Speedotron Force 10 Palm software

<p>There are some ancient posts on using a Palm PDA to control the power of the Force 10. Does anyone still have this code or know what is needed to plug into the remote port on the Force 10? Speedotron seems to ignore you if you ask on their web form :-)</p>

 

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<p >Ken,</p>

<p >I looked into this back in 2002. As an owner of a handful of Force 10's (who happens to be something of a computer geek), I was really looking forward to being able to control the lights through their RJ-45 connectors. </p>

<p >Unfortunately, Speedotron's implementation was somewhat lacking. Particularly troublesome was the need to acquire a proprietary ‘junction box’ (which retailed for maybe $100) to connect the lights, camera, and Palm. As I recall, some of the earliest Force-10’s also needed a firmware upgrade in order to support the Palm software.</p>

<p >I never bothered to order the junction box, but I did download the instructions. Just shoot me an e-mail and I’ll forward them to you.</p>

<p >If you are still interested, I’m fairly sure I could provide you with a means to locate the software. </p>

<p >Kind regards,</p>

<p >Warren Hatch</p>

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<p>Thanks, Warren. Sent you an email. Gotta wonder why Speedotron never followed through with this with how popular remote control is nowadays :-P<br>

I'm actually more interested in the protocol for the RJ45 port, but get the cold shoulder treatment when asking Speedotron about it...</p>

 

<p><br />Hey, Ken, Warren are you still there?<br /><br />I can probably answer a few of your question better then most.<br /><br />The box is there to convert RS232 to a current loop. A current loop is a lot better an transferring data in a noisy environment. Heavy industrial control electronics does the same thing. If you want you can read about it here (the wikipedia knows all):<br />http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Current_loop<br /><br />The Palm remote control feature faded away along with the serial port's availability on PDA's. Specifically, when Palm replaced the RS232 port with a USB peripheral port. That meant Speedotron would have had to build a USB host interface onto that box. At the time, that literally meant a computer. Only in the last few years are embedded processors capable of handling the burden of USB host responsibilities coming onto the market.<br /><br />The idea has been tossed around to use a computer to control the Force10s. That would simplify things as the box would only be responsible for USB peripheral responsibilities.<br /><br />If you can not find the Palm software, I can probably dig it up. But remember, you need an older Palm device with a serial RS232 port. And, of course, you need to convert the RS232 to a current loop.<br /><br />-good luck<br /><br /></p>