ARM Music Player

And I finally finished it.


Here is a video showing the functionality. I removed the sound but you can make an idea.

And the source code Download.

Leave your impressions below.

ARM Music Player

As I said, I started working on an ARM music player based on the EMX module from GHI Electronics.

Here is a short video showing where I am with the project. I will release the source code soon.

Please leave your comments below.

Music Player (MyMP3 v6.1) - Working

I finally gave up on this project since I will continue developing it on an arm platform (based on the EMX module, will post a video soon).


I got it to the point where you could browse files from the device with the application on the android phone and selecting a file started playing it.


Also the ethernet part was working (I could listen radio stations) but you can only test it by changing code on the device (no implementation on the Android side).


So, here is the complete source code for the xmega and for the android device. The android project can be imported directly in Eclipse.


Android Application Source Code
XMEGA Source Code

Changing platform and results

I was getting a little tired of the little 8 bit microcontrollers and all their limitations so I started searching for a new (powerful) platform. So, what to search for? Because I've worked in the past only with Atmel chips (with some few exceptions) I started looking on the Atmel site on the AVR32 and ARM solutions. After a little discussion with some other people, I decided to start working with ARM chips so I began searching for developing tools (debuggers, programmers, compilers) to see if this would be cost effective. 

In my search I stumbled upon some great arm developing platforms from GHI Electronics that support .NET micro framework. I worked a little with .NET micro framework in the past (a very small project at school) and it seemed pretty great. Well, this modules are light years from great. You can event run unmanaged native code via RLP if you need real time capabilities and everything else you need is there, in the SDK. You can just start working on what you want to do.

Music Player (MyMP3 v6.1) - Introduction

As I previously said, I decided to give up the LCD screen with the touchscreen and move the control part to a mobile device (Android phone in this case), also adding a Bluetooth SPP module and a 2.5" IDE HDD as a storage unit.

I finished all the drivers and the integration of the TCP/IP stack (using the stack found here). Some problems need to be resolved with DHCP and DNS but until now it's all working fine. On the first try, I was using uIP stack but wasn't fast enough. 

All the audio data is streamed to the audio decoder (VS1053) with the help of the DMAC (integrated in xmega192A3).

Also, will add a 32Kx8 SRAM chip that will keep one playlist (about 8100 entries in the playlist) on the device, so that it can work without a Bluetooth connection.

I'm now working on the Android application. I'll post some videos when I have a functional prototype. Until then, here are some pictures with the new Music Player.

For any suggestions or questions, use the comment area below.

Music Player (MyMP3 v5.0) - Videos - Final word

After finishing the hardware part and some part of the software, I decided that I don't like how the project turned up (it was to bulky) so I decided to go in a different direction. I gave up the modularity of the project and the LCD screen and I added support for 2.5" ATA hard drives and a bluetooth module. Also it now has an USB connector and the player appears as a mass storage device (only the internal HDD, not the card). The player will not have any buttons, nor display, instead it will be controlled over bluetooth by an android terminal and all the UI will be on the terminal. Also it will have a serial port connector in the back (disguised in a mini USB connector) that will allow it to connect to a preamplifier (not made yet) that will have an OLED display (for spectrum analyzer) and a rotary encoder. The new version has a total size of a standard 2.5" HDD. All the documentation for the new project will be available on my blog after the project is finished.

I will post soon details on the new approach and some images. Until then, some videos on version 5.0 and 5.1.

 (main menu demo - v5.0)

(play demo - v5.1)

Music Player (MyMP3 v5.0) - LCD controller

The first module I built for the music player was the LCD controller for the 6" LCD I bought from a friend. The LCD I bought came with a controller board based on SED1335. The board was equipped with the CCFL inverter and the DC-DC converter needed for the LCD (5V - 30V).

Music Player (MyMP3 v5.0) - Introduction

This is a project I started a few months ago. It's 4 predecessors where built around the VS1001 hardware audio decoder (MP3's mostly) and were all mainly just prototypes (built on test PCB's). For these versions I used various MCU's (Atmega8, Atmega32, Atmega644p), even 2 MCU's per project. The 4th version was a portable MP3 player (Atmega644p) that was using a microSD card as file support and vs1001 as the audio decoder. It also had a nokia 3310 LCD for UI and 5 push buttons.