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For those of you who have been dying to be able to print or use a USB flash drive with your Moto Droid, this is for you. Well, unfortunately there is no cable manufactured at this time. However, with these steps, the world of USB devices awaits you and your Moto Droid.
Android currently doesn’t offer drivers for USB peripherals, so no USB devices will work currently… with currently being the keyword here. It would be easy enough for developers to get some apps and drivers out there so we can use our phones and hook them up to a printer or a flash drive. Sounds like a great improvement for Android. I know, I for one, would love to print photos and etc. directly from my Droid, how about you?
[via UberGizmo]
Anything that increases the capabilities of my Android phone is a step in the right direction. Just today, I was listening to music, browsing the web, taking pictures of the snowy landscape and adding items to my calendar, all on something that fits in my pocket (Samsung Moment, btw). Android is a tremendous platform, and tricks like this only make it tremendouser!
You can already print wirelessly from your Android phone (at least on the Droid) using PrinterShare.
http://www.printeranywhere.com/mobile.sdf
now all you need is an ethernet to USB cable and you gots higggggh speeeed… jk
so does anyone how much power the phone puts through it’s usb? most devices require atleast some power to run properly. could this be used for like a big external HDD?!!??!!?!!?? get the drivers out there already! it is open source
I agree! This could open up an entirely new accessory line for android phones. Printers, additional storage, full keyboards, etc. Hello developers, get on this one!
Wonder if the linux drivers for various devices would work for something like this? Though I have no idea how you would go about installing them even if it would work.
This will only work if the USB port on the device is USB on the go, if not it only works in slave mode and you are limited by hardware not the software.
This would be nice for gaming purposes. Also, why don’t they just make a program that makes the current cord plug into a printer and think its a pictbridge or something. I can’t see it being impossible. It would be nice to print right from the camera. It would also be nice if the pictures didn’t suck as bad either……….
I just want USB keyboard / game controller support.
Alot of things can be done with the droid and no one is doing anything useful..This is supposto be the ultimate phone and its not being used to its full potential..i for one would love to be able to print things off my phone..i mean come on if you need a document or something for school or a report at the last minute all you have to do is plug it in any printer and away you print…
http://adq.livejournal.com/
This guy succeed to attache a real keyboard, a real mouse that is used as a trackball and a external USB storage device!!
Also he is using a battery USB hub to resolve the power charging needs of some of the devices…..
Unfortunately, it ain’t that simple.
As sjohn alluded to, there are different kinds of USB devices. Originally, you had two: a USB host (uses an “A” connector), like a PC, and a USB target (uses a “B” connector), like a memory stick. This is very different hardware, not just software… there is no possible way a USB target device can act as a USB host. This is also one reason USB is cheap.
After some years, the USB 2.0 spec came along. Everyone thinks of USB 2.0 as just “faster USB”, but that’s only part of the story. They also introduced different connectors, and as well, the “on-the-go” spec. This is a protocol for a device, like a PDA or cellphone or camera or whatever, to act as either USB host or USB target.
The original USB mini-B connector is actually an A/B connector… using the on-the-go standard, it can be host or target. But not every device using it can… more confusion.
Later, along came the USB micro connector. The first was called the micro-A/B connector.. it’s the smaller, not quite rectangular connector. I have this on my GPS and one camcorder. And in fact, the GPS can play music or video from a USB storage device, the camcorder can offload video or play back from a USB storage device. Both can also dock with a PC (or other host) via that same USB jack.
Now we have smartphones and cellphones, and they’re all using the USB micro-B connector. This is practically identical to the USB mini-B, but thinner and a bit more rugged (rated for 10,000 plug/unplug cycles). Technically speaking, that should be “B-only”… but of course, the mini-B wasn’t. So I don’t know for sure.
On the plus side, I looked up the OMAP 3430 datasheet, and that SOC does absolutely support USB on-the-go. So the DROID, at the very least, has this capability in the hardware.