absolute insane thought...

[chivas]

With the recent talk of navigation updates and yada yada, it got me thinking.

Is there anyway (adapter or something) to replace the DVD drive unit for a USB? I know the optical drive reads the files and then send it to some wiring etc etc... well, it just reads the data from the DVD. what *if* we can put all that info on a USB drive and feed that info the corresponding wires in the drive so the MKIV (or even MKIII, II, I) can benefit from this "conversion" (read: hack job).

Thoughts?

[e30cabrio]

Good luck. (no sarcasm).

[ants_oz]

Is certainly a technical possibility.

The navigation programmatic functions are undertaken within the drive itself, so you would need to replicate those (hardware and software infrastructure, as well as application programming).

Then, after that, it's just maps.

There are considerations - what are the limitation of the inputs (from the head unit) and outputs (to the head unit), but from a technical exercise perspective, its sure possible.

Above my pay grade, but would be really keen to hear of any technical analysis.

[chivas]

Originally Posted by ants_oz

Is certainly a technical possibility.

The navigation programmatic functions are undertaken within the drive itself, so you would need to replicate those (hardware and software infrastructure, as well as application programming).

Then, after that, it's just maps.

There are considerations - what are the limitation of the inputs (from the head unit) and outputs (to the head unit), but from a technical exercise perspective, its sure possible.

Above my pay grade, but would be really keen to hear of any technical analysis.

thought:
the actual spinning drive is nothing more (i think) than an optical reader with a motor that feeds the data on the disc to some.... pin/wiring... whatever. replace the actual physical drive with a USB input unit; power is there and the pins to send data in/out will need to correspond to where the dvd drive was pulled from. all other software will not be touched/needed. the actual software runs on ROM so we can upgrade the MKIV with a disc and ditch it after the upgrade as the ROM has been completely up reprogrammed.

[chivas]

http://www.xoutpost.com/articles/all...-nav-unit.html

this is a start but i don't see anywhere on the board that designates which pin does what.