Messages

46

TinyTV & Tiny Video Player / Re: TSVConverter Lockups/Freeze (supported video types)

« on: June 20, 2023, 10:08:10 AM »

Unfortunately the converter isn't working at all for me. I'm a tech savvy person. It's Mp4 files and everything, some ripped from youtube (so maybe they have extra data or something) and others just normal Mp4s. IN all cases the converter just crashes as soon as it open the file :'( :'(

What operating system are you using? (Windows 7/8/10/11, Linux, or macOS 12/13)

47

TinyTV & Tiny Video Player / Re: TinyTVConverter.app crashes on launch

« on: June 19, 2023, 10:52:30 AM »

We're looking into it. it's very likely that using macOS 13 (Ventura) will solve this but we want to get it to work on older versions as well.

48

TinyDuino Processors & TinyShields / Re: USB Shield Question - USB Host?

« on: June 12, 2023, 04:57:35 PM »

Hello there,

I'm working on a small project using a TinyZero - essentially a data-storage unit that I can connect to my computer and read data from. However, I would like to utilize it on-the-go thanks to it's small size. One solution is using an equally-portable USB Host device that can read and display my data-storage TinyZero's signals, in place of my computer. I know there is a USB shield, but it normally is used for programming Tinyduinos that did not have a built-in USB port.

Though, since it refers to "add[ing] USB communication capabilities to your projects" in the description (and that it mentions this as a separate, distinct function from programming the board), and also that the "entire USB protocol [is] handled on the chip" in the Tech Specs, I'm wondering: can this shield also be used as a USB Host? If so, that would be super helpful for my project!

If it cannot be used as a USB Host, is there at least a way to read data sent from the TinyZero's USB port without using a computer?

Could provide more details about what you mean by wanting to "utilize it on-the-go?" What exactly would the TinyZero be talking to if it's not a computer?

I don't think the USB TinyShield can be used as a host controller.

There is an Arduino USB host library that may work with the TinyZero: https://www.arduino.cc/reference/en/libraries/usbhost/

49

TinyTV & Tiny Video Player / Re: Video too fast on device?

« on: June 07, 2023, 10:31:51 AM »

Hi there!

Every video I have attempted to convert through the video conversion app plays back fine in the application, but once loaded onto my TinyTV2, the video plays back suuuper quickly, like 4x speed. Playing back the converted video through VLC works fine, too.

Is anyone else having this issue? If so, how have you been able to remedy it?

Hello,

Could you attach/send a video that has this problem?

Thanks,
Jason

50

TinyDuino Processors & TinyShields / Re: Having trouble with using WIFI and GPS same time

« on: June 05, 2023, 10:28:47 AM »

HI Ken. I am using the GPSLogger software fort he GPS but as soon as I insert #include <WiFi101.h> the compiler errors out. I did check the lines where the pins are set in GPS.h and it seems they match your suggestions. Is there I am missing here?

I am using  -- WiFi TinyShield with the example to sent a string from https://docs.arduino.cc/tutorials/mkr-1000-wifi/wifi-101-library-examples

In my case the GPS along and the WIFi alone work fine. It is the addition of the library that causes issues.

Would you be able to provide the error that gets printed to the Arduino console?

Thanks.

51

General Discussion / Re: Serial communication with TinyScreen+

« on: May 17, 2023, 11:25:04 AM »

Good Day guys I got some questions about the serial communication.

I understand that the USB serial and the Serial on the board are separate ports as if I want to see some info on the serial monitor on the screen I have to use SerialUSB. print ("something") but how can I use the TX and RX on the board? how should I call them? also what is the voltage that I need? I know arduino is 5v on the logic levels but not sure about Tiny Screen+, I got a project where I have to connect a ESP32 Feather to a TinyScreen+ and the Feather works with 3.3v levels.

I'm a bit lost and will appreciate all the help in this matter.

Cheers
Gerardo

Hello,

For voltage, the TinyScreen+ should work with 3.3V since the operating voltage range is 2.7V ~ 5.5V. You can check that yourself in "Tech Specs" on this page https://tinycircuits.com/products/tinyscreenplus.

Most of the information you are looking for can be found in the boards package for our samd21 based processor boards. You can download the latest boards package at this link: https://github.com/TinyCircuits/Arduino-Boards/raw/main/Packages/tinycircuits-samd-1.1.0.zip. You can extract that if you would like to follow along with how I figured this out.

Looking at the SAMD21 datasheet (https://ww1.microchip.com/downloads/en/DeviceDoc/SAM-D21DA1-Family-Data-Sheet-DS40001882G.pdf) I saw some stuff about SERCOM that can be used for extra serial ports. Next, I checked the variant files (standard Arduino board package files) called ''variant.h' and variant.cpp' which are located at 'tinycircuits-samd-1.1.0\1.1.0\variants\tinyscreen_p'. I checked these to see if there was any usage of the extra ports first (just had a hunch that they might be used or exposed in an Arduino kind of way).

You can see at the bottom of 'variant.h' that there are some extra SERCOM UART objects:

Code: [Select]

extern Uart Serial;
extern Uart Serial1;

At the bottom of 'variant.cpp' you can see

Code: [Select]

// Multi-serial objects instantiation
SERCOM sercom0( SERCOM0 ) ;
SERCOM sercom1( SERCOM1 ) ;
SERCOM sercom2( SERCOM2 ) ;
SERCOM sercom3( SERCOM3 ) ;
SERCOM sercom4( SERCOM4 ) ;
SERCOM sercom5( SERCOM5 ) ;

Uart Serial( &sercom0, PIN_SERIAL_RX, PIN_SERIAL_TX, PAD_SERIAL_RX, PAD_SERIAL_TX ) ;
Uart Serial1( &sercom5, PIN_SERIAL1_RX, PIN_SERIAL1_TX, PAD_SERIAL1_RX, PAD_SERIAL1_TX ) ;

So now we need to find which pins are associated with SERCOM0 and SERCOM5 and see if they're exposed on our protoboard shield (https://tinycircuits.com/products/proto-board-tinyshield). Using the protoboard shield should be fairly easy, but we also have a solution for solderless connections with this shield https://tinycircuits.com/products/proto-terminal-blocks-tinyshield. We'll need to check that the correct pins are exposed for SERCOM0 or SERCOM5.

Looking at the top comment in 'variant.cpp' we can see a list of pins and their relation to each SERCOM port (as well as a bunch of extra stuff). Glancing around we see that each SERCOM port has 4 pins (we should only need two though for UART, we'll figure that out later, the extra pins are probably so you can setup SPI or other protocols). Looking at the comment we see the following:

SERCOM0 pins:

• SERCOM0/PAD[0]: PA08
• SERCOM0/PAD[1]: PA09
• SERCOM0/PAD[2]: PA10
• SERCOM0/PAD[3]: PA11

SERCOM5 pins:

• SERCOM5/PAD[0]: PA22
• SERCOM5/PAD[1]: PA23
• SERCOM5/PAD[2]: PB22
• SERCOM5/PAD[3]: PB23

Now that we know all the pins we need, let's see if they're exposed through the proto or terminal shields.

Here's a list of schematics we'll need to look through:

• TinyScreen+: https://github.com/TinyCircuits/TinyCircuits-TinyScreenPlus-ASM2022/raw/master/design_files/ASM2022_Rev4.pdf
• Proto shield: https://github.com/TinyCircuits/TinyCircuits-TinyShield-Proto_All-ASD2009/raw/master/design_files/ASD2009.pdf
• Terminal shield: https://github.com/TinyCircuits/TinyCircuits-TinyShield-Proto_Term-ASD2005/raw/master/design_files/ASD2005_Rev2.pdf

Looking at the TinyScreen+ schematic we can see that the pins for SERCOM0 get called the following:

SAMD21/SERCOM0  pins to TinyScreen+ schematic pins:

• SERCOM0/PAD[0]: PA08 -> IO4
• SERCOM0/PAD[1]: PA09 -> IO3
• SERCOM0/PAD[2]: PA10 -> IO1
• SERCOM0/PAD[3]: PA11 -> IO0

Now looking at the schematic for the solder proto shield we can see in the "External Connections" block that IO0, IO1, IO3, and IO4 are exposed on through-hole pads on the shield. On the product page (https://tinycircuits.com/products/proto-board-tinyshield) in the 4th picture you can see where these pins are physically located.

Turns out those pins are also available on the solderless terminal block shield too. In the schematic they are located on J2 and are called "0 RX" and "1 TX" on the physical PCB. Since we only need one extra serial port, we won't verify if SERCOM5 has exposed pins.

Knowing all of that, you should be able to use the 'Serial' object (not 'SerialUSB' and not 'Serial1') to run the "0 RX" and "1 TX" pins on the terminal shield, or likely pins 'IO0' (RX) and '1' (TX) as marked on the proto board shield. As you know, the functions you'll have available should be mostly the same as is listed here: https://www.arduino.cc/reference/en/language/functions/communication/serial/#:~:text=your%20device%E2%80%99s%20ground.-,Functions,-if(Serial)

That's a lot of information, but I wanted to give you the path I followed to verify everything. Hopefully the information I gave you works, otherwise you could try debugging it through the information above or you can ask me more questions.

Hope this helps!

52

TinyTV & Tiny Video Player / Re: TSVConverter Lockups/Freeze (supported video types)

« on: May 16, 2023, 12:48:41 PM »

Hello. I love the TinyTV hardware, but I'm having trouble converting videos.

Basically, almost every video I try to open in TSVConverter causes the program to freeze immediately (Not Responding) when I open the file.

So far, I've only been able to successfully convert 1 video file using TSVConverter. That video was an MP4 (Codec: H264 - MPEG-4 AVC (part 10) (avc1)).


What video formats are supported?

Is there an error log somewhere that I can see what problem the program is having?

Would you be able to send an example video that I can try? I can diagnose the issue better that way. Most video types should be supported.

You should be able to add a file to a comment here or you can email us at info@tinycircuits.com.

53

TinyDuino Processors & TinyShields / Re: lithium battery management on TinyZero

« on: May 16, 2023, 12:46:06 PM »

In practical terms, what does 'lithium battery management' mean for the TinyZero. Does it turn off so the battery does not go below a certain voltage? Also, does the lithium battery charge when the tinyzero is plugged in via the usb cable?

Any help/insight appreciated, and thanks in advance to anyone who replies 

The batteries themselves have circuitry that shuts off their output when the voltage gets low enough.

The battery management on the TinyZero is just the charging circuit. When not plugged in, the TinyZero will draw power from the battery as long as the battery voltage doesn't get too low and the battery shuts off its output. When plugged in, the TinyZero draws power from USB while at the same time the USB is used to charge the battery.

54

TinyTV & Tiny Video Player / Re: Is the video limit only 10?

« on: May 16, 2023, 10:18:32 AM »

I wanted to put alot of my old child hood shows on this. I put 11 videos on jt and when I turn it on the screen stays black. If I delete 1 video and turn it on itll play just fine. (Side note I can't get the settings to work on this either.) Any help would be appreciated

EDIT*  I I kinda figured out my issue. I updated my tiny tv kit with the update feature from the website.  It would only read.avi files now and was limited to 10 videos. Also no settings were available for that

Yes, the firmware that's being distributed through the update page has a limit of 10 videos on the DIY platform. We're looking into increasing it.

55

New Product Ideas / Re: TinyTV 2 custom or varied casings

« on: May 16, 2023, 10:15:28 AM »

As excited I am for the release of the pre-built TinyTV 2, I’m not a huge fan of the casing/box design. Perhaps in the future there could be options either prebuilt or for kits to have different style tv boxes? (thinking of all the design variations the Tiny TV Classics had) Or at least maybe an option to have the prebuilt TinyTV 2 come in a color other than metallic grey?

Unfortunately it takes a lot of time to develop additional case designs, so that probably won't happen anytime soon. We're unsure about colors right now, we'd likely only do that with enough demand.

56

Thumby / Re: Where is data stored on the Thumby?

« on: May 12, 2023, 09:51:10 AM »

Where is data stored on the Thumby?

Do you mean, how do you view the data on Thumby? Go to https://code.thumby.us/ and connect your Thumby, you'll be able to see all the files.

If you really want to know where, it is stored on a persistent flash IC that the RP2040 microcontroller communicates with.

57

General Discussion / Re: UBlox GPS

« on: May 11, 2023, 02:14:06 PM »

Are you (TinyCircuits) still planning on offering a UBlox GPS board soon?

Let us know...thanks...john

We are not planning on releasing a GPS board anytime in the near future.

58

TinyDuino Processors & TinyShields / Re: How to use MPLab X with the Tiny Zero

« on: May 09, 2023, 02:19:44 PM »

Hello, as the title says how do I use MPLab X for generating code for the Tiny Zero Boards. I need to use MPLab X, rather than Arduino for a number of reasons, including issues with the SERCOMs. Is there an easy way to do this?

I looked into it and there doesn't seem to be an easy way to support that IDE. It looks possible but there would be lots of time, debugging, and configuration involved.

These are the links I looked at:

• https://microchipdeveloper.com/harmony:new-bsp-step1
• https://microchipdeveloper.com/harmony3:samd21-getting-started-training-module-step1

59

General Discussion / Re: Remove TinyTV buffer

« on: May 01, 2023, 10:26:54 AM »

Is there a way to remove the tv buffer effect. I want the files to play from the start when I select them, is there a way to do that?

Looking through the tutorial page https://learn.tinycircuits.com/Kits/TinyTV-Tutorial/, there doesn't seem to be a built-in way to do that, if there was it would be in the settings menu.

You would need to edit the TinyTV code and compile your own version of the firmware and then upload it. You can learn how to program your TinyTV here: https://learn.tinycircuits.com/Kits/Tiny-Video-Program/

60

Thumby / Re: Game Fast Executes and Emulates but won't play normally

« on: March 27, 2023, 10:45:21 AM »

Your game seems to work fine for me. I can save it to Thumby and run it from the main menu.

This probably means your game's main file is not in a folder with the same name. In the editor use File -> Set Path and make sure the path to your game is exactly: /Games/AsteroidsClone/AsteroidsClone.py