Following the launch of the $49 APC ARM11 board as a Raspberry Pi alternative last year, VIA has just announced two new APC products based on a WonderMedia WM8950 Cortex A9 processor:
- APC Rock – $79 Android board
- APC Paper – $99 Android PC with a case made of recycled cardboard
Both products run Android 4.0 (ICS) and mostly share the same specifications:
- SoC – VIA WonderMedia WM8950 ARM Cortex-A9 @800Mhz + Mali-400 GPU
- System Memory – 512 DDR3 SDRAM
- Storage – 4GB NAND Flash + microUSB slot
- Video Output – HMDI (Rock & Paper) and VGA (Rock only)
- Audio I/O – Audio out / Mic in combo
- Ethernet – 10/100 Mbps
- USB – USB 2.0 (x2) and microUSB (OTG)
- 20-pin ARM-JTAG header
- Extra GPIO, SPI and I2C busses on a header
- Dimensions (Board) – 170 x 85mm (W x H), Neo-ITX Standard.
APC Paper is basically the same as APC Rock, except it lacks VGA, but comes with a cardboard casing. $20 for a piece of cardboard seems expensive to me…
Documentation, mechanical files, firmware, as well as bootloader, and kernel source codes are available at http://apc.io/library. The ARM11 to Cortex A9 means it will be able to run Ubuntu and other variants (ALIP, lubuntu…), although performance will be limited by the lowly 512 MB of system memory.
APC Rock can be purchased now for US$79, and APC Paper is expected to begin shipping in March of 2013 for US$99. You’ll also have to add between $16 to $25 for shipping depending where you live.
Jean-Luc started CNX Software in 2010 as a part-time endeavor, before quitting his job as a software engineering manager, and starting to write daily news, and reviews full time later in 2011.
Support CNX Software! Donate via cryptocurrencies, become a Patron on Patreon, or purchase goods on Amazon or Aliexpress
