8 replies to this topic

[Traveling Tech Guy]

Hi,
A friend handed me his "old" (2+ years old) Garmin Nuvi (not sure of the model number).
I took it apart, having nothing better to do with it. I found the following:

• Touch-enabled color LCD (image 1)
• GPS sensor (image 1)
• SD card reader (image 2)
• Unidentified component - possibly CPU + storage? (image 2)
• Speaker w/ connector (image 3)
• 3.7v / 1.25Am rechargeable Li-Ion battery (image 4)

My question is: is there anything in here I can re-use/re-purpose to work with my N+?
Is it even worth the time and effort, or should I just look for similar 'virgin' components?

Thanks,
Guy

Attached Files

•  Garmin1.jpg   382.96KB   28 downloads
•  Garmin2.jpg   451.5KB   28 downloads
•  Garmin3.jpg   289.44KB   20 downloads
•  Garmin4.jpg   379.77KB   13 downloads

[Chris Seto]

Can you get numbers from those BGAs? I wanna see what processors they use on those...

[Traveling Tech Guy]

Can you get numbers from those BGAs? I wanna see what processors they use on those...

Sorry Chris, not sure I understand what you need. Do you mean the circuit, the components?

Guy

[Chris Seto]

The chips. Specifically, the 2 black ones that lack pins coming out the sides.

[Fred]

The GPS sensor looks much like the EM406 (or probably the earlier EM401). If you can get to the serial connection that could be useful.

Netduinos can read SD cards directly via SPI - you could in theory wire directly from the Netduino to the SD card contacts. If the socket is easy to remove it could be useful.

Whether it's worth the time and effort depends on whether you enjoy poking around with random electronic stuff. I suspect most of us on here do.

[Traveling Tech Guy]

The chips. Specifically, the 2 black ones that lack pins coming out the sides.

Chris,
The writing is kinda washed out here, but I'll do my best. Both chips have the word 'SanDisk' and 'Nand' on them, suggesting they're NAND storage units.

The top one has the following: SDIN2C1-512M and a serial: S73825221 followed by CP0078846
The bottom one: SDIN2C2-1G and a serial: S80925691 followed by CP0112595

So, all in all 1.5GB of NAND. I believe the real "logic" is buried in that silver unit on the SD reader side.
I wonder if it's worth all the de-soldering work, and where would I be able to find re-wiring info for any of these.

Guy

[Chris Seto]

Hmm... I wonder then where the CPU is. Both those chips are for flash then. Must be under an RF shield.

[Traveling Tech Guy]

Hmm... I wonder then where the CPU is. Both those chips are for flash then. Must be under an RF shield.

I keep wondering if it's even worth pursuing. I tried prying that silver cover open - it looked like it was held by flimsy pieces of metal. Boy, was I wrong. It broke the flat screwdriver blade of my Leatherman

Oh well - live and learn.

[Chris Seto]

You should be able to desolder the RF shield without a ton of difficulty if you know how... I'll see if I can get MarkH over to this thread later, he's quite good at getting them off.