[Guardian]

Very nice! Looks cool.

[SpookyZalost]

so I did pick up a capture card recently, I'll be taking pictures of what my wearable glasses desktop looks like probably in the next few days, just gotta route it through a composite switch modded to split video

[SpookyZalost]

sorry about leaving this abandoned for so long but I wanted to talk a bit about where I am with this.

still works great using a raspi 3 but it still feels like it's missing something.

on top of that there's more and more SBC's (single board computers), coming out all the time and I've been following their development to see if I can find one that not only supports composite video in some form but one that has both a GPIO and a different kind of CPU.

to that end right now I've been looking into one board that actually uses an X86 based CPU instead of an ARM based one allowing the user to run regular linux software on.

I don't have to tell you how much this speeds up not only development but also troubleshooting and such.

there's one other idea I've been experimenting with though, I've been using raspi-zero's as remote terminals so I can use their GPIO remotely, it's making me wonder if I can do things that way with just a bunch of specialized one's designed with a connector of sorts that allows me to clip onto/tap into various hardware lines and such then just ssh into and run software to capture/send data without directly connecting to the unit.

so that's where I am right now... the interface is still rather boring and work has kept me from optimizing it graphically for the low resolution of the video glasses.

[SpookyZalost]

I'm getting back into the swing of things with this project, mostly because I've been waiting for technology to catch up.  so here's the deal, I'm thinking of building a prototype a lot closer to my original concept soon, maybe have it ready by january.  I'm sort of excited because if everything works like I hope this will be a functional cyberdeck I can carry around with me.

so here is the list of parts I'm going to acquire.

1 Amiga 1200 3D printed case (remake) $94.50

1 tenkeyless mechanical keyboard kit $32



a set of mechanical switches and keys

switches: $1 per switch avg
key's, full set approx $50

a trackball to fit in the numpad space: $50 - $80 depending on quality and where you get it.



that's my thoughts so far... as far as the computer part I'm actually interested in a few single board computers that are coming out now that have PCI-E slots which means you can use standard and or low profile components, that or utilizing whatever one has good video output with decent CPU performance.

there are 8 core SBC's now!


for example the O-Droid UX4

* Samsung Exynos5422 Cortex™-A15 2Ghz and Cortex™-A7 Octa core CPUs
* Mali-T628 MP6(OpenGL ES 3.1/2.0/1.1 and OpenCL 1.2 Full profile)
* 2Gbyte LPDDR3 RAM PoP stacked
* eMMC5.0 HS400 Flash Storage
* 2 x USB 3.0 Host, 1 x USB 2.0 Host
* Gigabit Ethernet port
* HDMI 1.4a for display
* Size : 83 x 58 x 20 mm approx.(excluding cooler)
* Power: 5V/4A input
* Linux Kernel 4.14 LTS


pretty good for a single board computer lol, and considering I'll be using a TUI instead of a full on GUI the power is less important than the over all capabilities.

edit: wanted to update because I found this!




I can get one for around $56, it's an industrial panel mount trackball.  normally used for kiosks but the trackball doesn't come out without taking the back off (so good for carrying) and should be around the right size and shape to fit the numpad!  plus it looks awesome as hell with the brushed metal look.

[Guardian]

That looks pretty sweet!

[SpookyZalost]

I wanted to update this with something small.

there's a new CPU I think is better suited for this... mostly because it's capable of using a desktop graphics card!

the latte panda alpha.



this thing has some pretty amazing specs.

[*]CPU：Intel 7th Gen Core m3-7y30
[*]Core：1.6-2.6GHz Dual-Core，Four-Thread
[*]Benchmark (PassMark): Up to 3500, double computing power compared with same price range products in the market
[*]Graphics：Intel HD Graphics 615, 300-900MHz
[*]RAM：8G LPDDR3 1866MHz Dual-Channel
[*]Memory：64GB eMMC V5.0l
[*]External Memory：
            1x M.2 M Key, PCIe 4x, Supports NVMe SSD and SATA SSD
            1x M.2 E Key, PCIe 2x，Supports USB2.0, UART, PCM
[*]Connectivity：
            WIFI 802.11 AC, 2.4G & 5G
            Dual Band Bluetooth 4.2
            Gigabyte Ethernet
[*]USB Ports：
            3x USB 3.0 Type A
            1x USB Type C, supports PD, DP, USB 3.0
[*]Display：
            HDMI Output
            Type-C DP Support
            Extendable eDP touch displays
[*]Co-processor：Arduino Leonardo
[*]GPIO & Other Features：2x 50p GPIOs including I2C, I2S, USB, RS232, UART, RTC，Power Management，Extendable power button，everything you need
[*]OS Support：
Windows 10 Pro
Linux Ubuntu

but the big thing is that it has double the gpio pins of a raspberry pi and has a 1x M.2 M Key, PCIe 4x, which combined with an adaptor allows you to use a pcie x4 adapter to add a desktop expansion slot which can be used for just about anythign including a GPU!

this is important because this would give it enough power for true VR capability just like fictional cyberdecks allowing you to interface with it like so.


or at least that's the goal, it's actually plausible now provided the software is setup.

long story short... you can build a laptop scale device, with a desktop graphics card, enough power supply to run it, enough interface to quite literally control anything by directly interfacing with it and bypassing it's control interface board and have enough power to interface with it using an oculus rift!

however... you might still need a pretty beefy battery pack to run it.

[Guardian]

That looks nice!

[SpookyZalost]

The research is coming along really nicely so I'm very happy with how it's going.

I'm hoping to have something compatible to a laptop with a lot of versatility as far as what It can and cannot do given it can directly interface with mechanical systems easily enough by bypassing the control board... so very much like a hacking device out of "insert cyberpunk dark future/hacker movie here"

[Darth-Apple]

Just got caught up with this a bit. Looking very nice! Love the 3D printed case and the retro designs and keyboards! The mouse actually looks pretty freaking cool.

As for the SWIM interface, this I think is just about the best thing I've ever seen. I can't even begin to imagine how much time must have been spent by somebody to design that. I'd probably wind up using it honestly.

And the core m3 powered board looks really nice as well. ARM processors have come quite a long way in a few years, but Apple is the only manufacturer that has (as of yet) been able to surpass everyday midrange intel processors in terms of performance. Even so, this is quite impressive given that these processors are generally designed specifically to fit inside of tablets, phones, watches, and other small form factors without high power requirements. And the fact that Apple has surpassed the majority of intel core i5 processors now in their A11 and A12 Bionic chips, and that the Qualcomm SnapDragon 835 and 845 have come relatively close, is pretty freaking impressive.

Unfortunately, a lot of those really small embedded systems are designed for cost and affordability, not necessarily for performance. While ARM on the upper end is a screaming beast and a force to be reckoned with (given form factor and power constraints), their lower end A15's in that board are relatively comparable to a pentium 3, for the most part. Still worthwhile for quite a lot of things, but far from being modern, by any stretch of the imagination. But as someone who used a computer powered by Ubuntu and a 600 MHZ Pentium 3 for years when I was younger, I still think they are incredibly cool for what they are meant for.

[SpookyZalost]

Darth: the funny thing is, my currently working wearable prototype is using an ARM Cortex-A53 and 1gb of ram, with a text based interface for the majority of stuff.

it runs minecraft with the wearable display at low rez... but it works as a functional wearable.
just not really for true VR due to power constraints... yet.

[SpookyZalost]

I'm going to update this because newer, better, and more affordable displays have come out.

https://store.vufine.com/collections/all...le-display

this is the vufine, the original is $100 and features a 720p hud you can attach to glasses.

it connects via HDMI.

my current display is 640x480 and connects via composite.

I may decide to upgrade in the near future, we'll see, but this will save me a lot of trouble and effort... and the best part?

I'm thinking about combining my cyberdeck with a GPS to play ingress on it... just because

[SpookyZalost]

so I've taken my wearable off the shelf and I'm currently redoing the setup now that better stuff is available.

first things first, rather than relying on a satchel I'm experimenting with velcro for attaching the various components.

second, I've replaced the RCA setup with a TRRS cable, both ends are wired the same so I can use one cable that's less bulky and intrusive, plus it looks more cohesive now.

pictures later, I promise.

Edit: Images now avail.

  

it's much more refined but I've still a long ways to go on it.

in my one hand is the Raspberry pi 3 (in the purple case), as well as the battery pack (5 hours last tested btw).

in my other is the keyboard for inputting data... it's solar powered so I don't have to charge it or plug it in, ever.

I've yet to make the attachment points but I'm thinking velcro or something with armbands to make this truly "wearable"

[Guardian]

solar powered! Awesome.

Looks very Modern.

[SpookyZalost]

the best part is, since it's raspi based I can use the GPIO to do cyberpunk hackery things on it lol.

also interface with all sorts of crazy stuff from gps satellites to microwaves

[SpookyZalost]

so I'll be tearing down the video glasses soon so I can integrate them into this pair of goggles i have, it'll also make it easier to integrate the camera which I'm working on getting a live feed from with text overlay for things like GPS data inputs and stuff.

the real trick is getting the camera feed while still being in command line so I can keep the overhead and power usage as minimal as possible.

to get a live feed to the display I simply need to run the following terminal command: raspivid -t 0 -rot 0

making rapid progress