I cleared a table at home and dedicated it to being my target.

Keyboard Mouse

I am using a USB keyboard and mouse.  I could have used PS2 but that’s old-hat.  With USB you you can unplug and replug if needed which you can’t do.  Sometimes if the kb/mouse driver falls over or doesn’t load, this can be useful to restart things.  It does take up 2 of the 4 USB ports but I plugged in a USB hub and used this for the kb/mouse.  I intend actually using Bluetooth keyboard and mouse anyway.

Screen

I’m using a 1280 x 1024 LCD display, VGA connector; save space on an old CRT.  I will try DPI.  I’d like to add an LCD touch screen

Power

I have power-board on the table near the system.  That way I can easily plug/unplug and plug-packs needed by accessories.  Might upgrade to one with surge protection and switches.  I do have an inverter for use in a car if needed.  I might work on battery system like a laptop at some stage.

Networking

I set it up with a wired network connection to our network WiFi hub.  That way it can get an IP from the hub DNS server, be accessed from my dev machine for image download and debugging and for accessing the internet when an image when running.  Also, the remote client can be access from the dev machine.

A networking hint:

If your target can’t be on a network with DNS, the ICOP target boot menu has an option for a using a fixed IP.  Just use a cross over cable and a fixed IP on the development machine side (fixed IP that is in the same subnet as the target with an appropriate mask).  An alternative with dev machines that a wired NIC and and WiFi, where WiFi is the network portal, do the following:

  • Set the WiFi network to not use 192.168.0.xxx, eg use 192.168.100.xxx
  • Internet Connection Share the WiFi connection on the dev machine via the wired NIC
  • Connect the target to the dev machine using the wired NIC.
  • The ICS on teh dev machine will serve up 192.168.0.xxx IPs to systems on the wired side.

Cross over cable: Many NICs now don’t need a cross over cable.  They automatically reconfigure to suit.  Not sure whether the ICOP box supports this.

It is also worth noting that the dev machine and target have to be on the same subnet.

I use WiFi to connect to my target from my dev machine.  The 802.11g 56MBs is much faster than the achieved download rate when sending an image.
TODO: Compare download times when using WiFi and when using Wired.

Accessories

I have variety of of accessories from previous activities to use:

  • USB Bluetooth Dongle
  • Bluetooth Keyboard
  • Bluetooth Mouse
  • Bluetooth GPS
  • FTDI (USB-Parallel) Breadboard 
    • Serial commands control individual (GPIO) bits on breadboard
    • Great for prototyping
    • Could build similar for use with ICOP GPIO
      • Hint peel of the back and you can directly solder to the strips
    • I have previously integrated the driver into CE, will revisit.
  • Microprocessor system with serial or USB-serial connections
    • I did a presentation to MEDC in 2006 on integrating a micro with a CE system
      • I will revisit that

Next: Build an Image