Sparkfun Mp3 Player Shield

Question

Anyone know if this work with ezb? I cant find any documentation on it and confused about how it hooks into ezb or if it even works!

Rich · Answer

This one? Datasheet is here Quick Start Guide is here It's been discussed in this topic It has a support page here

CardboardHacker · Answer

Holy Rich!

Xuven · Answer

Thanks, Rich I saw those and I still wasn't sure for some reason. So its basically the same as a mp3 trigger just under a different name? Ive read a bunch of threads and checked the support. Just not sure which pins im soldering to.

Dave Schulpius · Answer

Sorry Rich, his board isn't a MP3 Trigger that's so nicely supported. He has a MP3 player shield for Arduino. This board may still be able to be used but it may not be so simple. First you will need to find where the RX pin is. That's where the signal wire attaches (white) from a digatal port to a MP3 Trigger. I looked at the link provided and although it has a RX pin that's attached to a UART (says it's for debugging) I cant see what pin it actually is on this MP3 Player Shield. I'm sure you can power it nicely from the EZB useing 5v (red) and a ground (black) from the same digital port. Then there is the formatting of the files you want to play and how ARC will play them. With a MP3 Trigger they name of the fils needs to be written out in a certin way to work. Here too I dont know if ARC can trigger the file in the format needed to play with this board. Once connected properly I guess your going to have to give it a try. Read through all the supporting info at SparkFun to find the right way to lable the sound files. Good luck and let us know what happens.

Rich · Answer

The link and datasheet I linked to are the right one though aren't they? I'll edit out the other 2 links (I assumed the Sparkfun MP3 Player Shield was the same thing as the MP3 Trigger in my haste). The datasheet (if it's the right one) will explain how to use it. From what I saw (a quick browse over) it's serial so should be simple to use but if it's not the trigger then EZ-Script will be needed. I'll have a proper read through it all when I get chance if Dave's reply hasn't already done so (again, I only had a quick browse over it).

Dave Schulpius · Answer

Hey Rich, Yes your first two links are correct. Don't worry, we've got your back around here. Honest mistake and easy to confuse the two. I almost missed it myself. I was able to see a good picture of the MP3 Player and see the RX pin is at the upper left corner of the board (under the reflection of light in the above pic). However that's about how far my talents go on this one. Not even sure that's the proper place for the signal wire bit it is if using the MP3 Trigger.

Xuven · Answer

Thanks for the input guys. Haven't had much time to toy with it but wanted to get as much info as I could before starting. I did see something similar in another thread but no solution to the problem. @Rich Im really not that great at programming, i just dabbled in it a bit. What would be a simple scipt that would accept a voice command and then play a track from the player? Im going to assume its using the serial command. @dschulpius Its the digital port wire that was throwing me for a loop. The data sheet looks nothing like the board in my eyes. None of the labels from the sheet are on the board. Like you said im just going to have to play with it and see.

Dave Schulpius · Answer

Here is where I'd start; Connect the signal wire to the RX pin and point the script in ARC to that pin like this: MP3TriggerPlayTrack( d0, 38400, 11, 6000) Example: MP3TriggerPlayTrack( digitalPort, baud, trackNumber, [pause time] ) Plays the specified MP3 track from the MP3 Trigger Sheild Optionally, the Pause Time value can be used which disables the Speech Recognition control for the specified number of milliseconds. Example: MP3TriggerPlayTrack( d0, 38400, 1 ) Example: MP3TriggerPlayTrack( d0, 38400, 1, 3000 )

Xuven · Answer

No dice! I hear a small pop like it wants to play but nothing. I tried changing baud rates,ports and even tried the serial command still nothing

Darathian · Answer

Not really a solution but I don't have a ez-b or this shield to test with.

Looking at the documentation:

Based on the products description it uses SPI to talk to the chip on the board.

Not sure what built in functionality there is in ARC for SPI communication. (Perhaps DJ or Rich or someone else can chime in)

Documentation also states:

It sends the MP3 to the VS1053 32 bytes at a time. When the VS1053 has decoded the 32 bytes in its buffer, it requests more data by sending its DREQ pin high. (This makes me think that whatever code is controlling this would have to be able to accept and respond to this pin high request with more data.

Thanks

Xuven

Upgrade to ARC Pro