Hello all!
I am the (soon to be) proud owner of an Empeg. I am planning to install it in my Explorer, where I also have a Pioneer DEX-P1R head unit. I was wondering if anyone has been looking into integrating Pioneers' IP-Bus with the Empeg. I thought it would very convenient to have the Empeg emulate a Pioneer changer, which would allow the use of Pioneer's standard remote for some of the more common features of the Empeg without having to juggle between two remotes.

I've been poking around the IP-Bus with a scope and it appears that Pioneer is using a serial data link to talk to their changer, but I'm not familiar with the format of data stream. I'm more used to working with RS-232, RS485/J1708. I have attached a copy of the waveforms I captured in case anyone is interested or can identify them.

If someone can identify the serial format, I am hoping I will be able to make an RS-232 adapter so I can capture the data and figure out their protocol.

Cheers,
Phil

Edited by philp69 on 29/04/01 11:38 PM.

Woops... Guess the file was too big...
Here it is...

I was wondering if anyone has been looking into integrating Pioneers' IP-Bus with the Empeg.

Others have discussed it, but I don't think anyone ever went anywhere with it.

I thought it would very convenient to have the Empeg emulate a Pioneer changer

Although the Empeg team once designed an OEM MP3 player that emulated a CD changer, there is no functionality in the Empeg Car software to do this, so you'd need to write your own player software. That's assuming you want a Pioneer CD-controlling head unit to fully control the Empeg, of course. If you managed to reverse-engineer the IP bus stuff, and all you wanted to do was send play/pause/next/prev to the Empeg, then some tricky work with the serial plug would do it, you could intercept the IP bus commands and translate those into ASCII commands sent to the empeg's serial port. But that would be a lot of work...

And it still wouldn't allow you to properly control an Empeg mounted in the trunk. There are many things about the empeg that require you to see its display. It's not meant for trunk mounting.


which would allow the use of Pioneer's standard remote for some of the more common features of the Empeg without having to juggle between two remotes.

Oh, is that all you want to do? So you don't really need to mount the empeg like a CD changer, you just want to use your Pioneer remote on it? Ah, that's easy. You don't need to mess with IP bus to do that. Frank Van Gestel has written a program to intercept and display IR remote codes, and then you can use a modified kernel that responds to those new remote commands. Or something like that. I seem to remember that they even got it working with the Pioneer remote already. Anyone have that link?

Question, though: If you already have a Pioneer head unit, wouldn't you rather have the empeg not respond to the Pioneer commands? If both units respond to the same remote, then you're going to be pressing "play" for both devices at the same time. It'd be a mess, wouldn't it?

___________
Tony Fabris

I should have been a little more clear- my intent is to mount in the dash above the Pioneer (Explorers have a double DIN slot). I think I have seen the page you are referring to somewhere, but like you said, it would cause all kinds of problems with both units responding to the same remote. That is why I was hoping I could connect to the IP-Bus, this way the Empeg would ignore the remote, but respond to the IP-bus, which would be controlled by the remote. Pioneer uses a device address of some sort w/ it's changers (up to 4 can be connected to 1 head), I figured I could get the Empeg to emulate one the device addresses and respond to simple play,stop,next/prev track/cd, etc. But without an understanding of their physical data link, I don't think I'll make too much progress...

Phil

This is not Pioneer, but woth at look
http://www.cus.org.uk/~cleggy/

TommyE

I finally received my new empeg! Let me just say this thing is f!^@%!*g awesome!!! It installed easily in about 3 hours with only minor mods to the radio opening required to accomodate both the empeg and the Pioneer. I can post some pics if anyone is interested.

After a day of using it, I find that the dual remote thing to be really, really annoying. If anyone has any insight on how I can begin to decode IP-Bus, it would be greatly appreciated. I would be more than happy to share anything I find with the group.

Regards,

Phil
Blue #010101261

After looking a little further into the IR-intercept apporach, I think I have it figured out (many thanks Tony and Frank). I loaded up the dev image and ir code intercept stuff, as well as the ir sniffer. I captured all the codes of the Pioneer remote (bear in mind that the DEX-P1R remote is not the same as the steering wheel remote) and remapped them. The Pioneer has a 4-way button arrangement for seeking CD tracks, stations, etc. I am using those four to emulate the 4 buttons on the front of the empeg. I un-mapped the volume so only the Pioneer responds, mapped the "RT" button to the "Info" button, mapped the "D" button to "Visual" button, and the "ESC" button to "Pause/Play". This arrangement works very, very well. All of these buttons perform no function when the Pioneer is in AUX mode, so there are no conflicts.

The only thing left is to use the AsenB signal from the IP-bus to control the ignition power to the empeg. I can steal this from inside the Pioneer aux input box (~8.5V when active). This will kill the empeg when I'm not in AUX input mode, and prevent conflicts when playing CD's or radio. The only question I have left is what is the current draw on the empegs switched Ignition input, and what is it's threshold voltage? I'm guessing that the 8.5V is probably sufficent and that it draws very little current, but I don't want to blow up the AUX adapter...


Phil
Blue #010101261

The only question I have left is what is the current draw on the empegs switched Ignition input, and what is it's threshold voltage?

The sense input is current limited with, from memory, about 4K7 ohms, which at
the nominal 13.8v battery voltage is around 3mA. The voltage threshold is
determined by a resistive divider, among other things. I think that it would work,
just, at 8.5v in, maybe down to around 7.5v, but I'm too tired to dig out the circuit
diagrams and check the values right now.

I've been hacking away at ARM7500 assembler all day, and I want to go to bed
now.

Patrick.

Opinions expressed in this email may contain up to 42% water by weight, and are mine. All mine.

Thanks for the info - I'll try it out...


Phil
Blue #010101261

Now, that's clever approach at integration of empeg and another head unit.

Cheers!

Dragi "Bonzi" Raos
Zagreb, Croatia
Q#5196, MkII#80000376, 18GB green

Sorry to drag up this old post. I was musing in another thread about the possibility of decoding an aftermarket protocol like Pioneer's IP-Bus so that the empeg could control a satellite radio receiver. I found this page where a guy made a IP-Bus - RS232 adapter. Anyone else interested in the possibilites of this? Best of all...his C code for IP-Bus control is GPL'ed and available on the site.

EDIT: you know you're dredging up an old post when Patrick is a newbie...

Me! Me!

Don't have the time/skillset for working on customizing it for empeg I/O, though.

Looking at what they're having to emulate to get it all working (reading the forums), I'm surprised they've gotten as far as they have.

-brendan

After looking around a little more, I realized that there is an XM Receiver for the PC for only $50. The device connects to usb. Fortunately, it is a serial device that is simply using a FTDI serial-usb chip to convert the signal to USB. The pins to grab the serial from are here. We could just connect them up to a MAX232 chip and viola...serial to the empeg. Also there is a digital audio hack, so if Stu ever gets a digital input, we could run digital quality sattelite radio in our vehicles. There have already been GPL'd Perl modules written to interface with it, and I'd imagine that could be ported to C. I'll probably create a new post in the Projects section if anyone is interested.