replied with the other systems i've found that 
might be interesting to others.

> Other people certainly _must_ have done much the same as you have
> done.  If you're using the Debian distribution on the TS-7300, you
> might consider going to:
>
> http://forums.debian.net/index.php
>
> And discussing your issues in the discussion forum.  There are a
> large number of engineers in that forum that know what they're doing.
>

There might be other people that have done it, again thats why i posted to this 
list, a couple of people have been 
very helpful getting things going, but some questions seem to remain 
outstanding, and they've been asked by others, 
the documentation has been improved as time has passed, but it still could be 
improved, i may have missed or 
misinterpreted the answers, but i see the questions pop up from time to time.

All but one of the problems i am having are possibly debian related, otherwise 
its the hardware, so a debian board 
or other such forum would not help, the touchscreen i may find help elsewhere 
and i've certainly tried but the most 
common answer is the least useful one, upgrade to 2.6, which is a sort of 
similar answer to yours, it states the 
obvious but it misses out on all the details and whether or not its practical 
or even possible to do, so that would 
mean again i'm posting on the right list.

If i were to upgrade to 2.6 and the framebuffer drivers and SD card stuff all 
worked properly that'd probably mean 
my touchscreen would probably start working, then i'd only be left with getting 
a new enclosure, the dc to dc 
convertor would work, i'd just need to write additonal software for it, but i'd 
still be faced with the slow SD card 
acess, having to use an extra memory buffer for alpha blending, perhaps too 
slow performance at 800x600, if the FPGA 
driven framebuffer driver is what causes the problems with the Xenarc 
redetecting the display modes, etc, and as i 
mentioned in my first post, i'd be working on solving problems that perhaps are 
already solved elsewhere, and then i 
could focus on finishing my project.




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