Phatmack said:
Any luck? I am curious to see how this thing works with the P5 head units... can't imagine they're that different from the "Verified yes" head units.
Anyway, also, it kind of sucks that we're sitting around waiting on a few guys to put these things together when they get around to it. I tried to get 'em to send me their design so I could make one for myself but it's "copyrighted" and blah blah blah. Bullshiiiiaaat. Really, how hard can it be to make this thing act like it is a tape deck??
I propose we attempt to reverse engineer the thing and make it avaliable to the public. Free information. Make one for $20 if you wish to hunt down the parts. I'm an aspiring electrical engineer and I'd love to give it a whirl but I don't have the stereo schematic nor the spare OEM tape deck to decipher. These guys did it... we should be able to too. Anyone with me?! Who's got a protege5 tape deck to destroy? Or better yet, anyone found the pinout for that connector?!
Wow, you're sure eager to get this thing eh?
I honestly am not that concerned about people using the circuit design, or finding out what the pinout or schematics for the design of the module is, that is the relatively easy part to figure out.
The reason that we've even bothered with this project is because it took more than a simple circuit to make the head unit recognize an add in module. It's not as simple as shorting a couple of wires, or adding a resistor. The radio actually uses a proprietary communication protocol in order to enable devices, relay messages, display text data, etc etc...
It took us quite some time to reverse engineer all the details that we needed in order to make AuxMod basic. 100's of hours. In addition, we had to develop a standalone firmware for our microprocessor that would be reliable, and properly functional in the radio.
We have contemplated open source, and offering kits for people to build, all of which should reduce the cost of the parts. The HU connector that is used by Mazda is not a very easy to source part, and is the key to making the module easy to plug in. We've spent lots of time to finally get reasonably priced supplies. Our total part cost is probably within the range that you mentioned, but we've just barely broken even on this project on all of our expenses, before even factoring the cost of any time that we've worked on it.
We think that we are offering this module for a fair price. The fact that we've had so much interest is pretty good evidence for that. There are also several other things that we would like to accomplish with the module in the future (iPOD, AuxMod Advanced, Text display on the HU, and more), and frankly, if AuxMod basic does well, the chances that we'll develop these other nice gotta have features are much better. We're not a big business, we don't have infinite resources, and we do have day jobs, so this doesn't always get the time it needs.
In the future, if we decide to call AuxMod quits, we'll probably open source the software & schematics on sourceforge, or something. However for now, it looks like things are just finally getting good. We're in a totally new ball game here though. We've got too much demand to make all the boards ourselves (3 to 4 an hour will burn us out in one day), and every step of our supply process takes a lot of time.
We're doing our best to get these modules finished. If you are too impatient to wait, find an alternative, I don't mind. This is just a hobby for me. We've had people interested in this project since January of '04. We didn't even sell the first prototype boards until February of 05. We may take more time than most people (including us) would hope, but we do get the job done, and we hope to do it right.
Regards,
OverLOAD
i think they will come up with something and yes they will use the MD/Tape Imput they have to.... who is going to buy a product that messes up another product? ok i see some of the point u have 40 Gigs of music so why have a CD player how about for a Guest or someone else driving your car are they going to be able to figure it out or all together bother you to ask you " so how does this s*** work man! i can't get it working!" so i prefer not messing with my CD player and using the MD/Tape would be the best bet for me and i bet for alot of us users. (band)
