OT: Playing with sounds on toys.

[905shmick]

Anyone ever "modded" any kids toys? My son has some toys that I was thinking of changing some of the sounds and songs on.

Kinda like the singing fish mod

[bcorkery]

The closest I've come is to send Fisher Price voices I've recorded for their toys. I think if you can gain access to the chip, you should be able to load your own profanity onto it.

I also did some of that point of sale audio so when you walk by the motion sensor the message is played. Again, I just sent the company the audio and they loaded the chip.

Don't hate!

[Tom Roberts]

As Bill said, you'll need to access the chip. That would require a software and hardware package typically furnished by the chip manufacturer, and the program written for the toy to insert the audio in the proper place, and a hardware device to burn the audio into the chip.

Good luck.

Thomas

[905shmick]

Tom,

Any suggestions on where to start? Sounds like you've got some experience with this.

FYI - This is the toy I'm interested in modding.

http://www.vtechkids.com/product.cfm...ver_Phone/298/

[Tom Roberts]

Any suggestions on where to start? Sounds like you've got some experience with this.

It was a long time ago for me, and the only thing I can think of would be to take the toy apart and find out which company manufactured the chip. It is probably made in China, but they may have a local rep that can help you out. IIRC, there were really only a handful of companies that make these chips that store audio. Most of that work has gone oversees and automated because the newer chips have greater storage capacity.

Any particular toy however, may have something written into the code to prevent the files on the chip from being compatible with anything else.

Be aware that toy companies are very tight with security of their proprietary information, to the point of being ridiculous. So if you called them and asked what chip they used you would probably get nowhere.

Thomas

[905shmick]

So basically it's probably easier to find some DIY kit and just use the buttons and speaker on the toy to interface with the DIY kit.

[Tom Roberts]

So basically it's probably easier to find some DIY kit and just use the buttons and speaker on the toy to interface with the DIY kit.

I guess, if there is such a thing. And probably much less expensive. I've seen toys that record and playback what you speak into them. You can probably chase down that sort of chip in a kit.

Thomas

[bcorkery]

In the case of the Point of sale, motion sensitive thing, the company had a bank of multi-pin slots you could pop chips into, with an interface to their computer. I delivered the file on a floppy, I think it was as an 8bit wave file and they pushed in 1 chip to test it out, made the transfer, removed it from the slot and put it into the motion detector to see how it worked.

The level had to be adjusted since there were no controls on the machine but after that they started copying the file onto hundreds of these chips and sending them out to the manufacturer. It was a very interesting experience.

I imagine it's similar with toy chips. But what Tom said about the toy companies is true, industrial espionage is a huge deal with them.

[905shmick]

Think I might try out one of these.

http://www.robotshop.ca/4d-systems-e...nd-module.html

[Tom Roberts]

Cool. Let us know how that works out. I'm curious.

Thomas