SoundGraph VF310 15c2:0036 Linux / XBMC

I have an OrigenAE M10 HTPC case which has a SoundGraph IR/VFD unit – Model: VF310 15c2:0036. This is the LCD display on the front of the HTPC case. Before I attempted to get the LCD display working under Linux Ubuntu 12.10 minimal and XBMC V12.0 Frodo, I had read several forum threads and it sounded very difficult to set this up under Linux especially with this particular model, however it turned out to be quite simple.

I already have the IR receiver working in MCE mode, I did have difficulties with this and was having issues with double presses / commands from the remote being sent to XBMC. I had installed LIRC initially and I think that and the inbuilt modules in the kernel for iMon where conflicting, in the end I uninstalled LIRC and only used the in kernel modules. I followed this user guide here and the “Do everything completely in-kernel”" option to get the MCE (Logitech Harmony) remote control working properly. You can see some comments I made on that thread here. I am not going to cover the setup of the remote control here as I had allot of problems with it.

Anyways I am looking at the LCD display today not the remote control setup. This is how I got it working. I also started a thread about it here on the XBMC forum.

To double check which VFD unit you have from terminal type

lsusb

Bus 002 Device 003: ID 15c2:0036 SoundGraph Inc. LC16M VFD Display/IR Receiver

1. From terminal I installed LCDProc

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install lcdproc

I then read the relevant parts of the LCDProc user manual here.

2. Edit the LCDd.conf file located in /etc

cd /etc
sudo nano LCDd.conf

Scroll down to the [Server] section and change this line from:

Driver=curses

To:

Driver=imon

Note: There is also an imonlcd driver I tried this initially but I just got garbled text on the display.

Scroll a bit further down to the Welcome and Goodbye messages, change these to suit your requirements. These messages are displayed when the HTPC is turned on from shutdown and when it is shutting down.

# Hello message: each entry represents a display line; default: builtin
#Hello="  Welcome to"
#Hello="   LCDproc!"

# GoodBye message: each entry represents a display line; default: builtin
#GoodBye="Thanks for using"
#GoodBye="   LCDproc!"

Change this setting:

# If yes, the the serverscreen will be rotated as a usual info screen. If no,
# it will be a background screen, only visible when no other screens are
# active. The special value 'blank' is similar to no, but only a blank screen
# is displayed. [default: on; legal: on, off, blank]
#ServerScreen=on

To:

ServerScreen=blank

You need to remove the comment # in front of it to make the setting active.
I wanted to slow down the speed that the text scrolls across the LCD display, I tried changing this setting but it does not seem to do anything?

# set title scrolling speed [default: 10; legal: 0-10]
#TitleSpeed=10

I change it to:

TitleSpeed=1

Save and exit the LCDd.conf file to do that press Ctrl+X on the keyboard then Y then hit enter.

3. In the XBMC settings in System enable the option for LCD/VFD

4. Edit the LCD.xml fie. There is an LCD.xml file in your userdata folder, you can customise and change
this file if required? You can read more about the LCD.xml file here.

I did make one change to the file and that was:

From this:

<navigation>
      <line>$INFO[System.CurrentWindow]</line>
      <line>$INFO[System.CurrentControl]</line>
      <line>Freemem: $INFO[System.FreeMemory]</line>
      <line>$INFO[System.ScreenWidth]x$INFO[System.ScreenHeight] $INFO[System.ScreenMode]</line>
   </navigation>

To this:

<navigation>
      <line>$INFO[System.CurrentWindow]</line>
      <line>$INFO[System.CurrentControl]</line>
      <line>Transport Controls</line>
   </navigation>

Because when I navigated in the XBMC GUI over the transport controls like Play / Pause / Stop etc the second line on the display would output my free memory like this: FREEMEM: 3382MB I don’t know why it does not display the name of the current transport control you are on? So I changed it to simply read “Transport Controls”


5. Reboot and your LCD display should now be working!

This is what gets displayed when nothing is happening

XBMC Running….
Current date and time..

You can change this in the LCD.xml file in the general section.



When I navigate around the XBMC GUI the second line on the display shows what Menu item I am currently on?





Here I am playing a music track Depeche Mode – Personal Jesus, the track play and remaining times are also shown. You can change what gets displayed for music playback in the music section of the LCD.xml file.



Not very clear in the photo, but I am currently highlighting one of the transport controls in the XBMC GUI and “Transport Controls” now scrolls across the screen whenever I do this.



Here I am now in my movie library in XBMC and as I navigate over the different movie titles, if I pause on a title it displays that titles name on the LCD display.



Here I am playing a movie – E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial



This is a bit funky, when in the System settings area and also when I am on some of the other system type menus it looks like this



Summary

The only other slight issue is that when I shutdown the HTPC (S5 Shutdown) the Goodbye message stays on the screen and the LCD display does not turn off. However if I put the HTPC in to S3 Sleep mode instead then the LCD display is turned off and the Goodbye message is not displayed. Also the Welcome message does not stay on the display long enough for my liking.

Overall I am very pleased that the LCD display is now working as I thought it would be a complete nightmare to setup and actually it was relatively simple. I wish I could say the same for setting up the IR MCE remote control, as that was a nightmare!

Please keep in mind I do not have LIRC installed, if you are using LIRC for your remote control this may or may not work ?
 
 
 
Phaze1 Digital

OrigenAE M10 Mini-ITX HTPC Build

Quick post today looking at a new HTPC Build I just did. I plan to install Ubuntu Minimal and XBMC !

HTPC Case – OrigenAE M10
Motherboard - Intel DH67CF
CPU – Intel 2nd Generation Core i3-2100
Aftermarket Cooler – Akasa K25
Zalman Fan Mate 2
RAM - Corsair 4GB DDR3
SSD – Crucial 64GB M4
Blu-ray ROM – Sony BC-5650H (On its way from Hong Kong)

OrigenAE M10 case – this particular case has a right of centre eject button for the optical drive, I’ve seen some of these cases where the button is on the left, so make sure you get the right slot loading optical drive which is easier said than done. I can’t seem to source any new slot loading Blu-ray drives in the UK, they are either second hand or refurbished. So I have a new one coming from Hong Kong thanks to my Chinese friend I know who is sending me one.

It also has the VF310 SoundGraph VFD/IR display, which I have read is extremely difficult to get working under Linux, unlike the VF210 version of it. Not looking forward to that!





I read that the rear intake fan was a little noisy running at full speed, so I bought a Zalman Fan Mate 2 to I can slow down the speed of this fan and make it quieter! If I still lived in a hot country I wouldn’t do this.







There is no doubt that the OrigenAE M10 is the original beautiful looking Mini-ITX HTPC case and I have always fancied having one, but the internal layout is a bit of a let down and could have been done better, you can only install one 2.5” SSD drive and it screws to the side of the case as shown in the next three pictures.



Outside of the case (Lid off) looking in at the SSD.





Cases some in Black or Silver.



PICO PSU and External Power Brick are supplied with the case.



External power brick next to a Harmony remote.



Rear connections and ports on the Intel motherboard, you can also install a low profile PCI-E card.



Installing the Mini-ITX Motherboard



I’m sure the stock CPU coolers are decent these days but old habits die hard, so I opted for an Aftermarket Akasa low profile cooler.



It spins quite slowly and I can hardly hear it. I am only using the Zalman Fan Mate 2 on the rear chassis fan and they recommend you be careful if using them on a CPU fan for obvious reasons if its set too low and not doing its job properly cooling the chip. 

You can see I have the single Corsair 4GB RAM chip installed as well now.



This is interesting, don't think I have seen this before, the circuit board you can see in the below picture is for the SoundGraph VRD, there is a switch on it, the default position is SoundGraph, the other says Philips. There is also a pin connector which says Philips IR, I am guessing if you don’t want to use the SoundGraph IR receiver you can set it to Philips and use a standard internal IR receiver board. Not sure where the IR window is, presuming its built in to the LCD Display some where.





Optical drive bay now installed, but I have no optical drive at the moment to put in to it. If you look at the bottom right you can see the circuit board for the front power switch arrangement.





I had to put on the Power LED cable the other way round as to what is shown in the Intel motherboard diagram, reversed the pins – / + etc.



After realising my TV was on the wrong HDMI input and a brief panic, I was then able to see the boot screens and get in to the BIOS.



Quick Summary

Very nice, good build quality and great looking Mini-ITX HTPC case. If you want this style of chassis with an LCD display then this is probably the one to go for, budget allowing. If your not bothered about an LCD I would recommend a fanless solution like the Streacom FC8. The OrigenAE M10 came with one of those daft iMon Pad remotes, would like to see it shipped with a decent MCE remote. Internal design around the optical drive bay could be better, you are limited to what types of slot loading drives you can use, due to button position and mechanism and I think they could have made it so you could install two 2.5” hard drives.
Next I need to install an OS, I have decided to install Linux Ubuntu and XBMC with a view to migrating all my HTPC’s away from Windows 7 / MCE in the long term. Will let you know how that works out? As I am new to Linux so it could be a bit of a learning curve. So keep reading the blog to find out. Or leave a comment if you have recently moved away from MCE.