Re: scavenging ccd chips

Allan Adler (ara@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx) writes:
Allan Adler <ara@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> writes:

I heard from University Optics. They sold the last of their parts for the
kits about 5 years ago.
How different is it to work with more recent ccd chips than it was to work
with chips such as the TC211 and TC245?

Someone mentioned scavenging ccd chips from an optical scanner. I found
a HP Officejet 4110 All-in-One Printer-Fax-Scanyer-Copier on the street,
with no cables and have been wondering what to do with it. Maybe I should
try to scavenge a CCD chip from it?

Wouldn't it make far more sense to keep it intact, and try to make
something of it that way?

If you extract the CCD, you'll then have to put it in a circuit, and
you'll have to find data for the device before you can do that. Keep
it intact, and you have the scanner to play with. Remote the the
actual scanning pickup if needed by extending the wiring (though that
may cause problems if the device isn't intended for driving long lines)
and then work around that pickup. Can you make something of it? Is it
worth it? Learn from it by observing the circuit in operation, bring
that scope back that you find waiting for the garbage truck and use it
to study the pins of the ICs while in operation (though be very very careful
to not short the pins with the probe).

Use the real product and then start research. How do the scannes work? How
do digital cameras work? Go to the library, or do a search, and start with
a basic definition and then as the work continues you can get to the more
complicated.

How do you mount a lense against the pickup? Is there enough definition that
there will be some value from it, or is the density of the pickup reduced
because of what it's intending to scan and the fact that the pickup can
be physically moved over the page? Remember a digital camera has the pickup
static so whatever its density it uses it all to take in the picture, using
the lense to concentrate the thing to be photographed on that pickup. If
you have to have the pickup physically move up and down to scan someone's
face (instead of a page) then that will take for quite a while to "take
a picture" since physical movement is limited in speed.

Only when you've learned from it can you then decide whether there is
any future to it all or not. If there's a future, that's when you think
about extracting just what you need.

You may find you've learned all you want out of it, and then drop the
whole project. Or you may find buying a digital camera is far more
reasonable than trying to build one from scratch. Or, the information
and skill you gather from this project will set the stage for something
more grandiose.

Michael



.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: (OT) Storm
    ... Yb400 batteries and the scanner is charged and I can ... plug it into the pickup if I have to. ... Laying low and staying in. ...
    (rec.radio.shortwave)
  • Storm
    ... Yb400 batteries and the scanner is charged and I can ... plug it into the pickup if I have to. ...
    (rec.radio.shortwave)
  • scanner not listed
    ... hi i have just loaded suse 9.0 and it pickup that i had a scanner but it was ... not listed on the list it is a canoscan D646U ex is there a way of setting ...
    (alt.os.linux.suse)