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Devices With USB OTG Host Mode Support

markmelvin edited this page Nov 28, 2014 · 4 revisions

Background Information

USB-On-The-Go (or USB-OTG) provides a means for a mobile device to act as either a peripheral or a host. USB-OTG host mode is extremely useful in the context of the IOIO-OTG because with the right adapter it is possible to power the IOIO-OTG board directly from the USB connector of quite a few modern mobile devices, avoiding the need for an external power supply.

This page provides a bit of background and provides information on where to find a USB-OTG adapter that is proven to work as well as a list of devices known to work in USB-OTG host mode (successfully powering the IOIO-OTG board).

Support for powering the IOIO-OTG directly from a mobile device supporting USB-OTG host mode was first demonstrated by Nadir and Misha and can be seen working in this YouTube video. This is now part of the official code base for the IOIO-OTG and any device supporting USB-OTG host mode (with a proper adapter) should "just work".

What Is USB-OTG and USB-OTG Host Mode?

Rather than duplicate information, you can find a really nice explanation here.

How Do I Know If My Device Supports USB-OTG Host Mode?

Determining if your device has support for USB-OTG host mode can be a little confusing as it is possible for a device to support USB-OTG host mode and contain either a micro-A, or micro-B connector (despite what the standards may say). I have found that a micro-B connector is actually the more common of the two, and once again there is an excellent summary here that should provide the information you need to get things working properly.

The above article mentions this adapter, and I can testify that this adapter does work well with a number of devices. There are other adapters that are known to work (and not work), and a bunch of them are summarized in this thread.

So Which Devices Work?

I have summarized a list of devices I have tested in the table below. Please feel free to add to this list if you know something does (or does not) work.

Device Status Notes
Asus Nexus 7 Tablet Works (Someone confirm v1 or v2?)
Blackberry Passport Works Currently no software support for IOIO-OTG
Blackberry Z10 Doesn't Work
Blackberry Z30 Works Currently no software support for IOIO-OTG
LG Nexus 4 Doesn't Work Running Android 5.0
LG Nexus 5 Works
Motorola Xoom Tablet (version 1) Works
Motorola Moto X (version 2) Works
Samsung Galaxy S4 Doesn't Work Stock AT&T phone, not rooted