The Ware for September, 2005, is shown below. Click on the image for a much larger view.
Yes, we all probably know immediately what kind of board this is by the looks of the prominent SIM card slot. However, the question is: what’s the model and make for this board? This one is actually the insides of my device; I had to do a little cleaning on it tonight to keep its performance up, and I love looking at how they put these things together…so compact, and so clean! And look at those fine-pitch blind vias in the upper right hand corner. They look like they are laser-drilled…
Sorry this month I was late! It’s been a rough month work-wise. Next month should be better, hopefully. I want to catch up on my printer hacking too, and there are some other neat projects that I’d like to play with soon.
Hi,
First time here. What i know so far:
AD6529 -> ARM7 based controller for GSM phone.
AD6521 -> Voice Codec, I&Q interface.
70Pl254 -> Some kind of memory, likely some ram, because there is a battery close to it.
SEC 434 -> It is likely a memory, maybe a flash.
Si4200 ->CMOS RF front-end for multi-band GSM
Si4133 -> CMOS radio frequency synthesizer (GSM/DCS 1800/PCS 1900 voice applications )
Hmm, judging by the rather wide form factor I’d say it’d have to be something along the lines of a Treo/Blackberry/Razr. The AD6529B says it supports “Bluetooth, IR, camera, display, SD/MMC card, USB and more.” (although we can’t get our hands on the datasheet without an NDA!). Clearly a high-end phone in the $250+ category.
SHA1: baae18bccb4fcc3b25a086265c61f961c5e446e6
Would it be the ASUSTEKs J101?
It might be a high end phobe, but i don´t think it has camera on it. I can´t see a CCD, and i not seeing a flat cable /or connector to other board. It could be on the other side, but all the basic systems are in this side of the board. There is no need for other board, only for the keypad and the display.
I would like to see the other side of the board.
In case there ware any doubt :) the Analog Devices chips on the right of the picture are part of a GSM/GPRS chipset. So it’s a board from a Phone!
Ok, slightly less obviously this phone seems to have 4MB of RAM, that’s the K1S321611 on the top right, its 2Mx(16 bits wide). It’s got 32MB of flash it’s also a 16bits wide chip, that’s the 70PL254J00BAWA2 on the right too.
At the other end of the board, there is an AWT6146, this is a quad band RF power amplifier. Which might tell us about the capabilities of this phone is it Quad-Band? (i.e. works all over the world)
There looks to be a mini USB and a 3.5mm Jack connector (top left) of the photo. The jack could be for an integrated MP3 player or maybe just for the hands-free kit. There would probably have to be some kind of memory card slot on the back for it to be an MP3 player too. On the opposite side of the board there is a wheel, and a button, presumably this is for navigating menus etc.
Scaling from the SIM slot, the board look to be (very) approximately 97mm tall and 62 wide. So it is quite a fat phone :)
So we are looking for a Quad-Band GSM cell phone that supports GPRS, has 256KB of ram and 32MB of flash, has USB and a side mounted scroll wheel. And is quite fat.
There might be more memory on the back, so the spec could be a bit higher. But this does not look like a bran-new model, still a good one though.
You would think all this info would help narrow it down a model, but there are just so many type of cell phone out there, I’m giving up looking.
What I want to know is:- What is the chunky circular Nickel-Gold plated tracks for at the right of the picture? It looks like it has some mechanical wear and could be a slip-ring for getting a signal out to a bit of the phone that rotates, maybe the aerial, or a rotating keypad? Or maybe it’s just a big button conntact?
Bunnie man, check your mail or shoot me a message cause you’re running out of time for Shmoocon.
It’s a blackberry in the [67]2xx series would be my guess. The large chunky black thing on the lower left is the scroll wheel and the microswitch just to the right is the “back” button. Another key identifying feature are the 4 largish pads just under and to the right of the sim slot which are the battery connection. Also of note are in the upper right the headphone jack and the mini-usb port.
The chunky circular tracks in the middle of the right side of the board are probably for the “in holster” switch. The blackberry external case has a small chunk of rubber at the bottom of it (the right of the board as shown) and I would guess that that forms a switch which closes when the blackberry is inserted into the holster which has a magnet in it which pulls/pushes a piece of metal and conductive rubber to open/close that round switch. If you have one, you can verify this by taking a magnet and bringing it near the bottom of your blackberry and watch it turn off the screen to save power.
As people have already identified it as GSM and 32MB flash that reduces the model numbers some, possibly the 7290? I don’t think there’s any clear way to tell if it’s a B/W or color (6200 vs 7200).
Since Mike has published the second correct guess, here’s my full response.
echo “Blackberry 7290 on Cingular” | sha1sum
Full thought process:
Headset jack upper left, mini-USB connector, thumbwheel lower left
SIM slot = GSM phone
Analog Devices AD6529B: DSP + ARM7, complex SoftFone part
Analog Devices AD6521: GSM/GPRS codec, interfaces to Othello chipset
AWT6146 Quad Band amplifier
http://www.anadigics.com/products/addrefs/Datasheet/AWT6146_Rev_1.0.pdf
What service providers are using phones with this chipset?
http://www.analog.com/en/content/0,2886,772%255F858%255F20339,00.html
Bunny lives in CA, so which of the cellphone providers offers a quad band phone?
http://onlinestorez.cingular.com/cell-phone-service/cell-phones/phonedetails.jsp?tabId=specs&id=cdsku9870018
Ok, does this model line up with this board?
http://www.blackberry.com/products/handhelds/blackberry7290.shtml
Thumb wheel, quad band, GSM, headset jack, USB. Yep.
I am working on reverse engineering a Nokia 5190 just for the hell of it and to see what useful purpose I could use it for. The problem, I have no clue on how to trace to lines sandwiched between the multi-layered boards. I was thinking of some sort of “X-ray like” scanner that could send a beam of some sort through the board and a sensor on the other side of the board be able to detect what has parts of the beam were able to pass through the board. It is somewhat like your watermark scanner on this will scan think copper line. Not quite but kind of. Perhaps there is an easier way, perhaps you know. Do you have any advice?
Most 4-layer boards do power and ground in the middle planes so you can just match up vias by scanning both sides of the board. Boards designed for security purposes may intentionally “bury” some traces, but that usually just gives you a view as to what parts are security-relevant. Since these are usually busses, you solder onto pins on one chip on the bus and get all the signals.
Hi, I work for a phone manufacturing company. Lets start by saying that the boards we use are all 8 layer, not 4. Tracing the hidden wires and vias will be tough if not impossible.
And it dowes look like a blackberry :)
its a rim, 7260? I just took apart a 7230 for parts, and bluetooth is a givaway.
I ran across your site while just surfing around, wanted to say hi and I like the blog.
if this thread is still alive, wonder if anyone can point out which of the chip/s or component/s on this bb 7290 board that might be the highest suspect if the symptom is an unceasingly searching for networks but never able to lock onto any found networks for any length of time.
most times, it just keeps searching but nothing happens..cant find any signals..
rgds
ron
anyone welcomed to email me directly at singolfer@yahoo.com
another symptom i encountered on another same board. battery runs out real quick..within 1/2 day even on standby.. which chip/s or component/s could be the highest suspects? thanks
singolfer@yahoo.com
I just want to say thank you for taking the time & effort for put this web page together! Please visit my site too:
Hmm… sweet! [*../nice_site2.txt*]
I’m glad I found your site! It’s nice! Please visit my homepage too:
This section contains tactics …
They are similar because they are sketchy and morally dubious ….
Is there a way to locate someone locally to try this?
One important thing I love about blogs is the fact that they spark a thought in my brain. Once that happens, I feel like I need to write a comment expecting it is interesting to other people. For the reason that there are so many blogs and forums with totally different points of view, they challenge your understanding. It really is at these moments when you have useful insignt many others might not have had, together with the blogger himself/herself. I find myself coming back to your blog mainly because you have plenty of terrific insights and also you are actually at this a long time, which is very exciting and tells me you know your stuff. Keep provoking ideas in others!
Posts like this make the time spent over the internet somewhat enjoyable :)
anyone heard about the new 3d phones they are coming out with? pretty ctrazy stuff. Wont even need glasses. Thoughts?
man 3d is taking off. they now have touchable 3d and they are coming out with 3d screens that you dont need glasses for. insane stuff. i still feel its a bit of a gimmick though.