TWC Today Forums

WeatherScan Local Emulator Project => General Emulator Discussion => Topic started by: cc17926 on October 30, 2008, 07:50:53 AM

Title: Foot Note for Another Project -- Jr!
Post by: cc17926 on October 30, 2008, 07:50:53 AM

I'd figure I would also spill the beans on another project that I decided that I would invest the time (and money) into. While the Weatherscan emulator is my flagship emulator that I've spent and still spend time working on, I stumbled onto something interesting a few weeks ago. Because I also work on electronics in my spare time, I've ordered many parts from an online retailer called Jameco, so in the mail i receive their catalog. So I flip through the catalog and find something interesting on November 2008's page 125. The item is called "XBOB-NC Video Text Module". The unit is basically a on-screen text generator, so I went to the company's website Decade Engineering www.decadenet.com and did a little research of my own on the device. What I found out is that I could almost seemlessly integrate it into a Weatherstar Jr emulator.. in a more of a real hardware sense. So I bought the XBOB-4 off their website for about $250 and I tinkered around with it the other day and i think it would work out just perfectly for displaying text weather data overtop any composite video source, be it blue background or something else you push through it. The fonts builtin to the device are very sharp and not only that, you can make your own fonts using their free XBOB-4 Conscriptor program to use on the device! It interfaces over your serial port so theres no crazy or funky wires going all over the place, just data/video in/video out/power ! So how about them apples??

Title: Re: Foot Note for Another Project -- Jr!
Post by: wxmancanada on October 30, 2008, 05:35:07 PM

Good find! This should do the job! Can't wait to see what you can create! I see that you can write custom C# applications for it too, neat!

Title: Re: Foot Note for Another Project -- Jr!
Post by: TWCDude on October 30, 2008, 06:47:48 PM

Good idea! :cool3: I certainly can't wait for you to start working on that project.

Title: Re: Foot Note for Another Project -- Jr!
Post by: WeatherSTARIII on October 31, 2008, 01:16:18 AM

Can you give us a preview of what the emulator is going to look like?

Title: Re: Foot Note for Another Project -- Jr!
Post by: narunetto on October 31, 2008, 01:47:03 AM

Wow, I was looking for something just like this the other day, to maybe pick up in the future and start tinkering with it. This is exactly what I wanted to find! Awesome.

Title: Re: Foot Note for Another Project -- Jr!
Post by: cc17926 on October 31, 2008, 01:55:27 AM

Quote from: narunetto on October 31, 2008, 01:47:03 AM

Wow, I was looking for something just like this the other day, to maybe pick up in the future and start tinkering with it. This is exactly what I wanted to find! Awesome.

well.. i stumbled onto this and i figure i would make a project out from it..

Title: Re: Foot Note for Another Project -- Jr!
Post by: Gil on October 31, 2008, 05:43:41 PM

I can capture the real Jr alert tone this weekend, in high quality if you're interested.