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Hack Chat Transcript Part 2

A event log for Bitluni's ESP32 Video Tricks Hack Chat

NTSC, PAL, and VGA for Espressif Microcontrollers

lutetiumLutetium 03/27/2019 at 20:110 Comments

bitluni12:24 PM
the i2s has a maximum data rate it supports

bitluni12:24 PM
the base clock can be like 40MHz

bitluni12:25 PM
but the pipeline itself is a bit finicky

bitluni12:26 PM
it simply stops working at certain clock rate that's around 20Mhz

bitluni12:26 PM
DVI specs have lowest clock at 25.175 MHz

Nicolas Tremblay12:27 PM
Any link for an FPGA upscaler?

Dan Maloney12:28 PM
What would you recommend as a good ESP32 dev board to start out with? And what kind of toolchain to support it?

erik pax12:28 PM
would an external serializer IC mean the esp32 would only need 2.5175Mhz gpio speed for DVI?

bitluni12:29 PM
@Nicolas Tremblay the new arduino FPGA board support hdmi.. I would look into that and clone it

bitluni12:30 PM
@Dan Maloney tkae something with many pins that's cheap and goes on a bread board. Arduino IDE with ESP32 integration is the simplest tool chain

morgan12:31 PM
I like TTGO boards, a lot of them include battery charging on board and are small enough to embed in even small portable projects. See #SatNOGS On Air O

bitluni12:31 PM
@erik pax not sure.. could be :-) you know any ones that does that?

erik pax12:32 PM

https://hackaday.io/project/164325-neon816

HACKADAY

Neon816

This project is about the design of an 8-bit/16-bit nostalgia motherboard using currently in-production parts, and designed to interface primarily with modern peripherals. Features based on modern peripherals: - 2 Atari or Sega-style joystick ports. Should work with 6-button Genesis controllers, and many compatible controllers are currently in production.

Read this on Hackaday

bitluni12:32 PM
@morgan I am using them, too. but they always want shipping :-D

andrew.michael.johnson12:32 PM
What I was wanting to do is use the ESP8266 to control a RX5808 Analog receiver, 8 input 1 output ic switch and generate a NTSC output to switch the video output to. an overlay would also be nice using something like a MAX7456 chip.. The problem is 2 fold CPU power and enough CS lines..

morgan12:33 PM
yeah... I just buy a dozen or so at a time

morgan12:33 PM
also, custom WROOM/WROVER is pretty straight forward, in the future I'll be making more of my own custom devboards

andrew.michael.johnson12:34 PM
without doing something tarded like hang a bunch of 328P's off it via I2C and have them manage the individual SPI's..

Nicolas Tremblay12:34 PM
heard of the Frog Board ?

https://www.tindie.com/products/fred_IOT/esp8266-frog-board-frogo-pins-esp-12e-dev-board/

bitluni12:34 PM
@erik pax is it serializing using the fpga?

bitluni12:36 PM
@andrew.michael.johnson :-D sounds neat... multi processing at its best

bitluni12:36 PM
@Nicolas Tremblay nice.. that's even cheaper than the one from aliexpress that I got

erik pax12:37 PM
I think the serializer is a sepperate chip

bitluni12:37 PM
I have to look into it, that might be the best hint I got so far :-)

bitluni12:38 PM
what I'm currently in is checking out ICs that do VGA conversion to HDMI

bitluni12:38 PM
analog devices has some encoders

andrew.michael.johnson12:38 PM
I have a handful of NodeMCU's I use with breadboards... Have done a lot with arduinos, STM32 and TEENSY stuff but have not had the time to take the ideas I have in my head and start programming and breadboarding hardware for it yet.

bitluni12:38 PM
but they are dicks since you have to have an HDMI license to get the ICs from them

Dan Maloney12:39 PM
Really? That seems wrong.

bitluni12:39 PM
ADV7513 is the IC I have hhere now

bitluni12:39 PM
actually you are not allowed to use the word HDMI if you are not licensed

erik pax12:40 PM
I think you can just fake the HDMI signal over DVI

bitluni12:40 PM
the smallest license you can get is 5k/year and somewhat like 1$ /device

[ E C C 0 ]12:40 PM
What are you supposed to call it then?? XD

Dan Maloney12:41 PM
Sounds like "March Madness" here or "Superbowl". You have to pay up to even utter those words in the media.

bitluni12:41 PM
not sure, but it might be an issue when wanting to sell on tindie

erik pax12:41 PM
call it DVI with audio :)

bitluni12:41 PM
the "compatible with modern video standard" shield

[ E C C 0 ]12:42 PM
Maybe some chip makers are gonna start buying licences and sell the chip with the licence

[ E C C 0 ]12:42 PM
Like PID/VID on USB

bitluni12:42 PM
HumanDeviceMostInvention

Dan Maloney12:42 PM
They'll never catch on to that

bitluni12:43 PM
with doge

bitluni12:43 PM
:-D

morgan12:43 PM
Hey! Movies, Does Indeed

morgan12:43 PM
nope, that's no good

bitluni12:43 PM
@[ E C C 0 ] I guess you are right.. I have to look into that

morgan12:43 PM
Hey, Does Movies Indeed

andrew.michael.johnson12:44 PM
I do live drone race streaming.. I use cheap composite to HDMI adapters to my streaming rig.. $12-25 most places.. Well its a little more convoluted than that.. as I go from composite analog to HDMI to SDI to a BlackMagic Decklink Quad 2 card in a PCI-E enclosure to Thunderbolt to my Zenbook running OBSStudio using its GTX1050 for NVENC to the internet to a digitalocean VM using FFServer and NGINX to multicast to various services... So yea thats one way to go from NTSC to HDMI.. lmao

bitluni12:44 PM
LOL

morgan12:44 PM
Hardware Does Movie Interface, that's the one

bitluni12:44 PM
30seconds latency

erik pax12:45 PM
seems like hdmi is just audio muxed into the front porch part of an dvi signal.

bitluni12:45 PM
morgan++

[ E C C 0 ]12:45 PM
Hey Does Movies Indeed sounds better

bitluni12:45 PM
is

bitluni12:45 PM
dvi licensed?

andrew.michael.johnson12:45 PM
Nah I can go from NTSC composite to HDMI to SDI in like 1 maybe 2 frames at 60 fps...

bitluni12:45 PM
sdi must be sick..

bitluni12:46 PM
we should look into that

andrew.michael.johnson12:46 PM
its really just serialized HDMI

bitluni12:46 PM
isn't it like only one wire?

[ E C C 0 ]12:46 PM
What about USB-C video?

andrew.michael.johnson12:46 PM
its what broadcasters use as well as many HD DVR's that use coax..

Niek van der Maas12:46 PM
@bitluni a second question: you started selling your own board now - do you have any other commercial plans for the future? maybe your own ESP-based consumer device?

bitluni12:46 PM
that could be even done by the esp8266

bitluni12:49 PM
@Niek van der Maas good question. I'm really excited about the tindie experience I had lately. however it was much work. there are people wanting to convince me to create a kickstarter console like thingy.. I'm not sure how viable that is. you can do everything better on the raspberry pi

Dan Maloney12:49 PM

https://www.tindie.com/products/bitluni/esp32-vga-board/

TINDIE

ESP32 VGA Board by bitluni on Tindie

This board allows you to display ultra fast graphics on a VGA screen. It's designed for the ESP32Lib Arduino library with many examples!

Read this on Tindie

morgan12:49 PM
that's has to be the first time anyone said that

bitluni12:50 PM
btw: I just added 10 boards to the stock

andrew.michael.johnson12:50 PM
But there are plenty of SDI chips out there that wouldn't have the license/security issues HDMI has with DRM type crap..

andrew.michael.johnson12:50 PM
question is $$

bitluni12:50 PM
I'll check the sdi specs

bitluni12:51 PM
about the product question: what should a product look like that I should develop?

bitluni12:52 PM
I'm sure I should stay in the maker realm

Dan Maloney12:52 PM
Your own ESP32 dev board perhaps?

erik pax12:53 PM
a chip 7 board :)

Nicolas Tremblay12:53 PM
i think that ports to different standard video connections with solid libraries and support would be good

Nicolas Tremblay12:53 PM
Or RGB led screens

bitluni12:54 PM
led screan support is coming to my library

Dave Blundell12:54 PM
The thing about the WROOM/WROVER modules is that they are super competitively priced on reeels AND they have FCC approval. If you want to make a "serious" product, FCC cert is a big deal. Staying to makerland keeps you out of serious regulatory territory.

morgan12:54 PM
nice

erik pax12:54 PM
8080 8bit wide lcds?

Dave Blundell12:55 PM
ESP32-WROVER boards w/ 128Mb flash + 64Mb PSRAM were less than $3 / 650pc reel when I ordered last month.

andrew.michael.johnson12:55 PM
bitluni with your board are there any CS/SPI lanes available on the ESP32.. I do not have anything ESP32 based yet and have not seen the datasheets.

morgan12:55 PM
wow, tha'ts great to hear

bitluni12:55 PM
@Dan Maloney Actually, I'm curretnly woring on a smd programmer for the esp32 modules. once this is done there will simple dev boards doing all kinds of stuff. like the oscilloscope display, game consoles etc

morgan12:56 PM
I messed up on my current design by using WROOM instead of WROVER

morgan12:56 PM
I'm too nervous to change in my next revision

Niek van der Maas12:56 PM
@bitluni just brainstorming... maybe something like the pocketsprite but standalone with VGA/HDMI output, to play oldschool games on your TV :)

Dan Maloney12:56 PM
Cool! What's the WROOM v WROVER problem?

bitluni12:56 PM
rgb panel support is coming to my esp32lib

morgan12:57 PM
footprint is different

Dave Blundell12:57 PM
the WROVER give the 128+64 option which isn't available from Espressif on WROOM

Niek van der Maas12:57 PM
@Dan Maloney PSRAM

Dave Blundell12:57 PM
WROVER has more I/O broken out

morgan12:57 PM
but WROVER have moar(!) flash+RAM

Dave Blundell12:57 PM
I'm sorry

morgan12:57 PM
doesn't it have 2 less?

Dave Blundell12:57 PM
WROVER has more flash/PSRAM option. WROOM has more I/O broken out

morgan12:57 PM
right

Dave Blundell12:57 PM
Apologies for brainfart.

bitluni12:58 PM
:-D Wrover and Wroom wars

Dan Maloney12:58 PM
Right, thanks - think I need more RAM that IO, so maybe WROVER is better for me.

Dave Blundell12:58 PM
Mouser seems to be the best place stateside to get modules in low-ish quantity.

Dave Blundell12:58 PM
Digikey tax em

morgan12:58 PM
yup, and were out of stock for a lot until recently

bitluni12:58 PM
be careful, the psram cant be used with i2s directly

bitluni12:58 PM
you always have to copy it

Dave Blundell12:58 PM
the 128+64 modules are hard to track down

bitluni12:59 PM
it's not even fast enough to be a frame buffer

Dave Blundell12:59 PM
the first ones I got I bought from TME in europe because all the US distributors were out of stock

morgan12:59 PM
was just about to ask if it was because speed...

Dave Blundell12:59 PM
yeah it runs on SPI bus. Relatively slow.

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