[Arm-netbook] Hacking the Mele A1000 - ultra beginner guide

[julien at forgeat.name]

On Wed, 21 Mar 2012 16:56:31 +0000 (GMT), Oliver Kiddle wrote:
> --- On Wed, 21/3/12, julien at forgeat.name <julien at forgeat.name> wrote:
>
>> I am starting this thread because I have just purchased a
>> Mele A1000
>> and would like to install GNU/Linux distributions on it but
>> need some
>> help.
>
> I'm in a similar position.
>
>> So let's see if this will fly, I am blocked at the very
>> beginning: an
>> UART to serial, or as I understand, UART to serial to USB
>> cable is
>> required, is this what I should purchase?
>
> I'm lucky enough to have a real serial port on my PC but the wiki
> page seems to indicate that the UART port runs at 3.3 volts. So do we
> need some sort of level shifter such as the following?
>
> 
> http://www.ebay.de/itm/RS232-Serial-Port-To-TTL-Converter-MAX3223-Adapter-Module-for-PIC-ATMEL-MCU-3-3V-/230682034527
> The photo shows four pins and the label GRxTx3.3v so which of the
> four is not used or how else is it connected?

I think this should be read as G(round) / Rx / Tx / 3.3V

But then, good point about the voltage, had not thought about that.

>
>> Same question to connect the internal USB to external
>
> I've no idea on that either but from the "Hack A10 devices" wiki
> page, I was wondering if that is needed. That page talks about using
> adb to put stuff on an sdcard. adb seems to be some sort of Android
> tool.
>
> Has anyone played much with the Android installation. I managed to
> get the interface into English which only helps a bit as lots of the
> installed applications are Chinese. I got a terminal application
> installed, though.

Yes, I played quite a bit with it, pre-installed applications are 
mostly in Chinese indeed, they are TV / Music streaming apps mostly. The 
Google Android market is there though so it should be possible to 
replace these by equivalent Western apps?

>
> Oliver

Julien