advice needed for mini pc project - Android Stick & Console Computers General

I want to design a program that will run on an Android Mini PC. It'll be connected to any monitor so that when the monitor is turned on, it'll power up the android mini pc via USB (monitor will be required to have USB port) and then the program will start automatically and display on the monitor.
The program itself is a visual acuity chart (like at your eye doctor's office). So it will run all day as you use an RF remote to flip through the images.
Sound easy? I'm trying to figure out if Android or Raspberry Pi would be best for this.
Thanks

Pretty cool idea. The only thing I can think of is Android on the Android sticks allows a customizable boot animation which would be cool to create your own for marketing. The Android sticks are also faster and boot quicker so less wait.
You can also remote desktop into a more powerful machine to offload some work. Essentially have a server as the mainframe.
Android will also require you program it to run at startup. I'm not sure how you do this without a 3rd party app, but I know some apps that load on startup.
Both units are tiny and the android sticks include wifi and there are some Bluetooth models. The Raspberry Pi has neither. And boots slower and isn't powerful.
I think its an easy choice.
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player911 said:
Android will also require you program it to run at startup. I'm not sure how you do this without a 3rd party app, but I know some apps that load on startup.
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ok, so it would at least be possible but I'd need some intricate coding and extra apps which is ok with me. thanks

You need to look at the power requirements of the Android Mini PC as well. Often they draw more power than is available through TV and monitor USB ports. You might get enough power to run the mini PC but if you have wifi, wireless keyboard/mouse, bluetooth and other devices the power draw might exceed the output of the monitor. This is something I am interested in as well as I am trying to resolve the power on/off problem on these mini PCs. The probox has a remote with a power button but I've heard the remote has problems with distances more than 1M.

strongsad said:
You need to look at the power requirements of the Android Mini PC as well. Often they draw more power than is available through TV and monitor USB ports. You might get enough power to run the mini PC but if you have wifi, wireless keyboard/mouse, bluetooth and other devices the power draw might exceed the output of the monitor. This is something I am interested in as well as I am trying to resolve the power on/off problem on these mini PCs. The probox has a remote with a power button but I've heard the remote has problems with distances more than 1M.
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I won't need BT, wifi, or really anything. I need to find someone that thinks he can tackle this project. Any good places to hire someone for this type of work?

apparker said:
I won't need BT, wifi, or really anything. I need to find someone that thinks he can tackle this project. Any good places to hire someone for this type of work?
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Couldn't you use tasker or locale or something similar to run an app on startup? Just an idea...

Related

[Q] Laptop Dock for All Devices?

I know this might be tough and might not work for all devices, but can we make something, via USB cables/Bluetooth/WiFi or whatsoever to dock our phone to our laptop/desktop?
Perhaps a program for the Windows to show the display of the phone at phone's resolution. Then mouse to navigate within Android (we'll lose multi-touch though - no pinch-to-zoom) and of course keyboard to perform what it should.
Is it very hard to realise?
What I have been thinking is to get the display out, let the mouse be our finger and each keyboard button to map to the alphabet input to the phone.
Impossible?
(Disclaimer: I have zero knowledge in developing an apps or software. It's just a wild idea I have after watching the laptop dock of Atrix)
VNC? Host VNC on the phone and connect to it from a laptop/PC. It'd run slow and **** though.
Webkey (ROOT REQUIRED) accomplishes this with a browser interface over WiFi, I'm not sure if it works over the USB cable.

[q] question : Android-pc bridge project for home automation

Hi there
I'm embarking on an ambitious project and i was wondering if anyone could help me by giving suggestions.
I am making my own home automation system, and I already have the necessary hardware to get it up and running, but I want to take it a step farther.
I have this (Use google translate lol) http://cba.sakura.ne.jp/kit01/kit_399.htm kit, which is basically a set of 8 relay switches that can be used to turn on and off mains devices (such as lights, powerpoints, ect) that are controlled by a computer through a DB25 printer port. I also have an old Dell D600 laptop that has said printer port, and the software needed to drive the circuit board. This is all well and good, as everything is working so far, but before I bother to install this thing in my roof and hook it up to control my lights, power points, ect, I was wondering if there is a way to use my android phone (HTC Legend, unrooted ) or tablet (Motorola xoom wifi rooted with Tiamat, o/c to 1.7ghz) to control this board through a computer.
I already have a client that remote controls the computer (splashtop remote), and I can achieve this with some difficulty by remote controlling the computer and using the PC software through my phone/tablet, but I was wondering if there is an android home automation program and its PC client service that supports DB25 printer port pinout settings, so I could directly control the circuit board through the app, like the leading home automation apps already available (minus the extremely expensive proprietary hardware that you need with them). If not, has anyone else considered developing one? If anyone could give me any help on this it would be greatly appreciated.

Is external touch screen control possible?

Hello all, I've been wondering lately if it's possible for an Android phone to be plugged into an external touch screen and be completely controlled via the external touchscreen?
By possible, I actually mean easily done via some basic or maybe not so basic code.
I know some Android devices offer mirroring via mini hdmi, but you usually have to either control using a remote or the phone. I'd rather have it connect through the micro-usb port, lay the phone somewhere else, and fully control the phone through the external touch screen.
I tried to search, but wasn't sure what to use for the search and all I found was ways to remotely control you pc using your device.
no i dont think so....a web application is there for controlling your phone via wifi with the help of router..
Airdroid try it..
shyamjptpm said:
no i dont think so....a web application is there for controlling your phone via wifi with the help of router..
Airdroid try it..
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Thanks for the reply. I'll give Airdroid a try, but I was looking for a more direct option. I'm thinking there has to be a way since the webtops/laptop docks seem to work well, but again those use mouses/keyboards for control.
I am hot on this idea too
I have a lilliput 4 wire resistive screen that i want to use a carputer.
I have seen one solution that is stuck in "coming soon" that requires some manual intervention called customgadz...google it. It's expensive.
I have googled endlessly to try and find a way to input the Liliput directly into the Atrix HD dock as a USB input but the touch screen needs to be calibrated.
So i've resorted to emailing liliput to see what they say.

Why do tablets do the processing work?

Why do they bother to still design tablets with the CPU/GPU on board? When I think about the future of windows with windows 8 I think about tablets being heavier to run the x86 architecture and I wonder why not just use something like intels widi and transmit only the picture to a tablet and have a server plugged in doing all the processing, maybe even running another instance or switchable session of the OS attached to a standard desktop display/keyboard mouse. The tablet would of course still need a processor but only to process a ready to go image, audio and to interpret touch inputs and transmit them to the server. This would allow for larger batteries and be much more cost effective in the long run.
Of course we will still need today's style for outside the home/office but like the desktop there is still a market for the LAN only machines.
Maybe this is already available and someone can point me to where I can buy it now! :x
You want the cloud? Not ready yet. Until then, splashtop will have to do. Also, botnet.
jdeoxys said:
You want the cloud? Not ready yet. Until then, splashtop will have to do. Also, botnet.
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No, nothing over the internet. I'm simply talking about a wireless display with a battery but one that can transmit touch inputs. Not sure how else to put it but if you have seen the wireless transmitter and receivers for HDMI, similar to this.
Does anyone see where I'm going with this? Windows 8 is touch screen but the best I could find that are desktop-like is the dell ST2220T which only has 2 touch points that is not cetified for windows 8 which I believe accepts up to 4.
Next I looked at tablets and there are a few budget(if you can call $500 with a small display, bad/slow graphics card and little storage budget) that look promising but could easily have 100 hardware issues that would drive me nuts and then theres the name brand stuff like samsungs $1,000 pc tablets which still suffer from built in gpu's that suck.
My idea would simply be the cost of a screen and battery if you already own a desktop with say, intel widi (wireless display) and some sort of input receiver to receive the touch commands from the tablet display. The performance would be virtually unlimited!
Are you basically talking about a device that connects through your local network to a transmitting PC running an OS of your choosing? Sort of like a portable monitor that doubles as a touchscreen?
Constant wifi or similar connection would drain the battery as well. Also, that would require a whole separate computer to run the system itself (if you're doing it at home), or a fast, VERY low latency broadband connection to a cloud (so forget about the device being very cheap just because you have to somehow pay for the server-side as well). Otherwise you'd be struggling with laggy UI which is the exact opposite of what everyone wants.
So... not for a few more years... or decades
Tristanlogd said:
Are you basically talking about a device that connects through your local network to a transmitting PC running an OS of your choosing? Sort of like a portable monitor that doubles as a touchscreen?
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Like a portable monitor with touchscreen that transmits touch inputs/commands wirelessly back to the desktop just like a mouse.
I don't think transmitting through networks is a good idea and thats why I mentioned the Intel WIDI wireless display technology that is already in most new Inte'ls so all we would really need to change on the PC side is a customized wireless receiver for the touch inputs.
Hell, I'm thinking about calling a friend who is an EE and getting something made if nobody else is...lol.
aard said:
Constant wifi or similar connection would drain the battery as well. Also, that would require a whole separate computer to run the system itself (if you're doing it at home), or a fast, VERY low latency broadband connection to a cloud (so forget about the device being very cheap just because you have to somehow pay for the server-side as well). Otherwise you'd be struggling with laggy UI which is the exact opposite of what everyone wants.
So... not for a few more years... or decades
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Eh the technology is here with http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/architecture-and-technology/intel-wireless-display.html
Using wifi isn't efficient, but tablets use most of their energy on the display and processing. Since all you would be doing is signal processing vs actual computation @ the tablet end you would use considerably less juice. Like Half.
You are talking direct wireless connection from tablet to monitor, not going through a wireless router or connection? Interesting idea, but why not just go through a wireless connection? Wouldn't this also kind of tether you to your pc? Splashtop or Logmein allows you to do this anywhere.
Tristanlogd said:
You are talking direct wireless connection from tablet to monitor, not going through a wireless router or connection? Interesting idea, but why not just go through a wireless connection? Wouldn't this also kind of tether you to your pc? Splashtop or Logmein allows you to do this anywhere.
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All I'm talking about is a PC or laptop with a second display thats wireless. Then we call it a tablet because it has a touch screen that sends signals back to the PC or laptop to move the mouse or rather gestures. Not cloud computing, I have done this and it's terrible. Cloud is basically remote desktop which is choppy and worse then current tablets. What I'm talking about would make the performance increase as Intel claims virtually no latency with WIDI and even 5 milliseconds would be hard to notice considering how laggy android is as it's basically a virtual machine.
Hereis a clip I just found, not sure if it's available yet but:
Now ASUS brings another solution to the table, the WiCast, which can be connected to any computer and any television and promises latency-free 1080p video and audio.

[Q] Use NVidia shield tablet as a display for PC

Hello, I have no use for my tablet so i was wondering, if i can somehow make the tablet a wired display. There are lots of app avaiable but i didn't find any that could connect to my pc with a cable. And alot of them are paid.
Is there a more effective way to do this?
Thank you
FINERYX said:
Hello, I have no use for my tablet so i was wondering, if i can somehow make the tablet a wired display. There are lots of app avaiable but i didn't find any that could connect to my pc with a cable. And alot of them are paid.
Is there a more effective way to do this?
Thank you
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Click to collapse
Hello, Shield tablet has only HDMI out. so, it can't be used as display effectively. If you could try those apps that uses USB cable, they still are limited by USB transfer speed, and custom code in their apps. They most likey won't perform fast enough to be a good display.
VNC viewer and other screen sharing apps are only decent options, but they lag, and resolution may mess up from time to time.

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