[Board]: reconsideration of the chatter 2.0 #2896
Comments
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It looks like you have everything you need to port meshtastic to it and make a pull request. PRs are generally accepted. The link you provided states that they're no longer available, as does CircuitMess' own website. Their only mention of what might be available is a projection; to be shipped with their subscription boxes in 2025. I don't think any devs are volunteering to secondhand-purchase and support what likely is a deprecated device. Unqualified statements like "Latest interest I've found was less than 30 days ago so produce cannot be EOL." do not function as proof that a device is not EOL. Edit: whoops, didn't mean to close the issue |
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I have over 20 of these chatter 2 units and would love to see a meshtastic port for them. |
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Yeah.
…On Wed, Nov 1, 2023, 16:30 sheehanisageek ***@***.***> wrote:
I have over 20 of these chatter 2 units and would love to see a meshtastic
port for them.
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Do either of you have any interest in creating the variant.h files and testing? You could use the DIY variant as a jumping off point. |
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I do! But I'm not sure yet I'm trying to learn to code. I know someone who
might as well But I don't want to over promise or overstate my abilities.
…On Fri, Nov 3, 2023, 23:50 code8buster ***@***.***> wrote:
Yeah.
… <#m_-3051923212411759796_>
On Wed, Nov 1, 2023, 16:30 sheehanisageek *@*.*> wrote: I have over 20 of
these chatter 2 units and would love to see a meshtastic port for them. —
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Do either of you have any interest in creating the variant.h files and
testing? You could use the DIY variant as a jumping off point.
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I found that they actually still sell some variant of this device on etsy. Any idea if this is the same hardware, or old stock of an earlier revision? |
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I just acquired one of these, I'll look at porting it, these are pretty interesting. @rimwulf @code8buster |
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So I'm running into an issue, it seems I can't find a RESET pin attached for LLCC68, there is a Enable PIN that comes from the USB port but that doesn't appear to be attached to the ESP. Is that absolutely required for the LLCC68? |
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The reset pin is connected to 3v3 that's perfectly ok. Have a look at the picomputer S3 definition, it's wired up in a similar way. #define LORA_RESET RADIOLIB_NC |
Oh sorry haven't been getting updates. Someone did make code that allowed the original to talk to the 2.0 I didn't find it relevant but I can share it if it helps. Spoke to the company they hinted that they are planning on making another run so we can't have the PCB files. |
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Seems unlikely that the Walmart version is more capable, what are the hardware differences? |
I have no idea honestly, I've seen them on ebay for as little as $15 btw |
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I'll add my 2cents in here, after seeing fang64's posts on Discord, I ordered one from e-bay. Got it, and was able to fiddle enough with variant.h and a few other files to get it compiled and loaded onto the hardware. It worked to the extent that I could send messages on Medium-Slow. The RA-62 is an almost pin compatible replacement for the LLCC68, but uses an SX1262. |
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More Pix ;>) |
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@GPSFan I haven't had time to get the dial pad keyboard working, I mean the radio on it doesn't support SF12 but it's still useful I think for those wanting to use it as is. That's pretty awesome though. |
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Replacing the Lora module is not that hard (the RA-62 modules are cheap too), and without replacing it you can still use the Medium-Slow preset with other SX1262 based devices, The actual data rate is faster than Long-Fast and the link budget is down only 2.5db. A better antenna will more than make up for that loss. (IMHO all those springy coil antennas are nothing but crap, yeah you can make one look nice on a VNA, but as soon as anything gets near them the resonant point can shift by 20-30Mhz, and there goes what little gain you had) |
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Would either of you like to share your modifications to variant.h and other changes that you've managed to get the 'stock' profile of this hardware to roughly work on? I would be appreciated! |
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After the holidays are over (a day or two), and after I un-bork my local repo, I'll submit a PR, I got behind in updating stuff and sheep has hit the can. I'm also working on an audit of all the gnss init code for the u-blox receivers, I've found a bunch of typos and incorrect messages. Lots of testing to do before I go live with that PR though. |
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I picked up three of these kits (one for each of my boys, one for myself) for Christmas for a fun little family project. Didn't realize that they actually communicate using LoRa til we started playing around with them. Not a big coder/programmer, but would happily test anything you might put together for the stock units. Really hope we can get the keypads to work so we can use them as self-contained standalone devices. |
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I bought a dozen and would love to test as well |
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Sorry, I haven't gotten the PR out yet, been busy with the GPS audit, it's grown larger than I thought it would. |
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@GPSFan Would very much be interested in your PR! Had similar idea on radio replacement to port this over and just stumbled across this. |
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I have to apologize for not getting the PR out. RealLife(tm) and DayJob(tm) have not left much time for fiddling with Meshtastic. Hopefully tomorrow or Monday. |
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@GPSFan @GamingNJncos same boat here, I still need to get the keypad working as well. |
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https://github.com/meshtastic/firmware/releases/ |
I can indeed confirm that this will work fine. My first unit that I built was set up exactly like this. Center conductor gets soldered in place of the springy antenna and the shield goes to the pad next to it. As others have mentioned, the hole for the SMA connector is a bit tight on the case design (didn't leave enough tolerances) I generally clean out the hole with a drill bit to make installation easier, although, I plan to update the model to make this less necessary along with some other quality of life improvements. I also plan to make a top mount antenna version. Just haven't had the time to do so yet. |
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That is awesome news. Yeah I did not get time yesterday to get an extra out to try this for them, so thank you for confirming for them! Look fwd to other designs! |
I have posted an update to the case design including a version with no side bump and a hole for a second button. I have also updated the original design to print better and have looser tolerances around the SMA mount. I also enlarged the area where the SMA cable comes through to make insertion of the connector much easier. I also noticed that I must have exported the wrong STL from my fusion timeline for the front faceplate as the screw holes were not properly countersunk. I have corrected this. I have yet to test print any of these yet, so feedback is welcome. |
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@tomhanax Any chance you could try building with the latest and seeing if we can figure out how to get it the way it worked in previous version? Guess this might even warrant its own thread/pr. |
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I tried with latest (2.4.2) version and no problem. |
Heroic! Thanks! Will give this a try when I get time. |
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@tomhanax works great. Thanks again! Be great if there was some way to set this font size as an option in the app. Some might prefer the small font for more text on screen I suppose. |
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Anyone try the latest 2.5 alpha firmware? |
Just tried it confirmed. The screen does flash for second. Also tried the bleeding edge one did the same. 2.5.0.33eb073 worked for me. Is that the Latest one you tried that worked? |
I also ran into this issue. Screen would flash for a second and go black. Interestingly, I was able to send messages from it, so the firmware is running but something with the handling of the display is off. The current stable build 2.4.2 seems to be working fine though. |
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For anyone interested, I am working on a much cleaner case design. It is not quite to the point where I can call it done yet as I am still working on the fitment of the back cover, but it should be a big improvement over my previous design and require a lot less materials to produce. |
That looks very awesome. Very simple and elegant |
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Add: |
Wow, thank you. Works fine now. Hoping that gets added going forward? Now to re-try getting the medium sized font working with the latest build. |
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Well, no luck on medium font with latest builds. The script is looking for specific lines but even when manually adding the changes it seems to build but not change anything. |
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how do I get the device into boot mode? keep getting these |
Wanted to double check you are trying to just use the precompiled firmware rather than compiling yourself? The below is the precompiled and much easier. It’s a bit controversial of sorts, but I don’t do anything to get into boot mode. I know others have to short two pins, but if you use device- update.bat -f and then turn the unit on it will “catch” it and start updating |
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Yeah, that would be. When you’re trying to use the device update do you still get that error message? I’ve also noticed these things don’t have the best USB ports. Have you tried it on more than one? I know at least one or two of mine have a bad port and you have to toy around with them. |
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The pin short trick works when it's on most of the time but sometimes it also takes holding the momentary button I've wired while it's booting. Still interested in the medium font size though text getting cut off on longer messages is a quirk and no good way to scroll. Be amazing if there was some way to make a fancy GUI for this thing since it's a color screen but I'm still really thankful and satisfied with the defaults and having a functional keypad. Being that there's 4MB storage there might be enough to add some kind of custom GUI, though it'd likely be very limited. |
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For those who are interested, I went ahead and published the slim case for the Chatter2. Wouldn't say its perfect, but I feel comfortable sharing it for feedback. Due to the tolerances being very tight, you may need to adjust scaling slightly depending on print accuracy. Unfortunately, to get the text to print on the front of it, you will need to use a .2mm nozzle. I do a layer change right at the start of the text backing to get the text to be in white. I also included a version with no text that can easily be printed with a standard .4mm nozzle. |
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Very nice, @scott1627 Good idea on using an existing button. Rather nice not to have to wire a separate one. |
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Sorry if this is the wrong location, but I have searched for the past few hours (and flashed a few different firmwares, etc). However -- I cannot for the life of me get the meshtastic.local (or direct to device IP) to work. In fact, when I try to connect, it loads the tab title and icon, and then just spins. Dev. console in Brave gives nothing for information, and most interestingly, it then freezes the chatter unit to a full stop for a few minutes or so, until it just reboots. Repeat, a million times over. Currently flashing older (2.5.1) firmware to see if this issue persists there, as well. I've also used other esp web flashers to 'erase all the flash', as I remember there being something about partitions/etc and I'm unsure how to reset or recreate those if that is perhaps part of the problem. Any suggestions? I assume the on-device web interface works for some of you out there on this device? Thanks! |
I have had issues in the past using the built in web interface. When loading it for the first time in a new browser, it takes ages and the device reboots randomly. I believe this is due to the ESP32 becoming overwhelmed and crashing (I could be completely wrong here). I've found that if you wait long enough, or refresh the page enough, eventually it will load the full interface and once the assets are cached to your browser, it seems to work totally fine from then on. |
Can you provide details on this? |
May have been hidden in comments as github seems to hide some of the comments in the middle with so many replies here. See this picture - #2896 (comment) Once that trace is very carefully interrupted (cut via whatever very small and precise tool, such as a very very small flathead screwdriver), you can then solder the jumper wire between the CPU and LoRA chip as shown in other pictures and Meshtastic works with "LongFast" as expected. |
Thanks for the info! This is what I was missing. |
Hey, @scott1627, I'd say it is almost perfect! Very nice and perfect fit, indeed. Only one small issue for me - I have an antenna connector that has a slightly larger hexagonal base. So when I was closing the case and putting on the back cover, the top wall of the front cover cracked a little due to the tension. The case could be a few tenths of a millimeter more of depth. Otherwise, excellent work! I managed to fit the battery and the TP4056 into the box without any problems; it's even great that the TP4056 can be cooled using the grille on the front side. Compact is what I like. Just label the buttons with a black marker and it will be done. Perfect! So, many thanks, for me this case is the best Chatter 2 improvement yet!
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and others
SOC
ESP32
Lora IC
DL-CC68-S-868
Product Link
https://www.samsclub.com/p/circuitmess-chatter-stem-project-build-and-code-walkie-talkies/PL980418145
Description
Requesting reconsideration of Chatter 2.0 support as product is still being produced.
Confirmed product is in-fact open source with hardware, schematics, and code. I included photos of mine board for reference and in contact with CircuitMess to see if original PCB files can be obtained.
Latest interest I've found was less than 30 days ago so produce cannot be EOL.
Refrence:
#2707 (comment)
Original code
https://github.com/CircuitMess/Chatter2-Firmware
Fork interest
https://github.com/bestander/Chatter2-Firmware-for-Chatter1
Hardware
LoRa module DL-CC68-S-868
ESP-WROOM-32
Hardware schematics:
Reference photos.
If permitted this will be updated with know info I just ask for consideration and not closing this issue
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