ST16: does it support USB OTG?

[methodus]

Hi,

I was working with the ST10 yesterday and tried to find out, what its hardware capabilities are. Unfortunately, it does not support USB OTG and some other peripheral features or other network capabilities like bluetooth. So I was wondering if the ST16 does somehow?

As I don't have an H, I was hopping that someone could check that.

 

[PatR]

Nope, it won't

 

[methodus]

Assumption or confirmation? Have you checked it and how?

 

[PatR]

If you can fit a USB into an HDMI port and make it work, and find a Bluetooth device in the system, go for it.

The camera and aircraft both have micro USB ports but their purpose is reserved for programming, nothing else. The ST-16 has one for battery charging and a link to the FC. Pick up the phone and call Yuneec C.S. if you want proof.

 

[methodus]

Well, that's not the qualified response I was looking for. The ST16 has a micro usb port, which can be used with ADB etc. so it is NOT only for charging. So maybe someone can give me a more qualified proof that it is not working.

Customer Support will likely not give that information, because they usually don't know about it.

If you are wondering why I am asking: the ST16S provides the possibility to hook up a smartphone via USB and route all the communication from the phone to the copter. As its pure Android stuff, it must use some kind of networking or usb communication protocol like USB Host Mode or USB Tethering. On the other hand, it could be possible to connect via Wifi Direct or Bluetooth, however Yuneec hides many of the System settings, so they need to be recovered.

 

[PatR]

The -16 and -16s are two completely different pieces of hardware. If you're certain of your position, buy one and give it a go...

 

[methodus]

Sad, I thought this forum is for people who help each other not to nip it in the bud. If I had the money just to buy stuff, I wouldn't ask for it.

 

[AH-1G]

Sad, I thought this forum is for people who help each other not to nip it in the bud. If I had the money just to buy stuff, I wouldn't ask for it.

It is a forum to help!!! Why can't you accept the info PatR has given?

 

[AH-1G]

Well, that's not the qualified response I was looking for. The ST16 has a micro usb port, which can be used with ADB etc. so it is NOT only for charging. So maybe someone can give me a more qualified proof that it is not working.

Customer Support will likely not give that information, because they usually don't know about it.

If you are wondering why I am asking: the ST16S provides the possibility to hook up a smartphone via USB and route all the communication from the phone to the copter. As its pure Android stuff, it must use some kind of networking or usb communication protocol like USB Host Mode or USB Tethering. On the other hand, it could be possible to connect via Wifi Direct or Bluetooth, however Yuneec hides many of the System settings, so they need to be recovered.

Just because it's there doesn't mean it's functional for what you are looking for. And how do you know
"Yuneec hides many of the System settings" this is true, or are you assuming this?

 

[methodus]

Because it does not contain any information about the actual proof. No rational, no explanation. Some years ago, people said, that it is not possible to share the video from the cam to windows computers, until someone found the live stream urls. Later people said, that it is not possible to write custom apps because there's no SDK. Those people said something without proving it. And it is commonly known that some features are indeed possible.

The ST16 and ST16S is basically just a piece of tablet hardware running Android surrounded by a controller board in a nice case. It can be rooted, it can be altered, it can be improved.

And how do you know
"Yuneec hides many of the System settings" this is true, or are you assuming this?

I know, because they did for the ST10 and they obviously tried for the ST16 as well. Or did you ever unzipped the update.zip inside of the ST16 firmware?

 

[PatR]

I have, and yes, you can change things in the ST-16, but plan on having a dysfunctional system afterwards. Some of the tablet’s functionality is deliberately dedicated to flight control programming, hence the inability to download apps from Google Play Store.

BTW, I didn’t realize what was tried with the ST-10 was ever perfected as it it never made it to the public.

 

[dylanfm]

Hi,

I was working with the ST10 yesterday and tried to find out, what its hardware capabilities are. Unfortunately, it does not support USB OTG and some other peripheral features or other network capabilities like bluetooth. So I was wondering if the ST16 does somehow?

As I don't have an H, I was hopping that someone could check that.

I just checked and it looks like the ST16 does support USB OTG. At least the extent that I could test it. It recognized a USB thumb drive and a keyboard that I plugged into the micro usb port.

Dylan

 

[AH-1G]

I just checked and it looks like the ST16 does support USB OTG. At least the extent that I could test it. It recognized a USB thumb drive and a keyboard that I plugged into the micro usb port.

Dylan

Welllllll, so much for my big mouth, I stand corrected! And my apologies to @methodus

 

[methodus]

I just checked and it looks like the ST16 does support USB OTG. At least the extent that I could test it. It recognized a USB thumb drive and a keyboard that I plugged into the micro usb port.

Dylan

Hey, that's great! So, if it runs in USB Host mode, it hopefully also recognizes other smartphones. Could you check another thing? Could you please hook up an Android phone to the ST16. Then on the Smartphone go to Settings -> Network Settings -> Tethering and try to enable USB Tethering? IF the ST16 was detected successfully it should be available otherwise it is grayed out. If it is working, you might have the chance to use the mobile data to go to the internet instead of the Wifi. Please don't do this while flying, because on Android 5 it will use mobile data over wifi if it has no internet, so it will probably try to route the requests to the cam over mobile data, which fails. Thank you.

 

[dylanfm]

Hey, that's great! So, if it runs in USB Host mode, it hopefully also recognizes other smartphones. Could you check another thing? Could you please hook up an Android phone to the ST16. Then on the Smartphone go to Settings -> Network Settings -> Tethering and try to enable USB Tethering? IF the ST16 was detected successfully it should be available otherwise it is grayed out. If it is working, you might have the chance to use the mobile data to go to the internet instead of the Wifi. Please don't do this while flying, because on Android 5 it will use mobile data over wifi if it has no internet, so it will probably try to route the requests to the cam over mobile data, which fails. Thank you.

That doesn't seem to work. I tried with a couple of different phones and the USB tethering option is always grayed out on the phone. If I reverse which end of the OTG cable is plugged in to which device then I can enable tethering on the ST16, but I don't think that helps.

Dylan

 

[methodus]

Thank you very much anyway. I thought, that it is possible to use USB networking to access the remote wifi, so that you can use its way better antennas for better distances of a second controller. HDMI output is nice, but you can't control anything. Using another ST16 is the best solution, but some may not have the money to buy or space to carry it along with the other stuff. So, the idea was to hook up a tablet and use it to control the camera.

Anyway, it does not work out of the box, so it seems to require some other modifications, which I can't check unless I have an ST16 on my own. I am hopping for the H Plus, which will have the ST16S.

 

[dylanfm]

Thank you very much anyway. I thought, that it is possible to use USB networking to access the remote wifi, so that you can use its way better antennas for better distances of a second controller. HDMI output is nice, but you can't control anything. Using another ST16 is the best solution, but some may not have the money to buy or space to carry it along with the other stuff. So, the idea was to hook up a tablet and use it to control the camera.

Anyway, it does not work out of the box, so it seems to require some other modifications, which I can't check unless I have an ST16 on my own. I am hopping for the H Plus, which will have the ST16S.

Ah. I think it would have been pretty difficult to get that to work. The camera video and camera settings are done over the 5GHz Wifi, but controlling the pan/tilt/yaw and starting/stopping the video (I'm pretty sure) happen over the Typhoon's non-wifi, RC transmitter/receiver link. The flight control app isn't looking to get that info from the USB port. I haven't used "Team Mode" yet, but if you can make it so you can control the camera with the wizard remote and then use a tablet with the CGO app and an external WIFI dongle with better antenna to view the video that might be closer to what you want.

 

[methodus]

No, only the gimbal is using the copter controller wifi, the cam itself, this means everything inside the camera orb, has its own wifi. So, you can start, stop and do also alle the photo and video settings. You just can't pan/tilt/yaw the cam as you said. That's the only drawback. However, in many cases, this could be sufficient already.

I was already able to get some code specs from the UART controller for the Q500. But they are read only. On the ST16, they accept also inputs at least for the gimbal and the cam. And they are separated from the rest of the copter, so you can control the gimbal without touching the copter interface, which is good for security reasons. However, I can't go deeper with firmware analytics only.

So, I keep improving the ST10 for the moment. It lacks a image previewer, which is in my opinion one of the most needed features. Downloading the images from the cam directly via wifi is more handy then pulling out the SD card everytime just to do a quick check on image quality.

 

[dylanfm]

I was already able to get some code specs from the UART controller for the Q500. But they are read only. On the ST16, they accept also inputs at least for the gimbal and the cam. And they are separated from the rest of the copter, so you can control the gimbal without touching the copter interface, which is good for security reasons. However, I can't go deeper with firmware analytics only.

I'm not following you on this. What UART are you talking about, on the ST10 or the Q500 itself? Is it between the "tablet" portion of the controller and the transmitter module? Is there a thread or forum with info on what you have found out about the ST10?

From my previous research I was under the impression that the ST10, ST16, Q500, TH, and the Wizard Controller, all use the same Zigbee tx/rx module (presumably with different FW). This thread has the info about I found about the yuneec RX modules:
Typhoon H / ST-16 controller : Can it be re-purposed?

 

[methodus]

ST10. The UARTController inside the ST15FlightMode.apk uses a native library which resides in the lib folder of the ST10. You can decompile it and try to get the codes. The FlightMode app of the ST16 works the same.