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Re: AMT630A firmware for mini TFT screens

Posted: Tue Feb 20, 2018 2:33 pm
by Bipsiljo
Many thanks for your reply nocash.

I will buy an EZP2010 type flash programmer. I will try to read the BIN code in my 25S40 chip, but i am not familiar to protected or unprotected chips. I hope i can read easily.

I want to ask a question nocash, I am using your No$x51 emulator and i am loading your AMT630A.BIN file.
Please look to attached photo : https://i.hizliresim.com/z0MaYD.jpg

My question : Red color place codes are special for your AMT630A.BIN ??? or if i load my flash chip's BIN file, can i get similar codes in Red color place? (different than your BIN code, is the red color place will be empty?)

Many thanks for your help.

Re: AMT630A firmware for mini TFT screens

Posted: Thu Mar 01, 2018 7:32 am
by nocash
I've updated the emulator/debugger, the AMT630A hardware specs, the firmware disassembly - and also finished my own custom firmware, which is fixing many of the issues found in original firmware.

The disassembly does now cover two different firmware versions.
The hardware specs include a lot more info on SPI-FLASH ports, Infra-red, PLLs, IRQs.
The magic floor game is more polished, with fade-in/out effects, and text line wrapping matched to screen size, and more floor sizes (the bigger sizes being unlocked after solving several games; with game position stored in FLASH memory).
The emulator/debugger now has support for Font DMA, more IRQs (adc conversions, and the newly discovered framerate irq), and fixes an assembler bug for "or c,bit" and "and c,bit" opcodes.
The new firmware has a bunch of features:
- backlight dimming (saving energy and being less painfully bright)
- low power standby mode with 8.4mA at 5V (unlike 33mA in original firmware)
- support for C64 video signal
- support for PAL60 (still imperfect, it works, but there's some flimmering, probably needs better timings)
- better GUI (without the annoying timeouts, and with black outlines on font characters for better visibility on bright backgrounds)
- xflip/yflip gimmick (except: doesn't work with Innolux displays as they don't have any spi bus).
- support for four display types (Tianma3.5", Noname3.5", Innolux4.3" and Innolux5.0") (the firmware should prompt for display type upon first use, or, to change it at later time: hold down MENU at power up).
Bipsiljo wrote:I will buy an EZP2010 type flash programmer. I will try to read the BIN code in my 25S40 chip, but i am not familiar to protected or unprotected chips. I hope i can read easily.
Red color place codes are special for your AMT630A.BIN ??? or if i load my flash chip's BIN file, can i get similar codes in Red color place? (different than your BIN code, is the red color place will be empty?)
The window at left side is showing the disassembled code from your BIN file, you can use any BIN file you want. If you dump your own firmware would be very interesting - I guess it's using different picture resolutions than the TFT screens, and as far as I understood, it's a AMT630, not a AMT630A? That might be yet different, but also interesting. There is no read protection on the flash chips so reading should be no problem. For writing, you may need to clear some write protect flags before writing, but it isn't too difficult (and your flash software should probably support doing it automatically).
Bipsiljo wrote:I have an electronic device, it's sizes are 25 mm x 25 mm about, it has 2 side PCB, one side is AMT630 + 25S40 flash and other side is V399 + 24C32 flash and some resistors and capacitors, etc... Device has a 12.00 MHz crystal on it.
V399 doesn't sound like a valid part number. This page http://foscam.us/forum/mjpeg-cameras-ha ... tml#p34007 says that the full name might be "Arkmicro ARK3399" - there's some sort of datasheet for that chip, but it's in "doc" format, with online viewers it's showing only more or less garbled text. It seems to be a 48pin chip (?) and maybe one could view the pinout using whatever dedicated "doc" viewing tools (microsoft word maybe) (if anybody succeeds, please post a screenshot).

Re: AMT630A firmware for mini TFT screens

Posted: Thu Mar 01, 2018 10:40 pm
by Bavi_H
nocash wrote:"Arkmicro ARK3399" - there's some sort of datasheet for that chip, but it's in "doc" format, with online viewers it's showing only more or less garbled text. [...] maybe one could view the pinout using whatever dedicated "doc" viewing tools (microsoft word maybe) (if anybody succeeds, please post a screenshot).
I found an "online viewer" of a PDF file. I think it wanted me to sign up to download the original PDF, so I just took screenshots and copied the text:
ark3399.zip, 2.92 MB.

(I also found an "online viewer" of a DOC file, but it seemed to be a text-only conversion from the original PDF.)

Re: AMT630A firmware for mini TFT screens

Posted: Fri Mar 02, 2018 2:23 pm
by nocash
Bavi_H wrote:I found an "online viewer" of a PDF file. I think it wanted me to sign up to download the original PDF, so I just took screenshots and copied the text:ark3399.zip, 2.92 MB.
Many thanks! The pin-out picture looks nice, and the .txt file with the pin/descriptions also looks less distored than what I had found online. Now I am wondering if the pinout does match for the V399 chip on Bipsiljo's board.

Re: AMT630A firmware for mini TFT screens

Posted: Fri Mar 02, 2018 8:31 pm
by krzysiobal
Couple of years ago I bought really cheap a few non-working portable LCDs for testing.
One of them that gave the best results (*) was based on MST702 chip.

The one I bought had the chip burnt, but I was able to order a few on aliexpress and replace them (really cheap, around 1.5$/piece).
I was able also to find use case datasheet, they work with LCD screens with 26 pin ribbon cable.

(*):
* Very good image quality, without adding any dostortion/vertial lines/noise, no picture shaking
* Works both with PAL/NTSC, colours are correct
* Has built in support for 4:3/16:9 ratio switch, colour/brightness adjustment
* Works with zapper

Re: AMT630A firmware for mini TFT screens

Posted: Mon Mar 05, 2018 4:22 pm
by mikejmoffitt
I would be interested in properly enabling the S-video input on many of these. The Sega Nomad produces S-video internally already from the CS1645, and people tend to use these screens with composite video when replacing a Nomad display. It would be a big improvement to use S-video here.

Re: AMT630A firmware for mini TFT screens

Posted: Mon Mar 05, 2018 5:43 pm
by nocash
mikejmoffitt wrote:I would be interested in properly enabling the S-video input on many of these.
What do you mean when saying "of these"? This thread is about AMT630A chips, or, if you are talking of something else, please clarify which chip you are talking about.

Re: AMT630A firmware for mini TFT screens

Posted: Tue May 15, 2018 8:16 am
by Zonomi
nocash wrote:
Btw. does anybody know how to deal with the russian http://remont-aud.net/dump/car_audio/ca ... nitors/356 ? Going by the word "dump" in the URL, that page seems to have firmware dumps for dozen(s) of AMT630 and AMT630A displays? Using translate, the separate pages are saying that one must register & login & solve some electronics test before being allowed to download "the file" (which might be a firmware dump... which would be actually interesting).


So, logging in seems to make things worse and just adds further restrictions. Maybe passing that electronic test would unlock those restrictions... though, once when logged in, it doesn't even show the link for getting to the damn test anymore (when not logged in, it's saying one must register and login before allowing to accomplish the damn test).

Looking at other forums that are discussing AMT630(A) chips, most of the western world is annoyed by that russian page prohibiting to download their firmware dumps - suckers - then on other hand, maybe it'd be time for some non-russians to do their dumps instead of complaining about it ; )
I've been able to register AND succeeded the electronic test. But there is still a limitation on downloading : a credit system, and a 4 files / day limitation.

Attached are the dump I found, and I still have to dump the two screens I have : a 320x240 like yours, and a bigger one, with IR and buttons.
But I can't use parallel port on my computer, I'll try with a teensy.
Maybe you should upgrade your connection method : instead of using parallel, try a microcontroller with USB.

Re: AMT630A firmware for mini TFT screens

Posted: Sat May 19, 2018 7:26 pm
by nocash
Cool, I had given up any hope to see any of those remont files (and wasn't even sure if those files were meant to contain flashrom-images).
The third file, "56231_backup_SPI_014.rar [20.96 KiB]" looks corrupted, I can't decompress it.

The other two files have some ascii strings in there that I haven't seen in the two previously dumped firmwares: The monitor.bin files seems to contain another language. And the 25q40_old.bin file has stuff like VERTICAL, HORIZONTAL. and FM 88.7 MHZ and A: 2.3M - 2.8M and PAL60. Hmmm, but the file is from 2015, and the later version from 2016 doesn't support PAL60, maybe those strings are just unused/garbage, unrelated to AMT630A hardware.

I haven't looked at the binary code yet, and didn't check which resolutions they are for (too busy with the new unlaunch exploit for DSi). A firmware with resolution other than 320x240 and 480x272 would be interesting. And a AMT630 firmware would be also interesting. Is it possible to download more files, or does that credit system prevent that?

Re: AMT630A firmware for mini TFT screens

Posted: Sun May 20, 2018 12:55 am
by Zonomi
I've downloaded most of AMT's firmwares I've seen, but there may be more. Searching on a russian forum isn't easy ^^
Attached are the firmware I downloaded, and 56231_backup_SPI_014 repacked.

Re: AMT630A firmware for mini TFT screens

Posted: Sat Jun 09, 2018 1:08 am
by emax
another one firmware for AMT630 with 1024x600 resolution.

Re: AMT630A firmware for mini TFT screens

Posted: Thu Jun 14, 2018 2:54 am
by nocash
Thanks, 1024x600 sounds interesting (especially for better understand of how to compute the resolution-specific values). The file is a good bit smaller than expected... did you crop the FFh-filled bytes (and user settings)? And is it really for AMT630? The binary looks more like AMT630A.

I've downloaded two pre-AMT630A versions (with help from Zonomi), the files are attached below, one is for "AMT630", the other for "AMT629" (which I didn't even knew that it does exist before downloading the file (meanwhile I noticed that some webpages also mention "AMT628")).
Running in no$x51, both AMT630 and AMT629 firmwares are doing an access to an uncommon I/O address, I haven't really investigated why they are doing that, maybe it's just a minor software difference, or the hardware is having different I/O ports (or different addresses for the ports).
Anyways, they are still similar to AMT630A, and I think it's now safe to say that AMT630 is definetely NOT a MST703 clone.

Re: AMT630A firmware for mini TFT screens

Posted: Wed Jun 20, 2018 10:15 pm
by emax
Hello from Russia!

I have read about your problem and can help download files from the Russian site. It uses the points system. The beginner is given 50 points, download one file costs 2 points. I have 30 more points left.
For uploading 1 file is given 1 point, firmware 5 points, etc.
Now I'm working with a small auto monitor. Its firmware coincides with WD-888 from the post of Zonomi.

My goal is to disable the blue screen. For disassembling I use the IDA pro.
I tested your firmware (amt630a.bin), but it does not work with my keyboard, although it also has three buttons and resistors.
Apparently it's connected to the wrong pin. In my monitor it's pin 8 of the AMT630a chip. How is it connected to your monitor? Which AMT630a pins correspond to the TX and RX of the UART port?

Re: AMT630A firmware for mini TFT screens

Posted: Thu Jun 21, 2018 1:46 pm
by nocash
Pinouts are shown in the "AMT630A - Component Lists & Pinouts" chapter (in no$x51 help text, or in the x51specs.txt/htm files on the no$x51 webpage). The keypad resistor values are also in that document (in the chapter with AMT630A Misc I/O ADC/etc). The keypad common pin could be GND (usually) or VCC (seems to exist, too).

Pin8 would be ADC1 input, the firmwares I know are using Pin9/ADC0, so your board actually won't work for that reason. Does your board have anything wired to the other two ADC inputs (aka SAR inputs which seems to be their official name)?

My firmware source code would be worth 5 points? If I would have known that, then I would have been better off to get a newbie account with 50 points for free ; )

Re: AMT630A firmware for mini TFT screens

Posted: Thu Jun 21, 2018 11:17 pm
by emax
Wow! It really work.
It turns out the pinout AMT630 vs AMT630a is very different.I used the wrong datasheet.
Now I have connected pin8 & pin9 with a soldering iron and added resistor between this input and 3.3v, so that the divider voltage falls within the required range.
All three buttons work fine! Thank you!
Maybe in source code you can add the ADC input definition?

I will check the remaining firmware for AMT630a on the site and post it here.