MC-EU1 remote protocol, PalmOS remote for Coolpix

[Ertugrul Akcaoglu]

Thank you very much for the offer. Let me check out Radio Shack & try to do it myself first, if I can't I'll contact you.

BTW, Merry Christmas and happy new year.

Ertu

I could make up a cable for you out of adapters if you can't find
what you need yourself. I'm not in that business, and I don't have
a 4500 (not sure if the serial cable is the same for the 4500 and
my N710C or not) so I couldn't test it out, but if you have no
other options, I'll be happy to help.

Rodney

Does anybody make & sell ready to use cables? I have a Clie and a
4500 and I don't want to modfy any cable etc...

Ertu

I'm interested in this coolcom s/w.
What is the minimum PalmOS version which is required to run
the coolcom.

I think It's PalmOS 3.3, but haven't tried older version...

For example, I have the original PalmPilot running System v3.0.
Is this good enough.

You could send me your PalmPilot v3.0 ROM dump and I'll try it with
POSE (Palm OS Emulator) ! If it doesn't work I may fix it

Vladimir.

--
http://www.imagestation.com/members/ertugrul/

--
http://www.imagestation.com/members/ertugrul/

 

[GreenEyedMonster]

Okay, sorry to ask a stupid question but I'm really kinda lost here. What specifically do I need to be able to do this with a m515 and a 995? If I missed this above, I apologise in advance.

 

[Barry Carter]

Well, I hooked up my m130 to a 4500, and you need the same thing I needed:

• Nikon Serial cable for CP....... SC-EW3
• Null Modem .... Radio Shack 26-264
• M-M, DB-9 gender changer....RS # 26-231
• Belkin serial sync cable (office Max) or Palm Serial sync cable P10804U

That's it!

Ciao...Barry

Okay, sorry to ask a stupid question but I'm really kinda lost
here. What specifically do I need to be able to do this with a
m515 and a 995? If I missed this above, I apologise in advance.

--
Ciao...Barry

 

[GreenEyedMonster]

Thanks Barry, I'll go gather my materials now and give it a shot.

• Nikon Serial cable for CP....... SC-EW3
• Null Modem .... Radio Shack 26-264
• M-M, DB-9 gender changer....RS # 26-231
• Belkin serial sync cable (office Max) or Palm Serial sync cable

P10804U
That's it!

Ciao...Barry

Okay, sorry to ask a stupid question but I'm really kinda lost
here. What specifically do I need to be able to do this with a
m515 and a 995? If I missed this above, I apologise in advance.

--
Ciao...Barry

 

[Rodney N. Yerby]

you're welcome. Merry Christmas to you to. Let me know how your cable turns out.

Rodney

BTW, Merry Christmas and happy new year.

Ertu

I'm not aware of anyone who sells ready to use cables, but you can
do it all with standard cables and adapters, you don't have to
modify cables. Get a serial hotsync cable for your clie, and a
Nikon SC-EW3 cable. Go to any Radio shack and tell them you need a
null modem adapter to put between the two cables, and any other
adpaters you need to hook the cables and null modem adapter
together. Radio Shack stocks everything you need. I think (but I'm
not certain) that if you buy a modem cable or GPS cable for your
Clie, you won't need the null modem adapter, but the serial hot
sync cable is a lot cheaper.

I could make up a cable for you out of adapters if you can't find
what you need yourself. I'm not in that business, and I don't have
a 4500 (not sure if the serial cable is the same for the 4500 and
my N710C or not) so I couldn't test it out, but if you have no
other options, I'll be happy to help.

Rodney

 

[Rodney N. Yerby]

Somebody posted the Radio Shack part numbers in another post in this thread. Here it is, just in case you didnt' see it.

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1007&message=4017208

 

[Auge]

With the help of the information from:
http://vyskocil.free.fr/coolcom/
and
http://delphys.net/d.holmes/photos/coolpix_e990/e990_usb_cable.html

I had made a Clie -> Coolpix cable and it works fine with my SJ-30 and Coolpix 995.

Here is how I make it:
1. Buy a SJ-30 serial hotsync cable.

2. Buy a spare Coolpix USB cable.

3. Cut out the 9-pin RS-232 connector from the SJ-30 serial cable, record down which wire was connecting to which pin on the connector (in order to know which wire is TxD, which is RxD, which is GND....)

4. Cut out the Coolpix connector from the Coolpix USB cable, remove all the wire (by soldering) from the connector (only the Coolpix connector is needed....the cable and USB connector is useless here)

5. According to Drawing 1 from the second URL above, solder the wires from the SJ-30 hotsync cable to the Coolpix connector.

IMPORTANT:

5.1 REMEMBER to connect the TxD wire to RxD pin on Coolpix connector, and RxD wire to TxD pin.

5.2 Connect the pin 2 and pin 5 on the Coolpix connector using a short wire from either the Hotsync cable or the USB cable, or elsewhere, and connect the GND wire from the Hotsync cable to either pin 2 or pin 5 on the Coolpix connector.

6. Seal the Coolpix connector and finish!

According to the Palm model you all are using, you can make your own cable....even you don't know the pin diagram of your Palm.

Also, both two cables I used are much more easier to find and cheaper then either MC-EU1 or SC-EW3 cable!!

Hope these informations help you all.

And I must say thank you very much to Vladimir Vyskocil who developed the useful CoolRemote software!! Keep the good work going!!

Regards,
Auge

 

[Stefan Wedin141242]

I got it to work perfectly with my Palm Vx (running PalmOS 4.1) and my Coolpix 4500 (firmware 1.2). Very cool!

Stefan

 

[Jordan Robbins]

Any idea if this would work on a 5700 when using an older palm VII os 3.2? MY camera is currently being repaired by nikon, but I am considering trying it out when I get it back. It may give me an excuse to resurrect my old palm once again.

This is so cool! I just bought a Coolpix 5700, and I have a Sony
CLIE (Palm OS) and an old Palm Vx. What cables do I need and where
do I get them?

 

[Jordan Robbins]

Any idea if this would work on a 5700 when using an older palm VII os 3.2? MY camera is currently being repaired by nikon, but I am considering trying it out when I get it back. It may give me an excuse to resurrect my old palm once again.

Hi,

Here is a link to some informatiions I found about the MC-EU1
serial protocol :

http://vyskocil.free.fr/coolcom/

You can find there, applications for PalmOS in very alpha stage but
useable to remote control the Coolpix family of camera !

All information about MC-EU1 is welcome !

Vladimir.

 

[y3000]

It work with my Palm m100 (Palm OS 3.5.3) and Nikon e4500 (v1.1) , Thx .

 

[Belen Hedderich]

Jordan Robbins wrote:
How about if u give me how tu run it on POSE?
I have tryed every configuration and want to run it from pose but can't thanks

 

[tom deering]

I don't want to be a trouble maker, but I was under the impression that the coolpix 4500 was USB only. So how can a palm device communicate with it over RS232?

If I'm missing something, please tell me, because I use this feature with my CP950 a lot, and it's the only thing that keeps me from upgrading.

Thanks!

Tom

Forgot to add that Cool Report was run on a Palm m130, controlling
a Nikon Coolpix 4500.

 

[Philippe Roger]

I don't want to be a trouble maker, but I was under the impression
that the coolpix 4500 was USB only. So how can a palm device
communicate with it over RS232?

If I'm missing something, please tell me, because I use this
feature with my CP950 a lot, and it's the only thing that keeps me
from upgrading.

Thanks!

Tom

Tom,

The Coolpix circuitry includes both an RS232 serial interface and a USB interface. Think of it as the equivalent of a "chipset" on a PC. In normal conditions you don't use the serial interface because it is way too slow to transfer the pictures that way, but as a control channel where only a few bytes are needed to tell the camera what to do, why not? I think that Nikon's own remote control MC-EU1 uses the serial interface and so do the Digisnap and CoolRemote. I can confirm that CoolRemote works fine with my 5700 and a PalmV.

So, don't keep this question from upgrading to the 5700, if that's what you want. You'll love it!
--
Philippe

 

[Norman Walsh]

The Palm/Coolpix interface sounds very cool. I've just about decided to get the 5700 (to replace my 950) and this will be one of the first things I try.

Can anyone tell me what the practical length of the cable is? Can I expect to setup the camera next to my bird feeder and sit back 20', 30', more?

 

[Todd Taylor]

Does anyone know if RadioShack (or anyone else) makes a USB to Serial adapter? If so, I would think that we could use the USB cable that came with our cameras instead of buying the Nikon serial cable (well, my CP5700 came with a USB cable.) Granted, that would mean there are 3 adapters between the Nikon USB cable and the Palm HotSync cable (if that's the route you are going), but it might be a lil' cheaper

Sincerely,
Todd M. Taylor

 

[Jordan Robbins]

Yes radioshack makes one (do a search on their site) but it has a male USB plug so you would need to find some form of coupler if they exist. This option, however, dosnt really make much sense seeing that it would cost $39 to purchase the USB to serial adapter. You can get nikons cable cheaper... and even a bit more so if you look around ebay. I bought the 3 wires needed 4 months ago for about $38-$40 (cant quite remember).

-Jordan

Does anyone know if RadioShack (or anyone else) makes a USB to
Serial adapter? If so, I would think that we could use the USB
cable that came with our cameras instead of buying the Nikon serial
cable (well, my CP5700 came with a USB cable.) Granted, that would
mean there are 3 adapters between the Nikon USB cable and the Palm
HotSync cable (if that's the route you are going), but it might be
a lil' cheaper

Sincerely,
Todd M. Taylor

--
-Jordan, CP5700

 

[Marty Scher B]

If the connection is anything close to the RS232 serial standard max length(which was about 200'), you should be all right with the length you are talking about

Marty

The Palm/Coolpix interface sounds very cool. I've just about
decided to get the 5700 (to replace my 950) and this will be one of
the first things I try.

Can anyone tell me what the practical length of the cable is? Can I
expect to setup the camera next to my bird feeder and sit back 20',
30', more?

 

[Mark Roberts]

The MC-EU1 uses 5V logic rather than true RS232 signal levels... the distance may be limited significantly.

FYI, the DigiSnap 2000 controllers use true RS232 (+ -12V) signals, and has been used to at least 1000 ft.

Marty

The Palm/Coolpix interface sounds very cool. I've just about
decided to get the 5700 (to replace my 950) and this will be one of
the first things I try.

Can anyone tell me what the practical length of the cable is? Can I
expect to setup the camera next to my bird feeder and sit back 20',
30', more?

--
Harbortronics... home of the DigiSnap!

 

[Mark Roberts]

You can't simply use a USB/serial converter... that requires a USB host, and would not connect to the camera... the signals and commands would get all screwwed up as well.

We have serial cable adapters for the Coolpix cameras for $22 at http://www.harbortronics.com

-Jordan

Does anyone know if RadioShack (or anyone else) makes a USB to
Serial adapter? If so, I would think that we could use the USB
cable that came with our cameras instead of buying the Nikon serial
cable (well, my CP5700 came with a USB cable.) Granted, that would
mean there are 3 adapters between the Nikon USB cable and the Palm
HotSync cable (if that's the route you are going), but it might be
a lil' cheaper

Sincerely,
Todd M. Taylor

--
-Jordan, CP5700

--
Harbortronics... home of the DigiSnap!