MP3Car.com - View Single Post - Renault "Tuner List" Head Unit/CD changer hacking

Vicne · 01-06-2006, 08:48 AM

The goal of this thread is to centralize information about hacking the control protocol between Renault's "Tuner List" head unit and CD changer.

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IMPORTANT EDIT : DISCLAIMER
ALL THAT YOU DO IS AT YOUR OWN RISK. WE TAKE NO RESPONSIBILITY IN CASE OF INJURY, DAMAGE, DEATH OR ANYTHING THAT COULD HAPPEN AS A RESULT OF TRYING ANYTHING DESCRIBED IN THIS THREAD. Please note in particular that wrong wiring and electrostatic discharges could result in damages to your head unit and/or PC.
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The (digital) audio-in part has already been successfully achieved by a few people including myself - see http://www.mp3car.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=53347 - but the control wires are still connected to the CD changer to fool the HU into thinking it's still playing sound coming from the changer.

Drawbacks :
- the dashboard cd#/track#/time fields give information completely unrelated to what you actually hear
- each time the changer loads a new CD, sound is muted for a few seconds
- stalk controls (next/previous) and head unit front panel buttons (1-6) are useless

I can live with that, but thinking of it more and more, using stalk controls and front panel buttons instead of touch screen has many advantages :
- they're much more ergonomic.
- your carPC doesn't need an (expensive) touchscreen, or even a screen at all if you use text-to-speech for feedback
- you can reassign all buttons to whatever you like. For example each numbered button (CD1-6) could be linked to an ID3 tag category (1=Track Number, 2=Album, 3=Artist, 4=Genre, 5=Year) and by pressing it, it would speak the value for the current track and select this "mode". Then, Next/Previous stalk controls could enumerate other values for this field, so by default, next/previous control the track number, but could as well switch to next/previous album by the same artist, or next/previous artist, or even next/previous genre or year (toggling to shuffle mode). Of course, this would have to be linked to some kind of backend index or DB to speed things up, but it would be great fun to press a few keys to hear what we listened to 20 years ago. Back to 1986 :-)

What has to be done :
- hardware connection of control wires to the PC. The pinout is available in this post and as I said there :

Quote:

among the protocols listed on http://www.mictronics.de/?page=cdc_proto , the only one that uses asynchronous two wires transfer (RX + TX + no clock) is the Blaupunkt one. Moreover it uses the same wires as our Tuner List, so that's encouraging : compare the last page of http://www.blaupunktusa.com/NR/rdonl...5E/0/MDP01.pdf to the attached pinout of the Tuner List. I also had confirmation by bistie on planeterenault.com forums that once the levels are adapted (5V TTL to 12V RS232) the protocol is compatible with a PC serial port.

Using a Max232-based circuit, we could thus relatively simply spy on the control wires. Ideally, both directions (Changer > HU and HU > Changer) should be spied at the same time to ease question/answers matching.

- protocol reverse engineering, enumerating all messages sent back and forth between devices

- actual emulation, listening to head unit messages and sending back responses or information to be displayed on the dashboard. Note that I believe that the CD changer is rather autonomous : I really think that when the CD changer is selected as source on the head unit, the control is given to the changer and all information is just passed through. For example, I believe the CD changer has the responsibility of loading a new CD when the previous one ends etc. If this is confirmed, it would minimize the emulation work as we wouldn't have to send "coherent" information to the head unit and we could for example use the dashboard display for custom use...

- link this emulation module with target applications. I'd suggest not to link the module to a particular app (Winamp) or front-end, but leave it as open as possible for anyone to be able to reuse the emulator for its own needs. Conversely, I guess there are already input plugins for Winamp etc that we could link to or reuse (LIRC ?).

Please feel free to enrich this thread with any link or information that would help, in any of the above fields.

Let's roll !

01-06-2006, 08:48 AM	#1
Vicne Variable Bitrate Vicne's CarPC Specs Join Date: Apr 2005 Location: Belgium Vehicle: 2005 Renault Scenic Posts: 325 My Photos: ()	Renault "Tuner List" Head Unit/CD changer hacking - Controls The goal of this thread is to centralize information about hacking the control protocol between Renault's "Tuner List" head unit and CD changer. ** IMPORTANT EDIT : DISCLAIMER ALL THAT YOU DO IS AT YOUR OWN RISK. WE TAKE NO RESPONSIBILITY IN CASE OF INJURY, DAMAGE, DEATH OR ANYTHING THAT COULD HAPPEN AS A RESULT OF TRYING ANYTHING DESCRIBED IN THIS THREAD. Please note in particular that wrong wiring and electrostatic discharges could result in damages to your head unit and/or PC. ** The (digital) audio-in part has already been successfully achieved by a few people including myself - see http://www.mp3car.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=53347 - but the control wires are still connected to the CD changer to fool the HU into thinking it's still playing sound coming from the changer. Drawbacks : - the dashboard cd#/track#/time fields give information completely unrelated to what you actually hear - each time the changer loads a new CD, sound is muted for a few seconds - stalk controls (next/previous) and head unit front panel buttons (1-6) are useless I can live with that, but thinking of it more and more, using stalk controls and front panel buttons instead of touch screen has many advantages : - they're much more ergonomic. - your carPC doesn't need an (expensive) touchscreen, or even a screen at all if you use text-to-speech for feedback - you can reassign all buttons to whatever you like. For example each numbered button (CD1-6) could be linked to an ID3 tag category (1=Track Number, 2=Album, 3=Artist, 4=Genre, 5=Year) and by pressing it, it would speak the value for the current track and select this "mode". Then, Next/Previous stalk controls could enumerate other values for this field, so by default, next/previous control the track number, but could as well switch to next/previous album by the same artist, or next/previous artist, or even next/previous genre or year (toggling to shuffle mode). Of course, this would have to be linked to some kind of backend index or DB to speed things up, but it would be great fun to press a few keys to hear what we listened to 20 years ago. Back to 1986 :-) What has to be done : - hardware connection of control wires to the PC. The pinout is available in this post and as I said there : Quote: among the protocols listed on http://www.mictronics.de/?page=cdc_proto , the only one that uses asynchronous two wires transfer (RX + TX + no clock) is the Blaupunkt one. Moreover it uses the same wires as our Tuner List, so that's encouraging : compare the last page of http://www.blaupunktusa.com/NR/rdonl...5E/0/MDP01.pdf to the attached pinout of the Tuner List. I also had confirmation by bistie on planeterenault.com forums that once the levels are adapted (5V TTL to 12V RS232) the protocol is compatible with a PC serial port. Using a Max232-based circuit, we could thus relatively simply spy on the control wires. Ideally, both directions (Changer > HU and HU > Changer) should be spied at the same time to ease question/answers matching. - protocol reverse engineering, enumerating all messages sent back and forth between devices - actual emulation, listening to head unit messages and sending back responses or information to be displayed on the dashboard. Note that I believe that the CD changer is rather autonomous : I really think that when the CD changer is selected as source on the head unit, the control is given to the changer and all information is just passed through. For example, I believe the CD changer has the responsibility of loading a new CD when the previous one ends etc. If this is confirmed, it would minimize the emulation work as we wouldn't have to send "coherent" information to the head unit and we could for example use the dashboard display for custom use... - link this emulation module with target applications. I'd suggest not to link the module to a particular app (Winamp) or front-end, but leave it as open as possible for anyone to be able to reuse the emulator for its own needs. Conversely, I guess there are already input plugins for Winamp etc that we could link to or reuse (LIRC ?). Please feel free to enrich this thread with any link or information that would help, in any of the above fields. Let's roll ! __________________ Vicne SPDIF CarPC V2 - Tuner List CD Changer Emulator - Chris Conty Last edited by Vicne : 02-24-2006 at 09:52 AM.

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