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Voice Command Robot — Parallax Forums

Voice Command Robot

jaegjaeg Posts: 156
edited 2011-09-22 11:34 in Robotics
The Radio Shack near here has a lot of old new stock and I bought a VCP 200 voice recognition chip thinking I could make something cool. http://support.radioshack.com/support_supplies/doc15/15364.htm
For the crystal can I use the Propeller to manually pulse it or should I just use a crystal? I was going to give it various modes allowing for use of both the direction commands and the Yes/No commands.

Comments

  • ercoerco Posts: 20,255
    edited 2010-10-13 17:34
    WOW. I bought several of those VCP200 chips from RS on closeout about 15 years ago, I still have some at home. Haven't seen them in 15 years, so you got some REALLY old stock there. They work OK for speaker independent chips of that era. I don't recall them requiring an external crystal. If I can find a schematic I'll let you know. PM me if you don't hear back in a day or two, I have a lot on my plate right now!
  • jaegjaeg Posts: 156
    edited 2010-10-13 19:22
    http://support.radioshack.com/support_supplies/doc15/15363.htm
    This is the schematic that comes with the chip and it shows a crystal and the pinout listing shows 2 pins for the crystal.

    This radio shack is pretty cool. They have bunches of old CMOS ICs and other stuff that you usually don't see at a Radio Shack anymore. How safe do you think buying some is? Or they protected from static in those little blister packages they are in?
  • HumanoidoHumanoido Posts: 5,770
    edited 2010-10-13 20:54
    jaeg wrote: »
    This radio shack is pretty cool. They have bunches of old CMOS ICs and other stuff that you usually don't see at a Radio Shack anymore. How safe do you think buying some is? Or they protected from static in those little blister packages they are in?
    The chips seem to last a long time. I have some from Radio Shack that are 30+ years old and still work. I never had any problem with CMOS in blister packaging. However, the RS origin SN sound chip never worked, even when it was new.
  • jaegjaeg Posts: 156
    edited 2010-10-14 05:39
    Is that the chip that allows you to record 20 seconds of audio and play it back?
  • jaegjaeg Posts: 156
    edited 2010-10-18 17:53
    So any idea about simulating the crystal? Or can I share the crystal with the microcontroller?
  • ercoerco Posts: 20,255
    edited 2010-10-18 18:13
    I haven't found my assembled circuits yet, but I did find the bare chip and that same schematic which shows the 10 mHz xtal. I didn't remember it, but it was a Shack part, so I suppose it wasn't hard to get back then.

    You can get two crystals for $2, fyi, if you can wait for China shipping...

    http://cgi.ebay.com/Lot-2-Crystal-10-000-MHz-10-MHz-HC-49-S-NEW-/220673595815?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item33612bd9a7

    Of course, you're dealing with a 20-year-old chip with 1980's voice technology limitations, so after all this waiting and buildup, you may be disappointed if you're expecting optimal performance like you get with modern technology.
  • jaegjaeg Posts: 156
    edited 2010-10-18 18:26
    I'm not expecting optimal performance. I mostly just want to play around with it. From what I've read it has good percentage of accuracy . Thanks for the info.
  • HumanoidoHumanoido Posts: 5,770
    edited 2010-10-20 02:13
    jaeg wrote: »
    Is that the chip that allows you to record 20 seconds of audio and play it back?
    Jaeg, actually no. It was the sound chip that was supposed to synthesize sound, like a train, siren, etc. I actually tried two chips at two different times in two different projects and it never even squawked once. I may still have the dead chips in the used parts box.
  • HumanoidoHumanoido Posts: 5,770
    edited 2010-10-20 02:23
    The good chip is the SPO256 speech synthesizer - this one is 1980's technology. I have a number of these 30-year old chips and they all work perfect. Maybe these are the lucky ones not to get too many hits by cosmic rays. I actually prefer this chip to most of the new ones because the voice sounds more like a robot. I really don't want my robots sounding like Nancy Drew. :) Another good 80's chip is the VOTRAX chip. I did development work with this chip and it's literally amazing what could be accomplished with it. There was a good speech recognition project using a microphone, some code, and a TS1000, around the same time. You can still pick up a mic and TS1000 on ebay for a few dollars.
  • Duane DegnDuane Degn Posts: 10,588
    edited 2010-10-20 15:28
    Jaeg,

    Have you considered the Say It module? It's the deal of the day today (10/20/10).

    You're limited to 32 custom commands but that should be enough to have fun with.

    It seems to me a "Say It" would be a lot easier to use than other speech recognition hardware. (I'm certainly no expert though.)

    I purchased a couple about a year ago when it was deal of the day but I still haven't used one yet.

    Good luck,

    Duane Degn
  • ercoerco Posts: 20,255
    edited 2010-10-20 18:37
    Good man, Duane, you beat me to it (alerting jaeg about the P'lax DoD)!
  • jaegjaeg Posts: 156
    edited 2010-10-21 05:59
    I can't afford getting it right now. Thanks for letting me know though! This is basically a spare-parts bot I'm working on. I had seen the chip at Radio Shack and thought, "Why not?" So I'm not really willing to buy an parts for it. I'm actually tempted to go and use it as a high level control for a robot similar to the BEAM Hider robot. Kind of like a separate mode of operation it can do or something. Not sure how far I'll get. I'm living in a dorm on campus right now and I go back home every weekend so that's the only time I really get to do any robot construction so progress will be slow.....
  • Tim-MTim-M Posts: 522
    edited 2010-10-21 09:41
    You guys may be interested in the following:

    www.speechchips.com

    and

    www.rcsys.com

    Tim
  • ercoerco Posts: 20,255
    edited 2010-10-21 10:22
    jaeg: just curious where you found those old chips and what you paid for them. What city, was it a Shack outlet, etc. I only paid a dollar or two for each chip when they closed 'em out 15+ years ago...
  • jaegjaeg Posts: 156
    edited 2010-10-23 06:45
    Radio Shack in Rushville, IN. He has a lot of new old stock chips and parts along with new stuff. Really nice guy too. Every time I've went in there we would talk robots. Nice change of pace since the only robot talk I can get around here is on forums.

    I paid $6 for the chip.
  • SpunkyMonkeySpunkyMonkey Posts: 4
    edited 2011-09-20 11:24
    I know this thread is old, but does anyone have the high-detail schematics for the voice control for the vcp200 that could possibly be scanned? I've looked at the radio shack schematics link and tried to enhance it but the quality is so poor. I have a vcp200 I bought in the 80's and in the blister pack it had a fold out paper. I've looked everywhere and can't find it.
  • RS_JimRS_Jim Posts: 1,762
    edited 2011-09-22 06:27
    SpunkyMonkey,
    His RadioShack must be a franchise store as that SKU is no longer valid in the Radio Shack system.
    Jim
  • PublisonPublison Posts: 12,366
    edited 2011-09-22 06:54
    I Gordon's book there is a clear schematic. Page 371:

    http://books.google.com/books?id=0uSILcWppmwC&pg=PA368&lpg=PA368&dq=vcp200&source=bl&ots=IZpseYnBhx&sig=tSr03MzN206vSFPjFAn-t36eyCg&hl=en&ei=wDx7ToeAPejb0QGJh-3aAg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=10&ved=0CFUQ6AEwCTgK#v=onepage&q=vcp200&f=false
  • SpunkyMonkeySpunkyMonkey Posts: 4
    edited 2011-09-22 07:38
    I did try the Gordon book project. I was having trouble even getting the 324 amp to work for some reason. No detectable audio output. I'll have to try it again. Thanks Publison.
  • GordonMcCombGordonMcComb Posts: 3,366
    edited 2011-09-22 07:44
    I wouldn't trust that schematic. Though it's based on the VCP200 spec sheet, I misdrew it -- V+ and Gnd are connected between pins 3 and 4 -- obviously wrong!) I also remember the analog input portion was extremely touchy and noisy. I used to have an errata sheet, but I can't seem to find it now.

    RS has a pinout listing here:

    http://support.radioshack.com/support_supplies/doc15/15364.htm

    and then use my horrible schematic to fill in the gaps of the partially readable one on the Radio Shack site.

    If possible, though, it would be best to find a good scan of the original schematic. I'd advise using a prepackaged modular amp, and not try to make something on a breadboard. the LM324 portion of the schematic on the RS site is legible enough if you'd like one more crack at it.

    -- Gordon
  • SpunkyMonkeySpunkyMonkey Posts: 4
    edited 2011-09-22 08:03
    Wow! Thanks Gordon. I wish I still had my sheet on the original I bought. Growing up in the 70's and 80's Radio Shack was heaven. That sheet is about the only thing I've lost. When I tried your schematic I wasn't really paying attention the first time. But my AA battery pack was very attentive :)

    Hopefully someone has the original. I'd really like to see the detail. Particularly around pins 16 - 20.
  • GordonMcCombGordonMcComb Posts: 3,366
    edited 2011-09-22 09:30
    What you're seeing on those pins are jumpers to ground plus pull up resistors. I dimly remember trying the combination I provide, dispensing with the jumpers, and connecting to ground or V+, in order to simplify the circuit. I left the 10K's to V+ in there in case that affected the power consumption of the chip. You might not need them.

    I'll say that the chip did NOT work on a running robot. There's too much motor noise mechanically coupled to the microphone. You're better off with a wired microphone. If you have one, a wireless microphone might help, and the receiver will likely contain an amp.

    The Say It Module is a good alternative, and apart from mine refusing to understand the word "look" -- with any accent! -- it works fine. Again, the microphone should not be attached to a mobile bot. No amp is necessary, and it connects to your host MCU via simple serial.

    The VCP200 is a fairly simple device at its core. You might be able to approximate it by using a 7-band EQ chip, like this one:

    http://www.sparkfun.com/products/10468

    With some clever coding, you can then program your bot using whistles, grunts, groans, screams, even simple words -- the trick is that each word should be fairly distinct in the sounds you make to speak it. It doesn't recognize speech as much as it does tonalities. Animal sounds seem to work pretty well! (And it's a riot with kids.)

    -- Gordon
  • SpunkyMonkeySpunkyMonkey Posts: 4
    edited 2011-09-22 11:34
    I'm not too worried about noise. This is more experimentation because my son is starting to get into electronics and I have so many old chips I think he would have fun learning about. I just wanted him to be able to turn on leds and then go into the latching stuff. He is going through the old 200 in 1 kit from the 80's and I also have the 300 in 1 when he finishes that. Better to learn on TTL and make your mistakes there before going to CMOS in my opinion. It is hard to kill a TTL chip.

    Thanks for your help Gordon. I'm going to give it another shot after I'm done with a serial interface to an old pocket computer.
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