[drssyoon]

How difficult would it be to build a box that will accept an external hard disk via USB (there are many external 2.5" drives available currently, or even 1" external drives) and output audio? Sort of "component" level compressed audio decoder. The device would have only the display, somekind of user interface (joystick, touchpad, etc.) and the necessary hardware/firmware to read/decode/amplify. It should be fairly inexpensive to build and small in size. Does the widget SanDisk sells - using thumb flash drives - work this way? If one was to build one, but make it slightly larger so that decent components could be used, it may work! Any engineer types out there who could do this? I would try it, but my engineering degree is over 20 years old - sigh...

 

[recephasan]

MODERATOR: please move this thread to DIY Audio. It might attract more attention there.

Let's see... since we're brainsorming here.

Starting with a module like the Sandisk, one would need to hack the firmware to be able to access a hard drive, essentially run a HDD controller in software to access the USB drive, right? That's one.

Power. I believe the smaller HDDs also require 12V as well as +/- 5V but somebody please correct me if I'm mistaken.

Assuming there is no way to hack the firmware on a Sandisk module (and I'd suspect this is not possible unless you find your way into one of their labs):

-A HDD controller
-A GUI controller (also input device controller)
-A decoder chip
-Buffer memory
-Battery controller (ok, you might skip this one if you don't care about the battery dying on you before parking the drive, and I bet the new ones park themselves in case of power failure)
-Microcontroller to make all this run
-Firmware for the microcontroller
-An amp, of course
-Associated hardware (switches, displays, audio jacks, power input jacks...)

Anyone got any input?

 

[drssyoon]

Now, remember - any and all of those tiny HD-based DAP already has all the logic required to drive a FAT-based disk subsystem. So, basically, all you'd need is a power supply to spin the bigger drives - which can be powered by 4 AA batteries - in addition to something the size of MuVo2 or Nitrus.

 

[recephasan]

Are you trying to add an extra HDD to a HDD based player, or are you trying to build one from scratch (which is what I understood)?

 

[drssyoon]

I would like to know if it would be possible to build one from scratch or jump start one by cannibalizing another player. Just a black box that has the user interface and the electronics and a USB port for an external hard disk. Should be do-able, right? There are a lot of clever people out there.

 

[Oddball]

Dr. Xin Feng is trying to build his own mp3 player as well, just FYI.

http://www.fixup.net/tips/xinmp3/index.htm