CRT video signal

[Guest F14CRAZY]

Howdy. My ECC's CRT has been going in and out the past few days. The touch digitizer still works when it's out. I'm gonna talk to a couple local TV repair dudes (Lansing is the Reatta capital anyway).

Anyone know if these things use like a composite video signal or is it proprietary? I've thought of getting an LCD the same size and using it in place of the old Zenith CRT. I don't think the world has an endless supply of these little CRTs and they're not going to last quite forever.

[Ames63]

Crazy,

Your question is on my to do list, I was actually wondering if there was a compnay that would create an up to date/modern (color) touch screen, with the same functionality as the existing unit. One question for you, the new monitor/computer system you installed in your baby. Can it talk to the cars control modules such that you can control things from a host computer?

[Guest F14CRAZY]

Yeah I don't have an interface with my PC on board and dunno if one could be made. May be possible but would be rather complicated and probably expensive.

Color would be cool, but that's what a Trofeo is for.

I'm thinking maybe it's like an RCA jack type signal. It would be nice if a small LCD could be used instead, cuz these old CRTs won't be around forever

[Duke]

I was thinking of trying to make a palm work as an ecm. And then set up the docking station as a link so that when the palm is hooked up it'll run and when you take the palm out there is no ecm so the car wouldn't work. I've seen palms with aldl cables, and there are programs small emough to run on palms that can emulate an ecm. I just wander how well it would work.

[Guest crtnrds]

I love reading the Brainiacs posts. Especially when they work out their theories then translate them into English so that we all can benefit.

[Guest F14CRAZY]

I thought you were the CRT nerd <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

[Duke]

I'm not a brainiac just a dreamer (I reserve the right to claim the title of brainiac when I get it to work )

If I do get it to work though it would be able to just about any engine that you could swap, and it could have boost controls for super/turbocharging. Also the possibility to have a built in dyno with easy to use tuning. And not to forget the security of knowing that unless thieves load it on a flat bed it ain't going anywhere with out the palm (that could also be a bad thing too).

Oh well, all of this is a long way off for me, but if anyone else runs with the idea and gets it to work or finds out some reason why it wouldn't work feel free to tell me.

[sahein]

According to the patent, it is VGA.

[Guest F14CRAZY]

VGA? Really? Hmmm...that can't be that bad then. What's the patent?

[Guest F14CRAZY]

A googled link to standard VGA pinout

I don't know how I would go about wiring this up...

The ECC has a coax "video" wire. What would this connect to? I'm thinking that the signal is just black/white, but VGA uses 3 colors...

The horizontal sync of the ECC is coax. Would the outside layer of the coax connect to the VGA's horiontal sync, then the inside wire to ground?

Again, 8A-83-2 of the "Electrical Diagnosis" section of the FSM has the ECC's pinout.

[Guest F14CRAZY]

I've found a VGA connector in inventory. Back to the Experimentory...I'll let you guys know what happens

[Guest F14CRAZY]

So...

I cut the yellow wire going to the ECC, which is for vertical sync, and soldered it to pin 14 on my VGA connector. I soldered the middle pin of the red ECC connector that's for horizontal sync to pin 13. And, I decided to solder the middle pin of the "video signal" wire to pin 2, which is green. I didn't get any signal from my old Compaq CRT ("check video cable").

I didn't do anything with grounds. Do I have to?

[sahein]

Yes

http://www.freepatentsonline.com/4787040.pdf

[Guest imported_dantm4]

In TV terms coax is most often used in Radio Frequency applications - your computer monitor shouldn't work, then again maybe the coax isn't used in a traditional tv monitor sense (didn't have time to read though all the patent pages). If it doesn't you could try it with one of those DVD converters and see if it would work with a television. You can get touchscreens from numerous companies on the web like http://www.trolltouch.com/. To get color you might have to rewrite the computer code though. I remember an old post here that said the computer was an IBM of some sort, would think you could write a program that would run on your car-puter and emulate it, not quite sure how you would interface it though, probably more diagram searching. Good luck, I know that you have the enthusiasm and dedication to make it work. I'm guessing that my 90 won't be able to do any of it.

-Dan

90' Black/Tan Coupe

[Guest F14CRAZY]

I think I'm going to give up for now on this one. In some future day and age, this will be reverse engineered. Until then...Jim Finn has reasonably priced, tested CRT assemblies <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

[Guest imported_Fox W.]

This sounds like what I proposed in a couple older threads, sorry it didn't work out though, and more sorry that I didn't get around to it myself, I started that project about 3 years ago and dropped it. Though I should mention that a color CRT is useless unless you just care about a computer being connected to it. The Reatta CRTC has no color to offer a color screen. Hey F14, how you been? I'm surprised you forgot our past research on this matter, heh heh, we knew it was VGA back in 2005, atleast I thought so! We should work on this someday.

Signal Inteface, CRTC to CRT

Touch-screen controller connection pinout

[Don B.]

I picked up a 5.6" LCD monitor and a VGA to video adaptor.

I have not tried it yet but I will make a posting when I do.

[Guest imported_Fox W.]

The whole thing is really frustrating when you think about it all. Let's say we get the video thing done (and I have no doubt we will, that's the easiest part) so you have the Reatta stuff on the LCD. We overlay the touch-membrane onto the LCD so that we can have the six screen selection buttons and be able to touch-interface with the Reatta's computer. Let's say we are lucky enough that things line up so well that the touch-points match the display item points and so we don't have to calibrate it (because guess what, we can't.) Now all we have is a suitable CRT replacement without the dimming or ideal color match. We can't touch-interface with a computer, even if the LCD we used was a touch screen it cannot be used now. The CRT was matched to have the right green in day-mode and be more aqua at night like the EL, the LCD screen would just constantly display a bright and very green image. (it's actually pretty neat when you think that they got these two very different technologies (LED, CRT) to come really close to the EL's aqua color for night mode.) Another thing is if one intends to display something else (such as an additional computer to the Reatta's) one would have to remote the video input switch (since thats all going to be contained now within your dash), and again no touch-interface to that device, wireless track-ball maybe? Atleast for me it just wouldn't be worth it unless it acted like the stock setup and let me touch-interface with an additional computer.

[manikmekanik]

Why can't the VGA signal leave the car's computer, then pass thru the added CPU via video-input, then CPU controls monitor display, and ECM controls input from touch screen.

OR, run all CRT features thru CPU, passing needed data thru to ECM. Kinda like using the CPU to "filter" all data passing to & from the new CRT & ECM/ECU. A touch button could appear on-screen to toggle between CPU & ECM.

Great one for you "Bread-oarders" out there! Build/buy a card to plug into the CPU!

[Guest imported_Fox W.]

Can you clarify? I don't understand "ECM controls input from touch screen." There are many control modules; the ECM is one of the many back-end modules to this interface. The only front-end is what we usually call the CRT controller or CRTC, which is a GM tailored IBM 8088 computer. The CRT does nothing but display, and a panel that overlays the CRT is a separate module that has a bunch of data wires for communicating to the CRTC which section we have touched, and for changing displayed screens when we touch one of the 6 buttons. Now passing the video out of the CRTC to a video-in on a modern computer is certainly doable, but that doesn't at all address how to interface with the 8088 computer, it just addresses how to view the summary screen, and you would be stuck there. I understand that the rest of your post is either saying that as an alternative one could adapt a touch-screen LCD's data to communicate with the Reatta's 8088 computer, and do away with the whole touch-screen that overlays the CRT. (This is another option that has been discussed, one would have to figure out how to also trigger the function that those 6 buttons do, and they are all independent functions, its not so easy as a single cycle button for going through the menus.) Or you are saying lets do away with the Reatta's 8088, CRT, and touch-screen module and just run everything the 8088 does and displays on a modern PC and have that modern PC communicate everything necessary on the Reatta's serial bus. Well that WOULD be the most ideal thing by far, it would solve everything, it is also the most difficult option of all. Even for someone like myself who has access to all the equipment of a hardware lab (I currently work at EMC) with PROM/EPROM/EEPROM readers, there are so many obstacles to address to do that sort of reverse-engineering. It can be done, and I agree it is the way to go, will it happen though? Forgive me if I have misunderstood your ideas or question.