ODROID-XU4 and ODROID-XU4Q Boards Going for $49 (Promo)

ODROID XU4 Black Friday

ODROID-XU4, and its fanless ODROID-XU4Q sibling, are neat little single board computer packing lots of power into a small form factor. I tested ODROID-XU4 with Ubuntu 18.04 recently and was relatively impressed by how well it worked considering it’s an Arm platform, as there were still admittedly some limitations. But as they say at $59 a board you can’t beat the price. Except you can actually do, as Hardkernel is offering both ODROID-XU4Q and ODROID-XU4 for just $49 during Black Friday here and there. If you’ve already forgotten about the board it is equipped with a Samsung Exynos 5422 octa-core Cortex A15/A7 processor, 2GB RAM, eMMC module support, Gigabit Ethernet, USB 3.0, HDMI 1.4, and more. You can read the full specifications here. The only difference between ODROID-XU4 and ODROID-XU4Q is the latter comes with a large heatsink, while the former is cooled by fan. If you are currently shopping […]

Open Source Hardware SpiderSoM System-on-Module Features Intel MAX 10 FPGA

aries embedded spidersom

When embedded systems companies offer a system-on-module (SoM) and a baseboard, the later is usually open source hardware with all design files provided so that customers can leverage the work for their own baseboard, but files for the SoM are normally not released to customers. Intel MAX 10 FPGA based Aries SpiderSoM and SpiderBase change that, as the company has decided to release both the module and carrier board KiCAD designs under a CERN OHL v1.2 license. SpiderSoM system-on-module specifications: FPGA – Intel MAX 10 FPGA in F256 package from 10M04DC to 10M50DA System Memory – Optional 128/256/512MB DDR3 DRAM for 10M 16/25/40/50 FPGAs Storage – Optional 4 MB SPI NOR, optional 4 GB eMMC flash 230-pin MxM2 edge connector with 178x FPGA GPIO pins, including 13 LVDS transmitters and 54 receivers Misc – RTC with battery backup,  programmable clock generator and PLL, with optional external reference input Power Supply […]

Orange Pi AI Stick 2801 Neural Compute Stick SDK & Documentation Released

How to use Orange Pi AI Stick SDK

We covered the launch of Orange Pi AI Stick 2801 neural compute stick a few days ago, the first easily available Gyralcon Lightspeeur based USB stick, and noted that while the hardware was there, we had no details about software development kit and documentation at the time. I’ve got some more information now. First, the company release an English presentation about the neural stick, and while it’s not technical documentation, it provides insights into what it is capable of, and an overview about the workflow. More importantly, Shenzhen Xunlong Software also released Orange Pi AI Stick SDK and user manual for x86 PC, as well as cat/dog data and pre-trained models to get started. However, if you want to perform training with your own data, you’ll need to purchase the stick plus PLAI model transformation and training tools sold on Aliexpress for $218 plus shipping, that’s $69 for the hardware, […]

Android 9.0 TV Boxes Now Available for $45 and Up (Promo)

A5X Max Android 9.0 TV Box

If you own a fairly recent official Android TV device, you should probably expect an update to Android TV 9.0 in due time, but for TV boxes running Android instead, I was not aware of any models running Android 9.0 so far. Having said that, with Android 9.0 support announcements from Amlogic and Rockchip made earlier, we knew Android 9.0 boxes would eventually become reality, and according to listings on Geekbuying, there are at least two Rockchip  RK3328 TV boxes running Android Pie: A5X Max going for $45.49 shipped with coupon A5XMAX9, and X88 MAX+ selling for $49.99 including shipping. Both boxes come with similar features except X88 Max+ comes with 64GB flash and dual band AC WiFi, so I’ll have a look at A5X Max specifications: SoC – Rockchip RK3328 quad core Cortex A53 processor @ 1.5 GHz with Mali-450MP2 GPU System Memory – 4GB DDR3 Storage – 32GB […]

Diskio Pi 13.3″ DIY Tablet Kit for Raspberry Pi – Take 2 on Kickstarter

Diskio Pi with ODROID-C2 Board

Diskio Pi was a DIY tablet kit for Raspberry Pi, ODROID-C2/XU4 and other compatible boards with a 13.3″ Full HD display that launched last year on Kickstarter. But the project failed likely due to the high costs (350 Euros and up for early bird pledges without battery nor SBC) and an elevated funding target of 400,000 Euros. But the team did not give up, worked on reducing costs, improved the design, and recently relaunched Diskio Pi on Kickstarter with a more achievable 52,096 Euros target, and reasonable pricing with rewards starting at 189 Euros including VAT. Diskio Pi “basic” DIY tablet kit content and main specifications: Display – Innolux 13.3″ TFT/IPS display with 1920×1080 resolution, WLED backlight + 10-point touch capacitive panel connected over USB 2.0 Video control board with HDMI 1.4 to eDP converter, stereo amplifier, and 2x 1W speakers Daughter board with Genesys USB hub, 9V to 5V/4A […]

Microchip Releases Tiny SAM R34/R35 LoRa SiPs and Development Kit

Microchip SAM R34

Microchip has been offering RN2483 & RN2903 LoRa modules for respectively 868 MHz and 915 MHz frequencies for several years, but the company has now announced SAM R34 and SAM R35 LoRa systems-in-package (SiP) that offer similar functionality in a much smaller form factor. Both SiPs integrate a Microchip SAM L21 Arm Cortex-M0+ based MCU,a sub-GHz RF LoRa transceiver operating from 862 to 1020 MHz, and a software stack. That means you don’t need different SiP depending on the region, and the only difference between SAM R34 and SAM R35 is the latter does without a USB interface for lower cost. Microchip SAM R34/R35 key features and specifications: MCU – Arm Cortex M0+ MCU @ 48 MHz System Memory – Up to 40 KB RAM including 8KB LP-RAM Storage – Up to 256 KB Flash for application code and stack Wireless Connectivity 862 MHz to 1020 MHz coverage Up to 20 […]

HiSilicon Hi1620 Server SoC to Features up to 64 Arm “Ares” Cores

Huawei Hi1620

A few years ago we covered Hisilicon D02 server board powered by the company’s Hip05 SoC with 16 or 32 Arm Cortex A57 cores. I had not seen any updates since then myself, but HiSilicon has released new “TaiShan” Arm based server SoCs every year, and recently unveiled Hi1620, the world’s first 7nm datacenter Arm processor, featuring 24 to 64 Arm “Ares” cores clocked at up to 3.0 GHz. Ares cores are supposed to greatly improve single thread performance in order to compete with x86 server chips. HiSilicon Hi1620 processors specifications: CPU – 24 to 64 Ares ARMv8.2 cores clocked at 2.4 – 3.0 GHz Cache – L1: 64KB I-cache, 64KB D-cache; L2: 512KB private per core, L3: 24-64 shared among cores (1MB/core) Memory – 8x DDR4 channels up to 3200 MHz Interconnect – Coherent SMP interface for 2S & 4S, 3 ports up to 240 Gbit/s per port I/Os […]

ODROID-H2 Intel SBC Launched for $111

ODROID-H2

Hardkernel introduced ODROID-H2 single board computer with an Intel Celeron J4105 processor last month. The first Intel board from the company supports up to 32GB RAM via two SO-DIMM sockets, as well as M.2 NVME SSDs and SATA drives, and exposes various other ports such as HDMI 2.0 and DisplayPort video outputs, dual Gigabit Ethernet,  and more. We already knew most details about the board, except for the price and exact launch date. Hardkernel launched the board today for $111 on their online store with shipments scheduled the start on November 27th. Here are ODROID-H2 specifications again with letters in parenthesis referring to the location on the photo below: SoC – Intel Celeron J4105 quad core processor @ up to 2.3 GHz (real frequency) with 12EU Intel UHD Graphics 600 (A) System Memory – Dual-channel Memory DDR4-PC19200 (2400MT/s) supporting up to 32GB RAM in total  (B) Storage – M.2 PCIe […]

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