[SOLVED] Repair a VR920

Post by **LukePC1** » Fri Jul 11, 2008 3:03 am

Hi I found a defect VR920 on Ebay. The seller said it has the VGA cable loose, somewhere from the chip.
Unfortunatly there is some plug for 13 pins missing, so you would have to solder 13times on a those propably very small pins.

Those who have a VR920: could you tell me, what he is speaking about? Is this on the outside? Would you have to take it to pieces?

If you can see it: how big is it? Is there a chance to solder it?

@ all others:
Do you know, where to get that plug?

Post by **sharky** » Fri Jul 11, 2008 4:56 am

hi!

any link to see? by the way if you ship it to me i might fix it.. did tricky things in the past. (xbox chips, ps2 chips and similar.) the ps2 chip has some soldering points as small as a monitor pixel..

obviously i cant guarantee, but at 99% no problem if you have the connector!

let me know

igor

Post by **sharky** » Fri Jul 11, 2008 5:00 am

just found it.. shouldnt be a problem..

Post by **Okta** » Fri Jul 11, 2008 5:15 am

Haha thanks for the heads up now i will outbid you

lol just kidding its not showing up in my searches although i did find one in australia but he wants a little too much for second hand i think. In his add hes says the display is bigger than a 26inch lcd and that it can use IZ3d drivers (bit early yet). I wonder if its someone from here selling it?

Post by **android78** » Fri Jul 11, 2008 7:01 am

Okta wrote:Haha thanks for the heads up now i will outbid you lol just kidding its not showing up in my searches although i did find one in australia but he wants a little too much for second hand i think. In his add hes says the display is bigger than a 26inch lcd and that it can use IZ3d drivers (bit early yet). I wonder if its someone from here selling it?

I saw that too and kind of interrested... but as you say a little too much for 2nd hand.
It's not me selling it BTW.

I can't find this one Luke and sharky are talking about so I can't really comment. I've done my fair share of soldering to SMCs in my time and I'd say that there sould be no problem with attaching a cable even if the entire socket on the circuit board inside the unit is missing, obviously you would want to take the couple of hours of frustration and cursing into consideration when calculating the price you are willing to pay though.
All the best if you get it Luke.

Post by **LukePC1** » Fri Jul 11, 2008 8:47 am

It's this one from ebay.de (just around the corner for me

)

The description is not good, but I got some information on it. - Or maybe I want to increase the price and are selling it myself???

So if sharky sais it's no (big) problem I'll count in (half) a day of work and some risk to kill it... so I can't bid that high. But from Australia or America you could bid even less than me...

The seller also said, the connector - how sharky called it - seems to be nowhere available...
So my concearn is: how smal/bigl could it be? The vr920 is pretty small, so there might be very little space...

ps: I can't find one in Australia... just new ones from US

PPS: it fell down and that caused the damage - so don't let yours fall down, except you want to spent the next hours soldering

PPPS: what could I do with it, if it is still not working? Could I build one more HMD? Should the headtracking still work (it's connected with USB, right?)

Edit (hopefully last):
Found the
australian glasses.
If you consider the shiping over the ocean and the vat and the included eyeshield of them it might actually work. Especially for the 280$...

Post by **cybereality** » Fri Jul 11, 2008 4:03 pm

I always recommend to buy new, and save yourself a headache. Although if you get a good deal it might be worth the trouble.

Its possible even you could get Vuzix to fix it somehow, but the shipping alone would probably make that cost more than a new unit.

If you are still feeling daring, I'm pretty sure this is the display model the VR920 is using (Kopin BDM922K):
http://www.kopin.com/data/File/BDM922KFeatureSheet.pdf

At the bottom of that PDF there are some pin numbers, maybe that will help. And yes, you would have to take the unit apart so make sure you know what you're doing.

Theres a guy on the Vuzix forums that did a VR920 mod and will probably help you if you ask:
http://forums.vr920.com/Topic2551-2-1.aspx

Post by **LukePC1** » Sat Jul 12, 2008 5:41 am

thanks cyber. Just realized you have even more posts there, than here
do you play at all??? I bet you don't have any time to do it

I'll read it later when I've got more time. Its interesting stuff...

Thanks for all the help. Lets see, how it turns out

Post by **LukePC1** » Sat Jul 12, 2008 11:49 am

Now I'm curious who bids 70€+ shiping for a damaged device. That is about 1/3rd of the price when it was whole...
Could it be someone from here? And if yes, please post, how it turned out

Maybe it's best, if I wait for the propper Iz3D driver first 8)

Post by **cybereality** » Sat Jul 12, 2008 1:21 pm

LukePC1 wrote:thanks cyber. Just realized you have even more posts there, than here
do you play at all??? I bet you don't have any time to do it

LOL! Yeah, at some point I realized I enjoy talking about gaming more than actually playing games. Imagine that.

To be honest, I've been gaming mostly on a 2D HDTV just due to driver/compatibility issues. If the new Nvidia (or iz3D) driver actually supported the VR920 then maybe that would be a different story.

Also, I don't sleep.

Post by **LukePC1** » Sat Jul 12, 2008 3:33 pm

I don't believe you... You get most posts, when it's afternoon or night here... so I think you either sleep or work in the other time (or do bot at the same time

)

But somehow I understand you... Although I skip all the 2D games, so there is even less gaming left

Well since I didn't get the device, I won't read the other forum. This one is enough

@ driver: Iz3D wanted to make one, right? They got vizuix API and want to implement it (with sync)...
Otherwise I wouldn't have put it in consideration

Post by **Xeno** » Wed Jul 16, 2008 9:22 am

LukePC1 wrote:Now I'm curious who bids 70€+ shiping for a damaged device. That is about

1/3rd of the price when it was whole...
Could it be someone from here? And if yes, please post, how it turned out )

...that guy is me - hi to all!

I bought these on ebay, mainly because I wanted to go back to stereo at a modest
price (since I got my 8800, I don't use my ELSA Revelator SGs anymore). While looking for
any information about the broken plug I stumbled upon this thread.

When I fetched the VR920 (I live in that area), the seller told me that he had taken the unit apart because of
"minor trouble after it fell down"

and then "accidentally torn the cables from the plug"

.
The cable is partly stripped and completey disconnected from the PCB plug, which is a mess
due to soldering. The rubber piece that fits into the casing looks like a dog or child has
been chewing on it - the seller neither confirmed nor denied that (judging his soldering
skills - well, at least he did not try to solder the cable to the PCB

).

I mailed to the vuzix for a new cable, but Todd from the support replied that they do not
sell these seperately.

The glasses would have to be sent to them for repair which he
estimated to cost about $75 - a reasonable offer, but shipping the unit to USA and back is way too expensive,
considering that I might end up with a fixed cable on a still defective unit.

Until now I found the manufacturer of the plug, but of course I need to fix the cables in
the correct order. Maybe anyone who has already opened his glasses for repair or modding
(and thus already spoilt his warranty) could do this again and send or post a picture
showing the wires and the plug? Any help would be appreciated!

BTW: It's one of the older ones with te ICUITI label - on the VGA cable it says "model 227"

Thank you all for reading - I'll keep you informed

Xeno

Post by **android78** » Wed Jul 16, 2008 3:25 pm

Xeno wrote:Until now I found the manufacturer of the plug, but of course I need to fix the cables in
the correct order. Maybe anyone who has already opened his glasses for repair or modding
(and thus already spoilt his warranty) could do this again and send or post a picture
showing the wires and the plug? Any help would be appreciated!

Unfortunately I don't have one of these... if I did then I'd probably have taken it apart by now.
One thing you may be able to do it find the datasheet of the driver IC and then match up the R/G/B, sync, VCC, GND, etc with those from the VGA plug to get the video to work. Then hopefully you only have a couple of stray wires that you need to work out.
I'd love to see some pictures of the unit inside!

Post by **sharky** » Wed Jul 16, 2008 11:04 pm

hi there!

if you need help on the soldering part just mail it to me in italy..

regarding the connections, luke ahd a link of another model wher oyu see the colors. but the order of the colors should be standard so it should be fine for oyu too.

Post by **Xeno** » Thu Jul 17, 2008 8:54 am

sharky wrote:hi there!

if you need help on the soldering part just mail it to me in italy..

Thanks, sharky - I'll might come back to that offer.

sharky wrote: regarding the connections, luke ahd a link of another model wher oyu see the colors. but the order of the colors should be standard so it should be fine for oyu too.

I set my hopes on that. The 230s btw have blue wires in that cable - seems that all vuzix are created not equal.

I sorted it out as follows until now (the capitalized ones are somewhat thicker in diameter - I believe them to come from the USB plug):

on the PCB plug
1 - missing
2 - grey
3 , 4 - missing
5 - GREEN
6 - WHITE
7 - orange
8 - purple
9 - yellow
10 - black
11 - red
12 - brown
13 - missing

and four more wires on the cable: RED, BLACK green and white.

If everything else fails, I'll have to go android78's way. Seems like the audio and MIC run through USB, but I'm not quite sure about the tracking system. The BDM922K's feature sheet mentions only seven lines on its input plug.

Post by **sharky** » Thu Jul 17, 2008 12:46 pm

ok, do you ahve a tester to test trough the cables?

is there some model written on the board or somethign to search on the web?

Post by **LukePC1** » Thu Jul 17, 2008 1:45 pm

Sorry was a way for some time, but I'm realy interested, on what I missed... Maybe I should visit you someday, to try it out - if you repair it

Wellcome on the board Xeno

How did you find it? Did you look for it after you got the device, or was it just so expencive, because You saw it here

PS: the link sharky mentioned: it was a AV230... that is a different product, but it was still by visuix - and maybe similar... If it is very different I'm sorry...

Post by **decoril** » Thu Jul 17, 2008 6:59 pm

Hi; i wish you lick repairing the visor, but i have a warning for you if you mange to get it fixed, if it is one of the older ones with te ICUITI label dont try to upgrade its firmware i bought one of this from icuiti now vuzix at the launch period but i went bricked with the first firmware update, just like hundreds of other ones went, they excanged it to me for a new onw and im pretty happy with vuzix the were very kind; there were some ones that didn t went bricked but at the end i though i remember it were some problem with that first units no one being really compatible with any future upgrades, so if you decide to upgrade it know that it will be a lothery and search the web before for beign sure about what you may do with it and what not.
best regards see you soon^

Post by **LukePC1** » Fri Jul 18, 2008 5:18 am

Sounds not good... does it mean their driver for 3D games (firmware upgrade needed???) does not work?

Post by **decoril** » Fri Jul 18, 2008 7:42 am

You may have luck and maybe the seller did upgrade it without bricking the unit before broking it you may ask to him; if he did not upgraded it it can be a problem and it can go brick whrn you try, i wish you luck.

Post by **cybereality** » Fri Jul 18, 2008 10:43 am

LukePC1 wrote:
Sounds not good... does it mean their driver for 3D games (firmware upgrade needed???) does not work?

Yeah, you need the latest firmware for full compatibility. But it doesn't necessarily brick the unit. Its supposed to give an error message if there is a problem (and there is a chance it might actually work!). I also had one of the original Icuiti units but it did not let me do the update (it said contact vuzix). So I had to send it back, but they were very nice about it. The model with the Vuzix name should come with the better firmware.

Post by **LukePC1** » Fri Jul 18, 2008 11:26 am

Hm... The seller told, that Crysis (and some other games on the Vizuix list) would run well (In S-3D I assume). He claimed to use a 8800, so I think it was not the NV driver...

This information could be an indicator, that the firmware update is not necessary, right?

Post by **Xeno** » Fri Jul 18, 2008 2:03 pm

- looked at the PCB (actually, there are 2 PCBs glued together):
PCB 227 Tracker REV 04 731(inverted) Icuiti 2007 Dynamic MO-UO S4U-O

I googled any combination of these terms, but to no avail. Btw, the displays are definitely made by Kopin - P/N KD 040922K-K

- measured the VGA cable with a wire tester. Identified the following wires (I inverted the numbers last time - here's the correct order, thicker wires CAPSed):

1 - ??? (could be VGA 8 BLUE_RTN Blue return)
2 - brown (VGA 8 - BLUE_RTN Blue return)
3 - red (VGA 2 - GREEN Green video)
4 - black (VGA 7 - GREEN_RTN Green return)
5 - yellow (VGA 1 - RED Red video)
6 - purple (VGA 6 - RED_RTN Red return)
7 - orange ???
8 - WHITE (USB - DATA)
9 - GREEN (USB + DATA)
10 - ???
11 - ???
12 - grey ???
13 - ???

plus 4 wires on the cable
A - green (VGA 3 - BLUE Blue video)
B - white (VGA 10 - GND Ground (VSync, DDC)
C - RED (USB VCC +5V)
D - BLACK (USB GND)

Could not identify 7(orange) and 12 (grey) which I expected to be SYNC. Maybe part of the tracking system.

Thinking logical, 1 should be A - Blue video, 10 and 11 C and D, but in what order? Did i mention that I won't lightheartedly screw my 8800 card for logicism? Hey, wait - what about my girlfriends laptop?

Just kidding - she'd kill me.

@ LukePC1: honestly - when I found this forum, the glasses were already on my desktop. Did the seller tell you more details about the "minor problem" which made him open the glasses?

@ decoril - I'll keep that in mind - if I ever get that thing fixed.

@ all: THX for your help - I'll try to post some pics later, when my cam is fully charged.

Post by **LukePC1** » Fri Jul 18, 2008 3:35 pm

Dont you have a 10-Year-old GPU for testing? Maybe with PCI (not express!) slot? It should be able to do the resolution and if it gets screwed it's no big loss.
And the chances of screwing the card with that are not very high, are they? I mean it's only for signal and there shouldn't be much power involved...

Oh and I PMed you all the stuff I knew, because it's German...

Post by **Xeno** » Sun Jul 20, 2008 9:34 am

...a member of the Vuzix forum posted pictures of the plug today!

I ordered the plug and hopefully it will be here soon.

Thank you all for helping with your suggestions and comments - I'll let you know about the results!

Post by **LukePC1** » Sun Jul 20, 2008 12:19 pm

Great I wish you a lot of luck

And are looking forward to hear results - as many others certainly, too

Post by **Xeno** » Thu Jul 24, 2008 8:53 am

...this is how it turned out:

The plugs and contacts arrived yesterday. I soldered the wires to the plug and reassembled the glasses. Installed the software, plugged in the glasses and... - nothing.

Nvidia controller finds them, but XP refuses to do so. Maybe they were messed up by an incomplete firmware update.

Since some guys in the vuzix forum had success only after trying 40 or 50 times on different computers, I'll do exactly that (plug and pray) over the next days. I rechecked the cable twice, but the soldering points are ok. The PCB even gets warm a little - just as in a working VR920.

If anyone of you has a better idea, I'd be happy to hear it.

Until then, my face really looks like this:

Post by **Xeno** » Fri Jul 25, 2008 8:10 am

After PnC(plug and curse)ing about a hundred times I finally found the fault. Deciding to open the small box where VGA and USB cable meet I checked each wire once more. Oops, short circuit between RED and grey? Ok, coming from the small PCB. Another one (BLACK and white), also connected on the board. But orange and purple? Hang on, this is odd...

Removed purple wire from the reassembled plug and - no short circuit. Removed orange wire too and then I saw what had happened: one of these tiny crimping latches had punched a hole through the connector housing - directly to the purple wire and totally invisible from the outside. Bent the latch, moved all connectors into a new housing, reassembled and...

Ok, everything is fine now. 8) I'll be fiddling around with the tracking system for the next week and decide if I am willing to play "firmware update lottery".

Thanks to all of you here for your help and comments - if someone should need a connector or housing - I have some left.

P.S.: Since I have not opened this thread, I cannot do this, but as far as I am concerned, it can be changed to [SOLVED]

Post by **android78** » Fri Jul 25, 2008 3:59 pm

Xeno wrote:P.S.: Since I have not opened this thread, I cannot do this, but as far as I am concerned, it can be changed to [SOLVED]

Happy to hear it worked out ok for you. 8)

Post by **cybereality** » Fri Jul 25, 2008 5:39 pm

Sweet man, good to hear everything's up and running.

I would suggest trying Unreal Tournament 2004, that game has very good support with the VR920 (both stereo3d and headtracking).

Post by **sharky** » Sat Jul 26, 2008 12:11 am

changing the name to solved.. good job.. nice to see you solved

Post by **LukePC1** » Mon Aug 04, 2008 3:01 pm

I'm glad you managed to do it. It sounds like much more work than expected...

I hope to see you around and maybe making a review - it's always best to have multiple ones to have a good overview.

Maybe include, how often you use it and in what situations it's no good choice.
Personally I don't like RTS games in 3D, because they have a bad hud and not much depth in 3D. Also it's realy hard to click right. I know it depends on the driver a lot...

Post by **Xeno** » Fri Aug 08, 2008 12:14 pm

Sorry, been offline for quite a while.

@ Luke: check your PM

Edit: for the german readers, I posted a summary of my experiences in the international language forum: http://www.mtbs3d.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=1788

[SOLVED] Repair a VR920

[SOLVED] Repair a VR920

Just for the curious...

Re: Just for the curious...

OK, I did some homework:

major progress...

No happy end yet...

ER LÄÄUUFT! (They're running! - from "Das Boot")

Re: ER LÄÄUUFT! (They're running! - from "Das Boot"