Hacking a Hotel POS Tablet - How Hard Can it Be? -- Episode 556

A lot of dedicated Sales Hardware (POS) is made from standard consumer tech. Clem has encountered a hotel tablet on sale and wondered if it could easily be repurposed for general Android tablet use? Without a normal USB port he has to sniff the proprietary connector with an oscilloscope, perform a factory reset, and even break open the tablet to verify its pinout! Will it boot into a usable version of Android, or is it indeed custom locked down hardware?

Bill of Material:

Product Name	Manufacturer	Quantity	Buy Kit
Digital Oscilloscope, Multicomp Pro Oscilloscopes, 4 Channel, 200 MHz, 1 GSPS, 40 Mpts	Multicomp	1	Buy Now

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mayermakes over 3 years ago in reply to colporteur +1

i now have a € 60,- calculator.

colporteur over 1 year ago

Great share Clem. I've stood in line at recycle shops holding junk (wifes description) with the focus your hack introduced.
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Femirichie over 1 year ago in reply to Mathyousee

I am issues with suitepad after using it for some while it does to back this saying on my image
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Mathyousee over 2 years ago

I have about a dozen Crestron TSW-732 touch screens which run a meeting-room-reservation client. The TSW-732 has an 800x480 screen with a capacitive overlay for touch. I would be willing to send a few in, if you think you could use them. They run on POE, and they have a 4GB microSD card inside. I opened one up and accidentally cracked the glass on top. It seems to have a 40-pin 0.5mm FFC/FPC ribbon cable connecting the screen, and a 6-pin FFC/FPC for the touch layer glass. It also seems to have a separate backlight layer with two pins for power. There are 10 buttons on the sides of the screen, which gives it a GameGear feel in my hands. It also has a stereo speaker module near the bottom of the device, so there is probably a sound chip on the PCB. It also has an IR proximity sensor.

When I tried to power one up, it said it was waiting for the server. When I removed the microSD card, it refused to power up. I don’t know if it is usable as just a screen with something like an AdaFruit TFP401 HDMI/DVI decoder, or if the software can be modified to run Android. I’m kinda stumped. I’d love to see someone run it with a Raspberry Pi ZeroW and make it into a tablet.

Let me know if I can send them to you.

Here is a link to the spec sheet on the Crestron website: https://www.crestron.com/getmedia/8fda2c7f-1f95-4401-9e2a-f22b790d4661/ss_tsw-732_1
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colporteur over 3 years ago in reply to mayermakes

Thanks for the response. I will keep my Ti66 calculator. I was looking for an upgrade.
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mayermakes over 3 years ago in reply to colporteur

i now have a € 60,- calculator.
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colporteur over 3 years ago

Great post Clem, enjoyed the attempted hack. It reminds me of something I would try.

What did the surplus set you back? OR how much is that really nice calculator cost you?
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mayermakes over 3 years ago in reply to DAB

does not look like digging alone will help, its so locked down, I think its better to salvage components and build something new with the parts.
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DAB over 3 years ago

Good jog Clem,

It looks like you will have to dig deeper to find secrets of the device.
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